After years of trying I think that this year I have managed to locate a
source of Sangiovese grapes becoming available tomorrow.
I must say that it was not due to my hard work, although I have spent hours
and the past searching the net for info. A chance connection on the Wine
press NG came up with another Yorkshire guy who had done all the hard work.
So tomorrow I hope to do my first small buy -- 10 cases of grapes at £5 a
case -- which should get me enough to make 5 gals ( imp) with about 50 lbs
left over in my freezer for adding to some of the kit wines I make.
It will be my first venture into "real grape" winemaking but I am looking
forward to the experience. Although only a small first go, I suspect that my
flat (apartment to you in the US) will be inundated with grapes, juice and a
general huge mess. At least it will be easier than destemming elderberries!

I will update this in a couple of days time!!!

--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire,
England, United Kingdom.
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Good for you! That is something I have not tried yet, but I keep thinking
about it.
Darlene ;o)

"Pinky" > wrote in message
.uk...
> After years of trying I think that this year I have managed to locate a
> source of Sangiovese grapes becoming available tomorrow.
> I must say that it was not due to my hard work, although I have spent
> hours and the past searching the net for info. A chance connection on the
> Wine press NG came up with another Yorkshire guy who had done all the hard
> work.
> So tomorrow I hope to do my first small buy -- 10 cases of grapes at £5 a
> case -- which should get me enough to make 5 gals ( imp) with about 50
> lbs left over in my freezer for adding to some of the kit wines I make.
> It will be my first venture into "real grape" winemaking but I am looking
> forward to the experience. Although only a small first go, I suspect that
> my flat (apartment to you in the US) will be inundated with grapes, juice
> and a general huge mess. At least it will be easier than destemming
> elderberries!
>
> I will update this in a couple of days time!!!
>
> --
> Trevor A Panther
> In South Yorkshire,
> England, United Kingdom.
> Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
>

An afterthought or two

1. Destemming elderberries.
It is certainly elderberry season now in England. I am not going to do any
this year but I have tried different methods in the past. The two methods I
have used are
a. Freezing the whole lot, complete and then destemming the frozen berries
quickly into containers. I actually used this for a couple of seasons and
then gave it up. The main reason for giving it up was that I had too much
rubbish ( small twig remnants/unripe berries)carrying over into the
containers.
b. Destemming them while freshly picked
I have eventually decided that this is the method I prefer. I do it by hand
and it is a total pain! But I sit at my sink and destem by hand -- quite
gently -- with a big sack by my side to take all the stems. When complete I
wash all the berries in a gentle flow of fresh cold water. It is not really
a washing but a method by which I can remove unripe berries ( essential) and
the very small bits of the stems remaining. I then drain in a sieve and
freeze in old ice-cream cartons.

As I said -- it is a pain -- but I have never had any problem with
retentive slime which raises its head on here occasionally

2. Cleaning out my deep freeze.
In preparation for a new input of fresh grapes on Monday ( tomorrow) I
emptied my 16cu ft chest deep freeze of all of last years fruit.
There was about 26 lbs of an unspecified wine grape ( almost certainly Bacco
Noir), about 8 lbs of last years elderberries and about the same of
blackberries. So I put the whole lot in a bucket with a few litres of
cartonned red grape juice, added a campden tablet solution and a pectin
enzyme. The addition of a kg of sugar upped the sg to 1.075 and I added a
gervin claret style yeast. It is going great guns now and I stir it 2ce a
day.
In a few days time I shall rack it off the fruit pulp and then press the
pulp for juice extraction. I shall then adjust the total volume by addition
of more grape juice ( standard supermarket carton stuff with no nasty
additives) and recalculate the amount of sugar to give me a finishing abv of
12- 13 %
A bit messy but quite a simple bit of maths together with a simple
fermenting regime. Probably drinkable by December 2006 or 2007

This wine making stuff has been fun for over 35 years now and it continues
to be full of surprises. I can usually guarantee a different basic wine
most years by some new combination of fruits.

Never thrown any away yet -- although there was one 5 gallon ( imp) lot that
was bottled with attractive Christmas labels as red wine vinegar ( my fault
but it was good wine vinegar) and was well received by friends ( I did
discard the polyethylene container it was in though!)

Ever on to new things!


--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire,
England, United Kingdom.
Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
"Pinky" > wrote in message
.uk...
> After years of trying I think that this year I have managed to locate a
> source of Sangiovese grapes becoming available tomorrow.
> I must say that it was not due to my hard work, although I have spent
> hours and the past searching the net for info. A chance connection on the
> Wine press NG came up with another Yorkshire guy who had done all the hard
> work.
> So tomorrow I hope to do my first small buy -- 10 cases of grapes at £5 a
> case -- which should get me enough to make 5 gals ( imp) with about 50
> lbs left over in my freezer for adding to some of the kit wines I make.
> It will be my first venture into "real grape" winemaking but I am looking
> forward to the experience. Although only a small first go, I suspect that
> my flat (apartment to you in the US) will be inundated with grapes, juice
> and a general huge mess. At least it will be easier than destemming
> elderberries!
>
> I will update this in a couple of days time!!!
>
> --
> Trevor A Panther
> In South Yorkshire,
> England, United Kingdom.
> Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
>

In article > , Pinky
> writes
>An afterthought or two
>
>1. Destemming elderberries.
Yes, after trying several alternatives, I now always freeze elderberries
on their clusters, then strig them off with a kitchen fork. I'm tempted
to go for a spiced wine with them this year, ginger, cloves etc. I call
that a mulled wine, but I'm not sure if that is correct.
--
Alan Gould. North Lincolnshire, UK.

You are totally incorrect!
A mulled wine is something entirely different in its preparation and
drinking.
It is made from a ready to drink red wine and is NOT part of the process of
making wine
It is always served warm to hot and the best mulled wines are about 1/2
wine and water prepared slowly with cloves, lemon & orange slices, a few
sticks of cinnamon, sugar to taste --but not too sweet please. Definitely
no ginger and then a splash of cognac just before serving
When I lived in the Sultanate of Oman from 76 to 86 I regularly served up to
200 expats with gallons of the stuff prepared slowly over several hours
under the afternoon sun ,over a low heat, in huge Indian style pans and the
"splash" of brandy tended to be several bottles.

But it is easy to do it on a small scale in a saucepan. The danger is to use
too much neat wine -- half water and wine with the spices produce the best
result. And despite the addition of brandy it is not a high alcohol drink
due to the evaporation of alcohol

You have other minor misconceptions in some of your posts on this wine NG.
Beer makers talk about the "mash" wine makers refer to the "must" --
which is the mess of early fermenting sludge which produces amazingly good
wines.
A minor point but I am certainly not a beer maker and being in the home
winemaking hobby for far longer than I like to admit to I do like to
maintain the language!!!


--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire,
England, United Kingdom.
Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
"Alan Gould" > wrote in message
...
> In article > , Pinky
> > writes
>>An afterthought or two
>>
>>1. Destemming elderberries.
> Yes, after trying several alternatives, I now always freeze elderberries
> on their clusters, then strig them off with a kitchen fork. I'm tempted
> to go for a spiced wine with them this year, ginger, cloves etc. I call
> that a mulled wine, but I'm not sure if that is correct.
> --
> Alan Gould. North Lincolnshire, UK.

In article > , Pinky
> writes
>A mulled wine is something entirely different in its preparation and
>drinking.
>
Thanks for that advice. I am not contemplating adding spices to an
existing wine, but using them in making a new one. I have an old recipe
for it which has always turned out well. It is a lovely warming drink to
come home to after a day out in the cold. Elderberry wines are very
adaptable to variations of choice.
--
Alan Gould. North Lincolnshire, UK.

An update.

Got 90 kg of Sangiovese today. They were in excellent condition and think
they were only picked last Friday in Puglia in Southern Italy.

I have just finished destemming the lot by hand -- 4 1/2 hours of messy
work. I have bagged 6 boxes worth and they are now in my 16 cu ft chest deep
freeze. The other 4 boxes worth are in 2 buckets tightly sealed (and mildly
sulphited) till I have recovered enough to press then tomorrow.

I am still vaguely tempted to ferment on the wild yeasts. The grapes looked
so good with a heavy "bloom" on them. But I suspect that I shall use a
packet yeast to have a good kick start.

The wastage on destemming was very small -- I wouldn't say that there was
as much as 2 lbs of waste grapes. Most of the destemming was fairly hassle
free just a trimming of the top of the bunch and then a stripping action
from top to bottom removed most of the grape with a small crushing action as
well. But it was boring and tedious -- though hardly hard work.

I am also informed that there might be some Montepulciano grapes coming to
Manchester wholesale market soon! I shall be there!

This is the first time after many years of searching that I have found wine
grapes available in UK. I know that you in the USA have lots of
opportunities but there seems to be a different mindset here in England (
and I refer to England and not UK).

The real problem is the "Home brew" shops are tied irrevocably to the beer
and wine kit manufactures. Even my good friend Allan ( a Home brew supplier
in Doncaster) will not look towards the real grape market.
It is a slow progress here but there are many ( perhaps isolated) winemakers
who want access to real grapes. It is silly really when the whole of
Europe's over production of wine grapes is so available.

Ah well -- just another of my high horses! --- and I do have a few!


--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire,
England, United Kingdom.
Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
"Pinky" > wrote in message
.uk...
> After years of trying I think that this year I have managed to locate a
> source of Sangiovese grapes becoming available tomorrow.
> I must say that it was not due to my hard work, although I have spent
> hours and the past searching the net for info. A chance connection on the
> Wine press NG came up with another Yorkshire guy who had done all the hard
> work.
> So tomorrow I hope to do my first small buy -- 10 cases of grapes at £5 a
> case -- which should get me enough to make 5 gals ( imp) with about 50
> lbs left over in my freezer for adding to some of the kit wines I make.
> It will be my first venture into "real grape" winemaking but I am looking
> forward to the experience. Although only a small first go, I suspect that
> my flat (apartment to you in the US) will be inundated with grapes, juice
> and a general huge mess. At least it will be easier than destemming
> elderberries!
>
> I will update this in a couple of days time!!!
>
> --
> Trevor A Panther
> In South Yorkshire,
> England, United Kingdom.
> Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
>

"Pinky" > wrote in message
.uk...
> An update.
>
> Got 90 kg of Sangiovese today. They were in excellent condition and think
> they were only picked last Friday in Puglia in Southern Italy.
>
> I have just finished destemming the lot by hand -- 4 1/2 hours of messy
> work. I have bagged 6 boxes worth and they are now in my 16 cu ft chest
> deep freeze. The other 4 boxes worth are in 2 buckets tightly sealed (and
> mildly sulphited) till I have recovered enough to press then tomorrow.
>

Why are you planning to press the grapes before fermentation?

Brian

Ooops ! I meant "crush" and not "press".

I used the grapes from 4 boxes and then had a good foot stomping yesterday
and now have 5 gals+ (imp) in two fermentation bins fermenting away like
mad on the results. Quite cathartic really



--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire,
England, United Kingdom.
Remove PSANTISPAM to reply
"Brian Lundeen" > wrote in message
...
>
> "Pinky" > wrote in message
> .uk...
>> An update.
>>
>> Got 90 kg of Sangiovese today. They were in excellent condition and think
>> they were only picked last Friday in Puglia in Southern Italy.
>>
>> I have just finished destemming the lot by hand -- 4 1/2 hours of messy
>> work. I have bagged 6 boxes worth and they are now in my 16 cu ft chest
>> deep freeze. The other 4 boxes worth are in 2 buckets tightly sealed (and
>> mildly sulphited) till I have recovered enough to press then tomorrow.
>>
>
> Why are you planning to press the grapes before fermentation?
>
> Brian
>