The Dangers of Bulk Aging Your Homemade Wine

Some people feel that bulk aging can be dangerous. What I mean when I say bulk aging is aging your homemade wine in a carboy or barrel rather than in a bottle. What bulk aging offers is a more consistent batch since all of your wine is aged together.

Many commercial wineries bottle age their wines, and some of the lower cost wines are aged in large stainless steel vessels. Some of them even try to age their wines in 6 gallon carboys.

I did a survey of home winemakers and found that most of them bottle aged their wines and some aged them for three months to a year. That’s not to say that some of them didn’t age their wine in oak barrels, but this type of aging can be expensive.

So if you’re considering aging your wine in carboys, there are some things you must consider. A bung fits into the neck of a carboy but even with an airlock on top doesn’t provide a hermetic seal. There’s still some room for microbes to get in. So don’t leave a large space in the neck of the carboy that can allow these microbes to flourish. Make sure that you add some reserve wine back into the carboy as the wine evaporates. You can either reserve some of the wine you’ve created, some of the same type of wine you made before, or you can buy a bottle of wine of the same type and blend as the wine ages.

Keep a close eye on the sulphite levels too. You need to keep them up if you’re going to age your wine. You can check the levels using a sulfite testing kit. You should check every other week for long-term aging.

When storing your carboy, make sure it’s in a cool, dark place that is free of vibrations. Check the carboy often to make sure that the airlock is on. Make sure the airlock is sanitized and contains sanitized water and doesn’t go dry. I made the mistake once of not paying attention to my wine and let the airlocks go dry – most batches were fine although I did have to pour two down the drain as they had both spoiled. Not good considering I’d been aging them for over a year and a half!

If you follow these simple steps, you shouldn’t have any trouble aging your wine. In fact you can save a lot of space by waiting to bottle your wine as you need them.

To your wine making success!

Potassium Sorbate – Do You Need to Add it to Your Homemade Wine?

Every single wine kit that I’ve ever purchased comes with a package of potassium sorbate. The instructions that come with the wine kits tell us to add sorbate at the same time that we are to add potassium metabisulfite. However, many winemakers balk at adding sorbate to their wine and don’t always follow instructions.

Why the balking? Many believe that potassium sorbate adds a bubblegum flavor to wine, or as some call it, “kit wine taste.” So why do so many advise to add this stuff to our wines after the fermentation has been completed?

Well, let’s bust one common myth right at the outset. Potassium sorbate does not kill yeast. Many believe that the purpose of this additive is to kill yeast. What sorbate does, at the correct quantity, is slow down and stop the reproduction of yeast. It will not stop yeast from continuing to ferment a wine, nor will it prevent a fermentation when it’s added to juice before the juice has been inoculated with yeast.

Primarily, it is used to prevent a re-fermentation of the wine if there is enough residual sugar left in the wine after it has been bottled or if a wine has been sweetened after it has fermented. You may have heard stories – or perhaps it’s happened to you, where a home winemaker has bottled their wine, only to start hearing corks popping out of the bottles six months later. This is because there was enough sugar in the wine for some yeast cells to feed on and begin reproducing. As they feed on the remaining sugar, the produce more alcohol and carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide build up in the bottles creates enough pressure that the corks are forced out of the bottles and the wine inside blasts out.

Dry wines that have fermented to very little or zero residual sugar and that will be bottled without a sugar based sweetener added do not need any additions of potassium sorbate. If there is no sugar for any remaining yeast cells, there will be no re-fermentation by yeast.

If the winemaker is making an off-dry or sweet wine, potassium sorbate should be added to the wine to stabilize it. Generally, the rate of 1/2 teaspoon per gallon is the rule of thumb.

If you’re new to winemaking, I’d recommend that you use the potassium sorbate additive in your wine until you are very comfortable using a hydrometer to measure the specific gravity and understand the relationship of sugar and yeast. Wine kit makers don’t want to take any chances that you may not have fermented your dry wine completely, and therefore instruct that you add sorbate at the same time as sulfite. Potassium sorbate is more effective when used in conjunction with potassium sorbate.

Wine Making Kits For Homemade Wines

Wine making and fermenting your own homemade wine takes a lot of time and effort. It doesn’t necessarily equate to being a complicated process, the procedure is actually very simple but the whole wine making process will require an extended period of toiling.

Most people would define wine as an alcoholic beverage made from fermented grape juice. It is a popular definition because grapes are the usual base fruit or juice used in making wines, but according to some wine connoisseurs , Wines are basically any alcoholic drink produced from any non-toxic fruit juice (Strawberry wine, Pear Wine, Apple Wine, etc.)

Wine making consists of very simple steps that any person with the right equipment could do. As long as you have the basic wine making kit, you could produce wine whenever you desire.

Making homemade wines if, done properly, could produce good quality wines that may taste just as good as any commercially available wines. And since you are the one making your own drink, you could experiment on the acid levels, alcohol levels and the sweetness of the beverage that would suit your taste.

If you’re planning to produce your own homemade wine, you will need a few equipment necessary for the fermentation of the juice. The list of equipments consists of the following:

1.A primary (primary fermentation vessel) which most of the time comes in the form of a plastic bucket or pail. This is where you will mix your concoction together with your ingredients.
2.A sieve or a mesh bag or a nylon straining bag where you will put your chopped, crushed or sliced fruits during flavor and aroma extraction.
3.Sterile cloth that will cover your bucket during the primary. This will prevent contaminants and bacteria from getting in to your concoction and at the same time, it will allow the unwanted vapors from your mixture to escape.
4.A siphon hose which you will use when you are going to transfer the wine from the primary to the secondary fermentation vessel. You will also use this when you are going to rack your wine.
5.A secondary fermentation vessel, most of time, Carboys are used as secondaries because it is easy to airlock and it is more resistant to scratching.
6.Air locks which is vital for the anaerobic fermentation process that the mixture must go through to produce wine.
7.Bottles which will be used for aging the wine.
8.Corks to secure the wine inside the bottles.
9.Hydrometer, which is one of the most important equipments you will need because this will measure the specific gravity of the wine.

The listed items is actually the basic wine making kit. Some of the tools you will need that were included on the list could be replaced by or substituted by common household items. Just remember that the substitutes you will use are sanitized and sterile.

Using tools that haven’t been properly sanitized may cause spoilage in the wine you are making.

Of course, there are other tools and equipments as well that you could use to ferment your own homemade wine. But some of those are already for advanced wine makers. As a beginner, the list should suffice until you have become a true fanatic of homemade wine making.

There are additional ingredients or additives as well that you will require when making your homemade wine. These ingredients may not be bought from regular convenient stores and may be difficult to find. If there is a Wine Maker store near your place, then you are in luck, otherwise, these essential ingredients will be difficult to obtain.

These additives required in wine making are:

1.Sulfites, the most common sulfite used is the Campden Tablet
2.Acid Blend or Citric Acid
3.Tannin
4.Pectic Enzyme
5.Potassium Sorbate
6.Yeast Nutrient
7.Sugar
8.Yeast
9.Wine Finings

All of these ingredients are essential to wine making. If one of these is absent or missing during your wine making process, it is likely that the fermentation will produce a bad batch of wine or the fermentation will not be successful at all.

Be sure that before you start making your wine, you have the complete ingredients along with your complete tools.

Now that we have listed the complete basic wine making kit you will need to ferment your alcoholic beverage, we are going to give you a simple step by step instruction on how to turn your fruit juice into wine.

1.Fruit preparation – from the moment you pick out and choose the fruit you will be using as your base fruit, it is already part of the wine making process. This also entails the chopping, slicing and crushing of the fruit which will be put in the straining bag or sieve in the primary.
2.Pour water in the primary where the bag is. Whether to use cold or hot water will depend on the specific instructions of that specific recipe you are making.
3.Adding the Ingredients – All additives that were listed, except the wine yeast and the yeast nutrients will be added in the concoction. These should be mixed until all the ingredients have dissolved.
4.Cover the primary with the sterile cloth and leave for at least 24 hours depending on recommended specific gravity required as specified in the recipe.
5.Transferring to the secondary – When you have reached the recommended specific gravity, you will now have to transfer the must into the secondary, add the yeast and yeast nutrients, stir then cover with air lock.
6.Racking – When the wine have reached a specific gravity as indicated in the wine making recipe you have, you will need to transfer the wine to another secondary vessel. You are to leave the lees or the sediments found at the bottom of the Carboy. These lees are dead yeast cells. Prolonged exposure to it may cause the wine to taste bad.
7.Rack again – After a recommended period, you may check your wine’s clarity. If the wine is already clear and has no more sediments at the bottom of the vessel, you may proceed to the next step. Otherwise, you will have to rack again and again until the wine becomes clear and free of lees.
8.Bottling – once the wine is already clear, this is will indicate that the fermentation process is over. You may now transfer the wine in smaller bottles.
9.Aging – this step will require a really long time. It may take six months to a year before the wine is aged enough to have that good taste. The recipe or wine book you are following should have a recommended period of time for the aging process. Once it has aged long enough, you may now taste your wine to see if it still needs to age longer.
10.Enjoying – At this point, your wine have already aged long enough and already tastes like expensive wine. It is now time to enjoy your home made wine.

The listed steps are the general steps in fermenting homemade wine using wine making kits. If you will notice, it was mentioned repeatedly that some procedures will depend on the recipe you are following. This is because the amount of time, additive or ingredients required may vary from one fruit to another or from one variety of fruit to another.

Each fruit and each variety of fruit will have its own characteristics and its own level of acidity, sweetness and the like which may affect the variation of needed additives.

Now, if you find these steps complicated, you may want to start with fermenting fruit juices i wine kits. There are Wine kits available now that sells concentrated juice together with pre-measured ingredients to add and an easy to follow recipe or instructions to homemade wine making.

These wine kits are expensive and don’t come with the wine making equipment but if you really want to learn, this may be the simplest and easiest way to learn since everything is already laid out for you. Just so you’d get the feel of fermenting wine.
But if you really want to experience first hand what it’s like to make wine from choosing the fruit to enjoying the beverage, then you better start looking for fully ripe fruits now.

If you are wondering what kind of fruits you could ferment and turn into wine, and what flavors wine kits offer, we suggest that you visit the blog site, Wine Making Kits. It has additional information of the process of making homemade wine and some information on the available kits in the market.

Common Wine Myths (and Why They’re Not True)

Wine is a complicated, intricate drink, and for that reason alone, there are many myths surrounding the ancient beverage. You can’t believe everything you hear, though, and that maxim holds especially true for wine.

One of the common myths surrounding wine has to do with the specific type of wine known as Chianti. The myth states that Chiantis are, by definition, a cheap house wine that will offer quality only in proportion to its low price tag. While Chiantis are generally thought of as those bulbous bottles obscured in straw holders, Chiantis of the modern age are no longer held to those standards. Now they are altogether higher quality and higher priced. Cheap bottles can still be acquired, but in general, Chianti has made a more upscale name for itself.

Another myth floating around wines is that red reigns supreme in Italy. While it’s true that Italy certainly produces far more bottles of red than white wines, that does not mean the quality of the latter is lacking. In fact, even the regions of Piedmont and Tuscany, which are renowned for their red wine production, have a number of high quality and well-received varieties of white as well.

Lastly, what list of myths would be complete without one about the infamous category of cooking wines? For this myth, we turn to the popular wine variety of Marsala. A very common ingredient used for cooking, perhaps best known in the Italian dish chicken Marsala, this wine is not simply handy in the kitchen. While some lower quality grades of the wine are best kept to the broth and sauces, there are plenty that are a pleasant and delightful sipping wine alongside your meal. Of course, as wine producers mature and change, so do the wines, and with that in mind, Marsalas only look to improve even further. As with many wines, it’s best to use price as your guide if you’re feeling a bit lost in the dark. The higher the price, it’s a safe bet, the higher the quality will be. You can also ask for suggestions from your local wine stores or from your sommelier or waiter while dining.

Keep these myths in mind the next time you’re ordering a bottle with dinner, and remember that you can’t always believe what you hear about wines. Although, if nothing else, they might make interesting dinner conversation for you and your dinner companions.

Homemade Wine – 3 Myths Exposed About Wine Making at Home

Imagine never leaving your house to buy wine ever again. You sit back and enjoy a freshly made batch of homemade wine and think of all the money you are saving. You can experience this wonderful feeling if only you did not believe these 3 myths about wine making at home.

Myth #1: It Is Very Hard To Do

People have this misconception that the process of making wine is extremely difficult. They think they have to stand in a barrel and stomp on grapes. This is wrong. Wine making in fact is a very easy process and once done a few times it becomes incredibly enjoyable. Lots of people make it into a huge hobby. There are even wine-making kits available that include all the equipment you need. The only one difficult part about wine making is that all the equipment needs to be completely sanitary. If not, then there is a big chance that bacteria can grow. So keep everything clean and you will get a great batch of wine.

Myth #2: It is Expensive

Wine making is actually pretty cheap. If you bought all the supplies separately then it can get a little pricey. However, if you bought an all in one kit you get everything you need. In a single batch you can make 5 or 6 gallons of wine. That equals out to almost over 30 bottles of wine! Do the math on buying 30 bottles separately and it will cost you well into the hundreds. Also, think of how long 30 bottles would last. There really would be no need to go out and buy any more wine.

Myth #3: It is Going to Taste Gross

This is completely wrong! Homemade wine taste so much better than bottled wine. Wine vineyards add their own ingredients whether they are natural or other unnatural ingredients. At home you can make your wine completely natural and chemical free that the result is going to be one delicious batch of wine. There are multiple wine recipes that you can make that incorporate different types of fruit. Once you become comfortable with the wine making process you can customize the wine to your liking. That means, that you will no longer have to find that perfect bottle of wine, because you are making it right at home!

If you can really just get over these 3 myths about making wine, you will start to create some spectacular wines. Everyone you know will love to drink them and you will save buckets of money. Wine making at home is very fun and easy to do, it is not expensive, and the wine tastes just as good if not better than bottled wine.

Wine Making – The Basics Facts Of Wine making

Wine making as the products of human creativity has been used over a period of more than four thousand years.

A sparkling wine that’s available in the Champagne region of France it is named after that region.Other regions in France that are into making good wine are Bordeaux and Burgundy. The finest Italian wines come from Tuscany, while the best American wines come from California.

when wine is produced the grapes are squashed and the juice taken out.The juice has yeast and sugar. The yeast ferments the sugar and bit by bit alcohol is produced. Nevertheless, the alcohol regularly is the same and every wine has its own flavor. This also depends on the type of grape used and the circumstances in which fermentation occurs.

Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir grapes make full, rich red wines. Merlot grapes produce lighter, softer red wines. Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc grapes make white wines.

As a practice in wine making, good wines generally have their year of production on the bottle. This is called the vintage. Some years produce better wines than others.

Almost all the red wines get better in quality as they get older, some even as long as ten years. And most of the red wines are not made available until about two years after they were made. Although, most white wines do not improve in quality with aging except champagne and sweet dessert wines.

Wines can be enjoyed like any other drink, but they are often consumed with a meal. For full flavored meats such as beef choose a full red wine, like a Zinfandel, Cabernet or Syrah.

For lighter meat like pork or lamb a medium bodied red like a Merlot or Pinot Noir is usually a good choice.

Chicken and fish are in general accompanied by white wine like Chardonnay. This wine will also go with a non-meat dish, as would a Zinfandel or Riesling.

White and sparkling wines are best served when they are cold. A red wine should be served when it is slightly below room temperature. Both wines are best left to stand before opening. Some red wines have sediment which should stay at the bottom of the bottle, and an agitated sparkling wine is often much too eager to leave the bottle.

White wine can be served immediately after removing the cork, but a red wine gain from ‘breathing’
for about thirty minutes after the bottle is opened. For optimum result cautiously pour the red wine into another container. This make allowance for greater surface area of the wine to breathe and leave the deposit behind in the bottle. If you do not have a decanter, pour half a glass from the bottle and let both stand for 15 to 30 minutes before serving.

Wine Making – Nothing Less Than An Art

Wine Making is an art. The preserving process of wine makes all the difference to the flavor. The process of storing is gradually changing to stainless steel barrels from the age-old traditional oak barrels. Steel barrels have better longevity and are less expensive to maintain.

Before getting yourself a classic bottle of wine, you might have never given a thought as to how much time or years that it might have taken to come to your table or bar. Wine making is a long and delicate process, an art, in fact.

The entire process of making it correctly, from choosing the grapes to storing the new wine for aging, is a delicate process and requires a lot of care and attention. A slight deviation in the proportion of ingredients, or less or more exposure to air, may render it tasteless. An important part of the wine-making process is the aging of the wine. Aging can make all the difference to the taste of it. Some of the finest wines in the world are the oldest and the best stored ones.

Good wine barrels and stainless steel drums are crucial for winemakers, as the quality of the equipment has a key role to play in turning out an excellent wine, as wine is a natural and perishable product. For large-scale production, good wine barrels are needed, as well as properly constructed wine cellars. There are many wine barrel makers who provide all types of barrels that are required for wine making, like oak barrels and stainless steel drums. Often, these companies also produce other types of drums such as stainless steel nitric drums, overpack drums, seamless stainless steel drums and salvage drums.

Traditionally, it was stored in oak barrels which imparted a special oakiness to the wine that is greatly appreciated by wine lovers all over the world. Though the oak flavor is still preferred in wine, this steel has become a welcome change from oak barrels as the new medium for storing wine.

Stainless steel wine barrels are a smart choice for all stages of wine storage as their special designs are high on integrity, have better longevity, are less expensive to maintain and have pure materials. Stainless steel wine barrels can be used for years at a stretch. Oak barrels, on the other hand, face the problem of a short life span, as the inherently acidic wine corrodes the wooden barrel. As steel barrels are neutral, the flavor of the wine is not affected. Moreover, any desirable flavor can be imparted to the wine. For instance, for the classic oak flavor, oak can be added in the form of chips, planks or powder. Steel barrels are also used for experimental batches of wine, which requires a neutral storage container in order to see the impact of the experimentation on the wine.

Unlike wooden barrels, these barrels are easier to clean and do not absorb the flavor of its contents as stainless steel wine barrels do not share the porous characteristic of wood barrels. Wine requires a controlled exposure to air, as the taste of the wine has to be preserved. Exposure to air leads to the deterioration in the quality of wine. Stainless steel barrels are the best, because the air exposure can be controlled as required to make the perfect barrel of wine. Hence, it is not surprising that more and more wineries are switching to stainless steel wine barrels because of their stable chemical and physical properties.

Price Ranges of Wine Making Kits

If you’re new to wine making, or even if you’ve made a batch or two of homemade wine already, you may be wondering why there’s such a vast range of prices when it comes to wine making kits. There are a couple good reasons for this that we’ll take a look at here.

First is simply the selection of grape. The higher the price of the kits means the better quality of grape that was used in its creation. This is no different than wines you buy at your local liquor mart.

Another reason, and perhaps the most significant, is the level of concentration the wine juice has. Some kits supply a can of concentrate that is approximately one and one half quarts, which will produce five gallons of wine. You’ll need to add over four gallons of water to these kits.

Grape concentrates are simply grape juices that have had the water removed through a vacuum process. The more concentrated the kit is the more water you’ll have to add to get to five gallons, and in some cases you’ll even have to add additional sugar. These kits tend to be the least expensive, but most would agree they produce wines with less body and structure than kits made with more juice.

Some kits are all juice, and these will be the most expensive ones, but will also yield a wine more true to form than a concentrate kit. Both methods represent approximately the same amount of grapes. One is just more concentrated than the other.

So as you’re just starting out and developing your wine making skills, a can of concentrate that is two or three times less expensive than a kit of all juice may be the way to go. Concentrates can produce wines of good quality and some people opt to stay with concentrates exclusively, balancing the fun and novelty of homemade wine making with the cost savings that can be significant.

If you’ve honed your wine making skills and have made a few batches of wine from concentrates, but desire a wine with more body and character, perhaps a bucket of pure juice, not concentrated at all, is what you’re looking for. You can make high very quality wines with these types of kits.

There’s a kit for every level of desire, taste and budget, so whatever your choice, get started making homemade wine today!

How To Make Wine At Home Using Wine Making Supplies

Making wine at home is not difficult, and it is a very rewarding hobby. In this article, we will go through the equipment needed and all the steps you take to make wine from fruit – grapes, apples, plums, pears, peaches, or whatever fruit you have.

You can also make wine at home from a kit, usually using grape concentrate, but the results are very variable, and it is much more satisfying to make wine from fresh fruit.

You probably thought of home wine making because you have your own fruit, or have been given some, or because fruit is in season in your area and you can get it very cheaply. Making wine is a great way of using fruit when you cannot possibly eat it all, or make all of it into jam, or freeze it all.

I have made wine successfully from many kinds of fruit, including grapes, apples, apricots, plums (many varieties), quinces, pears and peaches. Make sure you discard all rotten or suspect fruit right at the start.

Assuming you have your fruit ready, here are the equipment and supplies you need. A large food grade plastic tub or stainless steel pot to squeeze or press juice into. Needs to have a lid. An electric juicer (not essential if you can squeeze or press the fruit by hand). A glass fermentation vessel like a jug, carboy or demijohn (also called a ‘jimmyjohn’) with an airlock. These are available at brewing shops. It is usually better to use several smaller vessels (of one gallon capacity) than one large one. A plastic tube for siphoning. Yeast (available in packets at brewing shops and some supermarkets). Sugar.Sterilizing solution or tablets. (Not essential – you can clean equipment with boiling water.)

With this all collected, follow these steps to make your wine.

Get your juice

People starting out with home fruit wine making often wonder how much fruit they actually need. Here is a tip I have found works – you need enough juice to fill the glass fermentation vessel you are using – your carboy or demijohn. Some recipes advocate watering your fruit juice to make up the quantity you need, but never do this. Use pure juice and your wine will be full-flavored and satisfying to drink.

You will either press the fruit, squeeze it by hand or use an electric juicer. If squeezing by hand (soft plums for example) you will need a large stainless steel or plastic container. If you have hard fruit like apples or hard plums, and electric juicer is a good investment if you don’t own one already. You can also cut up the fruit and boil it in a little water to extract the juice, but this degrades the flavor of the final wine. If you have grapes, you can try trampling them with your feet in the traditional manner. Some fruits can be cut up and left to soak for a few days in a little water to extract the flavor and color from the skin.

Some fruit, like apples, throw a tremendous froth after juicing and you will have to siphon the juice out after the froth has risen to the top.

Note that mixed fruit wines are very successful. If you have only a few apricots but a lot of apples, mix the juice to make up your gallon.

Add the sugar

Some fruit juice, like very sweet grape juice, will not need the addition of any sugar. Most other fruit wines will need sugar to be added. I normally add 2 pound of sugar to make up one gallon of fruit juice. If you prefer a drier wine, you can reduce this amount. This is the reason it is better to use several smaller glass vessels when starting with home fruit wine making – you can vary the amount of sugar in each (record this by writing on the carboy with a felt pen); when you eventually come to drink the wines, you will know which style between dry, medium and sweet that you prefer. More sugar also means more food for the yeast, and so more alcoholic wine at the end of the process.

Add the sugar by warming the fruit juice slightly in a stainless steel pan, and stirring in the sugar to dissolve it.

Add the yeast

Sterilize your carboy or demijohn with sterilizing solution, or boiling water. Put the sugared fruit juice into your vessel. Dissolve the powdered yeast in a little warm water and sugar in a cup, and leave it for a few minutes to activate. Then add the yeast to the fruit juice. Put your air lock on the vessel.

Fermentation of the fruit juice should begin soon, and you will see bubbles in the air lock. This means the yeast is converting the sugar to alcohol.

Watch and wait

Put your fermentation vessel in a warm place if possible. Ideally you should leave the wine fermenting for nine months to a year. If you drink it after only a month or two it will taste rough and poor; leaving it for about a year will let it mellow out – this really makes a difference. As fermentation goes on, you will notice a white layer appear at the bottom of the fermentation vessel. This is formed by dead yeast cells. You can ‘rack’, or siphon the wine into a new vessel, which stops the wine becoming tainted with a yeasty aftertaste. You should do this once a month.

Bottle your wine

If the wine has not clarified, and you want it to be fully clear before bottling, leave the vessel in a very cold place for a week or so, and the clarity should improve.

When the fermentation has stopped (no bubbles coming through the air lock) you can bottle the wine and cork the bottle. Remember to sterilize the bottles and corks before you use them. If you will be making a lot of wine, remember to label all the bottles with details of the fruit, the yeast variety used and date of bottling. If you make a superb batch, you can then try to replicate it in following years.

Drink up!

Few people can resist drinking a bottle at this stage. But most fruit wines are at their best up to two years after bottling, so you can put a few bottles aside until you have some friends round, or have something to celebrate. There’s nothing quite like drinking your own wine, made the way you like it!

Basic Wine Equipment Tool Kits

There are several different pieces of wine making equipment to be used in order to achieve a great batch of wine. I will name the pieces of equipment and what each item is used for.

1)    You will need a primary fermenter–this item is used to begin your winemaking. It will be your first container used and it should have a solid cover over it.

2)    You need a hydrometer. This contains a SG (specific gravity) scale. It measures the liquid volume or density in comparison with water. It can also be used to measure how much alcohol the wine has in it..

3)    You will need two glass or plastic carboys. Glass is best. The wine will be stored in one of these carboys and the other is for the purpose of transferring the wine.

4)    You also need tow measuring cups–one large and one small. The large measuring cup needs to be at least two quarts. It is used for measuring and pouring your water. The small one (at least 8 oz.) is used for measuring the ingredients that are added in smaller amounts. Along with your measuring cups, you should have some measuring spoons ready.

5)    Another piece of wine making equipment you need is a funnel (large and plastic) to add cleaning elements or any ingredients you will add to the wine.

6)    You will need a long handle spoon (plastic preferably). Your batch will be at least 5 gallons. It is very difficult to mix anything in a large container with a short spoon.

7)    You need to get a wine thief–this instrument is used to extract wine samples for tasting purposes.

8)    Another piece of equipment necessary is a siphon hose (a plastic hose which is PVC grade). You will use this to transfer the wine into the carboys from the fermenting container.

9)    Lastly, make sure you have a gallon jug. This is for containing the solution you will need for the sanitation of the wine making equipment. Any of the equipment should always be scrubbed before use and after use.

Now, this is all the equipment you need for winemaking. Of course, after the wine has been made you need wine bottles in which to pour it. The bottles must have corks and must be sanitized. There is a wide range of bottles to choose from–different ones for different wines. You can find any wine making equipment you need at locations for online ordering or at brick and mortar stores that sell this type of equipment.