Dan’s Cellar Notes Index

   August 2002:  Country Wine

Summer is the time for making country wines, a term that usually means wine made from fruits other than grapes. Many home winemakers begin by making fruit wines and then move on to grapes or grape juice. That’s how it used to work, anyway. Nowadays, with the popularity of wine kits, I wouldn’t be surprised if some folks have made Zinfandels and Chardonnays, but have never tried making wine from strawberries. If that describes you, then read on!

A wide variety of fruits are used to make wine every year, including some we more typically think of as vegetables! Ever thought of trying zucchini wine? There are dozens of books available offering tips and recipes for making fruit wines, so I won’t get into details, but it’s worth noting some of the important differences between grape wines and those made from other fruits.

Wine grapes are very sweet compared with most fruits. While lots of fruit tastes quite sweet when ripe, it’s very rare that you don’t have to add sugar—sometimes LOTS of sugar--to get the Brix up to the 20 degrees or higher required for sound wine. Recently a neighbor at a gathering was complimenting me on my latest chardonnay, then he asked me—one winemaker to another—how much sugar had I used. When I told him "None," he was incredulous. Obviously he was a country winemaker.

Red grapes (and some white ones) convey tannins to the wine must, while few other fruits contain sufficient tannin. As a result, many country wines lack the structural backbone we look for in good wine. The solution is to add some grape tannin to most batches.

Besides sugar and tannin, most country wines also contain added water. I would almost never add water to grape must, but other fruits need water. Wine can be made from juicy fruits, such as ripe strawberries or tomatoes without water additions, but many folks would consider the resulting beverage to strongly flavored, or too full of body. Squashes, peaches and most other fruits just don’t contain enough water. On the other hand, I once made a wine from ripe strawberries with no water or sugar added. The result was a very rich, sweet, strong dessert wine. I wish I had some left! Another reason to add water is to correct high acidity. Many fruit musts have very low Ph and very high Total Acidity. If the fruit is also strongly flavored, then amelioration with water is the best bet. In all cases, use filtered or distilled water. You don’t want to add chlorine or chloramines to your wine.

Pectin is not typically found in great quantities in our wine grapes, but many other fruits contain lots of pectin, as well as gums or proteins, all of which cause haze. If I think I am using a pectin-rich fruit, I’ll add a little pectinase enzyme to help clarify the wine. Protein hazes require fining and/or filtering, or very long aging, or learning to love cloudy wine. Some fruits contain materials we do not want in our wines at all. Be sure to remove without breaking the stones from cherries, peaches, plums and apricots. They contain cyanide compounds.

The best way to "crush" fruit is to freeze it for a couple days. That breaks down the cell walls. Then squeeze the defrosted pulp out in a cheesecloth bag.

The smallest batches we generally make with grapes or grape juice measure five or six gallons. Fruit wines are very often made up in one-gallon or three-gallon batches. It’s hard to pick (or too expensive to buy) enough fresh blueberries or blackberries or strawberries to make bigger batches. So plan on getting some smaller fermenters.

You say you don’t have an orchard or strawberry patch? The season has passed and you forgot to pick the blackberries? Never fear! Bob and Jeanne stock excellent canned fruit purees from Oregon. Now you can make blackberry wine without scratching your arms up on briars and bringing home ticks in your socks. Enjoy country wines. They can be surprisingly good.