6 August 2007
[Epi 10] TintoTV - Welchs based wine you say???
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We’ve made it to 10 episodes successfully, and we celebrate the 10th with the beginning of our first grape-based wine! We said we’d eventually move to making wine from concentrate (and we were referring to Winexpert types of concentrate), we’d thought we’d experiment with a concentrate that is cheaper and more readily available (before going to the traditional wine kit concentrate): Welch’s 100% Frozen Concentrate – Concord Grape.
Before we go into specifics, within 10 episodes we made it into WineMaker Magazine, and we want to thank WineMaker Magazine for including us in their Aug/Sep 2007 issue in their cellar dwellers section! Check it out, we are on page 10! Also, on page 9, you’ll see a reference to Winestock 2007, a gathering of home wine makers. Stephany and I are going to try our best to be there (Sep 28 – Sep 30 in North Dallas), hopefully we see you there!
OK, now, about Welch’s: we can use Welch’s Concord Grape 100% juice or concentrate because it has no preservatives and no added sugar (the only thing they added is ascorbic acid for vitamin C which we could have added anyway). Check out their product FAQ to learn more about their products. Based on our product code, our concentrate cans were manufactured on April 30, 2007 from the Welch’s North East, Pa plant. So we are making some 2007 Concord! Concord is actually of the species Vitis Labrusca; these varieties are more common for juices, jams, and jellies. They tend to be higher in acid and lower in sugar than the traditional wine grapes Vitis Vinifera.
Since the concentrate is made from unaltered grape juice, we have to measure the specific gravity and total acidity of our specific batch before making adjustments. We ended up adding NO acid blend and adding 1 cup of sugar. Our final SG reading was 1.086 and our final TA was about 0.8%.
Some new tricks we also tried: raisins??? This is also part experiment, but we’ve seen in recipes that you can add chopped raisins to help increase the wine’s body. We shall see. Also, OAK CHIPS!!! So, our home winemaking doesn’t allow for oak casks or barrels, so we have our pick of oak dust, oak cubes, or oak chips. We chose French oak medium-toast chips, sanitized them and added them to our juice/must (you can also add them during the aging stage, but we thought we’d start here).
Our blackberry wine is bulk aging in the 1-gallon carboy and our strawberry wine is at the end of secondary fermentation and is due for racking.
Viewers, have you tried this before? How’d it go for you? Rookies (like us), did this intrigue you? Any questions? Want to say hi??? Please comment below!
Very cool episode!! I never thought about wine being made from Welch’s grape juice. Can’t wait to hear how it turns out. Congrats on making it into Winemaker magazine! What an impressive accomplishment!
— Asad Aug 6 #
Well guys, are you having fun yet… very interesting project; looking forward to see how it comes out.
Good job!
— FS Aug 6 #
Fermentation is happily underway! We’re taking some short clips to show more of the fermentation process. Very exciting to hear the slight bubbling/fizzing of the primary fermentation into the night! (well, it’s not that loud, but we can hear it if we want to :-P ) —> keep the comments rolling!!!
— Nico Aug 7 #
Dear steph and nico i think you are going to be famous . and i want your autograph.
— lauren rodriguez Aug 9 #
Congrats on your spot in Winemaker Mag! That’s how I heard about this blog. Keep it up. You guys should try to tackle a batch of cider for the fall… still researching cider mysself but it seems very similar to wine making minus the beer-like bottling procedures.
— Rich Aug 12 #
Hey there Steph and Nico. My name is Adam and my wife Jennifer and I are new to home winemaking as well. We live in Cincinnati and are bottling our first batch of Merlot tomorrow night. We started with a Winexpert kit and it has been pretty easy so far. My wife loves sweeter wines and I found your site while researching Concord wine recipes. I love the episodes and I plan on starting a batch of Concord wine this week. Keep up the good work and I look forward to seeing the next episode.
— Adam Aug 19 #
Very cool episode. You guys should have a show on the Food Network : )
— Manoela Sep 13 #
Umm, uvas!!! If this goes well for you guys, I’m willing to forego my legal career and help you open up a winery!
— Juan Carlos Oct 3 #
Hey, congrats on your ste. Nice of you to demystify winemaking for beginners. I’m sure you’ve enlightened a lot of people who thought the process of winemaking was too complex to tackle.
Production-wise, it might help to have your lids already removed and your tablets pre-chopped,etc before the video, stuff like that, to avoid slow-spots (dead airtime).
Would have loved to have your videos to watch last year when I first started with a batch of dandelion wine. Which tasted like gasoline 3 months after it was made, and then amazing 16 months later. Time is definately a factor in winemaking.
Best of luck to you both and continued videoblogging success! Winemaking is good for your soul. And you’re demonstrating that to many grateful people, I’m sure.
Erin
— Erin Oct 7 #
Hey guys, I just discovered your site recently and love it! I have always used kits in my winemakeing (5 so far) and never done fresh fruit. I am getting ready to do a batch of fresh fruit but had a question. Can I use a 3.5 or 5 gal bucket to make a 1 gal batch of wine? How about a 6 gal carboy with only 1 gal (approx) of wine? Is all that air bad? I want to start expiermeting with smaller batches. Thanks guys!
— Jeremy Rodgers Jan 3 #
hey Jeremy!!! Thanks for visiting and for commenting on the site!!!
I hope you find the videos useful… we’re also learning but are glad to share anything we know. So, for your question… for a 1 gallon batch of wine, using a 3.5 or 5 gallon bucket is no big deal. Just make sure to watch the SG and as soon as it’s low (1.020 or so), rack it quickly. As the fermentation slows, the protective layer of carbon dioxide it produces thins and you have a lot more surface area for oxidation with a big bucket. One side tip, make more than 1 gallon (like 1.5 gallons) so that you can save the extra to top off. After racking into the carboy, we’ve saved the excess in tiny carboys or bottles. OK, the next part of your question about the carboy – yes, that is a bigger deal. Surface area exposure of the wine is now a bigger deal and you need to minimize it, so a smaller carboy is a must (you can also use like 1 gallon milk jugs for the secondary fermentation, but don’t bulk age in them because the plastic breathes too much). Here’s a link to where I get the 1 gallon jug/carboy: http://www.finevinewines.com/ProdDetA.asp?PartNumber=5190B (you can also get a stopper to fit it as well).
I hope this helps, let me know if you have any additional questions… and if you have any tips for our kit winemaking that we’re currently working with in the latest episodes, let us know!
Cheers,
-Nico
— Nico Jan 3 #
Hi!
— Mike Jan 4 #