HOW TO MAKE PERFECT WINES & SPIRITS
FROM HOME
“How To Make Perfect Wines & Spirits
From Home” is one
of the most detailed & useful
instructional books for wine & drink
enthusiasts everywhere. It is crammed with
step by step instructions to
make just about any wine type from your
own home. Creating your own
fine tasting wines is one of the most
pleasurable and rewarding things in
the world – it is enjoyable, relaxing and
once perfected you can share
with family and friends who will admire
you for your talents. And of
course, with the raw ingredients costs
being so very low it is also a way
of saving a lot of money.
I also invite you to create your very own
signature wine – one that is
suited to your own taste, that has your
perfect delicate blend of flavours.
It is the ultimate achievement!
GETTING STARTED
At one time or another you must have sent
away for something. A "do it
yourself kit," of some sort.
Something that gave you instructions on how
to make, build, or create something.
Something that you had seen, was
important to you, so, you sent away for
it, and just had to do it for
yourself. That's what this article is
about. "Making Wine In
Your Home" is an instructional on how
to make wine. Made
simple, with easy-to-understand
instructions, on how to get the job done.
It requires very little money, and very
little effort. It does require a bit of
time, but this is due to the fermenting
process. When you get right down
to it, everything that’s worth doing
requires time.
The supplies required for making wine,
will be the biggest obstacle. I
have discovered that most kitchens have
enough utensils to more than
"get the job done”.
I should say that making wine is one of
the most satisfying things that
you will ever achieve. Simply because its
really simple, and because time
does all the grunt work for you!
THE BASICS
The simple methods described here are
designed for beginners who do
not know where to begin and for those with
some experience who
frequently run into difficulties and
disappointments.
The making of top-quality wines is
absurdly simple, yet not quite so
simple that we can be careless about it.
Too many people are still
following Granny's fruit mixtures to
ferment of their own accord, leaving
bottles of fermenting wines corked loosely
(the three main causes of
ruined wines), while others are still
preparing their fruits and other
ingredients in a manner which nine times
out of ten produces cloudy, acid
wines that more often than not find their
way down the drain.
If your previous attempts have not been up
to expectations there is a
reason. This will be found with in these
pages as well as the essential, yet
simple, information that ensures success
in making what is, surely, the
finest home product on Earth.
I repeatedly make it clear that I am an
advocate of simplicity. There are
many highly complicated scientific and
chemical aspects underlying
amateur wine-making. A few home operators
begin to dabble in these, so
that, to them, wine-making becomes a
grueling test of knowledge and
skill. Expensive laboratory equipment
becomes necessary as does some
experience in laboratory techniques and
from then on all pleasures are
lost in a worrying maze of technicalities.
And all for no reason at all,
because their wines are no better than
those turned out by the simple
methods and recipes here. However, so that
readers understand the reason
for wines being spoiled, I have included a
few chemical details so that the
very beginner not only knows what to do
and how to do it, but also why
he is doing it in one particular way.
Success is thus assured.
Nevertheless, he will need no knowledge of
chemistry and no more in the
way of utensils than is already available
in most homes.
USING UTENSILS
For making wines with the recipes and
ingredients here all one needs is a
gallon-size glass bottle, an unchipped
enamel saucepan and a polythene
pail. Make certain to use polythene as
some plastics are not suitable. Do
not use aluminum or copper vessels and do
not use an enamel vessel not
ordinarily intended for cooking purposes
as these often contain lead in the
glaze, and this could render wines
poisonous.
Fermentation will not be carried out in an
open vessel such as a crock or
polythene pail in all these recipes unless
you want it to; it is best to
ferment the liquors in a gallon-size glass
bottle-this point will be covered
again later on. A polythene pail is
necessary for only a few of the recipes
and may be disregarded for the time being.
THE ART OF FERMENTATION
This is the process by which the liquors
we prepare are turned into wine,
and we have nothing to do with it. All we
do when making wine is to
prepare a liquid containing substances
that will give a pleasant flavour to
what will eventually become a finished
wine. The yeast we add turns the
liquid into wine for us.
Ordinarily, baker’s yeast and white
granulated sugar are used
by the average home wine maker. However,
over the past few years
wine-making has taken such a hold that
suppliers of equipment and
ingredients offer a wide range of yeasts
specially imported from the wine-
producing areas of
finest wines because they are true wine
yeasts whereas bakers’ yeast in
only bread yeast and should not be
expected to make good wine-
though of course it does, but not to be
compared with the results
following the use of wine yeasts.
Wine yeast is capable of producing
eighteen per cent of alcohol by
volume (32 proof), against the fourteen
per cent of bakers’ yeast.
More and more people are using these wine
yeasts together with invert
sugar instead of household sugar.
Now let us understand what happens when we
add yeast to a prepared
liquor containing sugar.
Yeast is obtainable in the form of a
compressed cake, dried tablet, pellet
or in power form as a liquid culture, and
all are inactive (dormant) at the
time of purchase.
When making our wines fermentation is seen
as a slight frothing during
the early stages and this soon settles
down to a gentle ferment that may
last as long as six months. But if warmth
is given-as we shall see later
on-fermentation should be over and done
with in half that time.
All the time fermentation is going on;
that is, all the time the yeast
continues to reproduce itself, the amount
of alcohol in the wine increases.
But it cannot go on for ever because when
what we call the maximum
alcohol tolerance of the yeast is reached,
the alcohol formed kills the
yeast. It will be seen then that from the
tiny amount of yeast we add at
the start masses of new yeast is made and
all this helps to make alcohol
until the last surviving generation of the
original yeast is finally destroyed
by the alcohol it and all the other
generations put together have formed
since we began. When this happens,
fermentation ceases and no more alcohol is
made. Thus the old tale that the longer
wine is kept the stronger it
becomes is proven a fallacy-or old wives'
tale.
As already mentioned, bakers’ yeast can
make up to fourteen per cent of
alcohol by volume, while wine yeast makes
from fifteen per cent to
eighteen per cent by volume.
To get the maximum alcohol and to get
fermentation over without undue
waste of time we must keep the fermenting
wine warm. The ideal
temperature at which to keep a 'must' is
between 65 degrees F. and 70
degrees F. However, few can manage this,
but if fermenting wines are
kept warm throughout fermentation time,
this will do. Most people use
an airing cupboard for this and it works
well. Others use all sorts of
ingenious devices and these are described
under he heading 'Aids to
Fermentation'. Do not be tempted to keep a
'must' hot during fermentation;
during the warmer weather almost any warm
spot in the kitchen will do,
but during cold weather and especially
during very cold nights it is
always best if a little added warmth can
be given.
When a ferment is allowed to become cold
the yeast ceases to work. This
means that at some time later, if the weather
turns warm, fermentation
begins again. If the wine has been bottled
in the belief that fermentation
has ceased for good, the result is a
popping under the stairs and corks
flying in all directions and the loss of
valuable wine.
(To be continued…)