Wine making

[1948berg]

Why stop at wine?
Is there any tradition of making stronger stuff over there?
Lots of people does it over here due to the high prises on alcohol.
Making it,even for for private use, is forbidden, but socially accepted in Norway.
http://www.hjemmeproduktion.dk/images/dest5 2 red.jpg

 

[Paddy]

Alcohol is pretty cheep in the US. If your looking for cheep, 30 pack of 12 oz cans, 30 x 355ml is about 10.50 Euro or $13.00 USD. That's .43 USD a can
Store brand Vodka is cheep too.

Cost is not the real driver is wine making. It cost about $3.00USD to make one 750 ml bottle. When I travel in Europe (Italy), I can often find 2 Euro bottles of wine and it's not too bad! In Venice Italy, they re-fill bottles for 1.5 Euros

 

[smitesmash]

I do some wine and beer brewing. I've mostly given up on doing wine though. when I get the ingrediants from a box, it just does not have the same cooking-artistry experience. And I was only about breaking even with store bought prices, for wine that was not much better than the mid to cheap wine. I just could not justifiy the process.

I still do a lot of beer brewing though. I can buy the ingrediants individually and brew mostly from scratch (I still use DME though).

Most of my wine equipment is being used for mead at the moment. I can't buy that for love or money around in my area. and its really good. The only problem is that you have to let it sit for at least two years before its ready to drink.

 

[kossetx]

Gunnar, I have a friend who is from Oslo. He made rum and vodka by the caseloads while he moved back to Norway for a while. He had a 60 gal copper still in his basement. He said it was the only way to make ends meet because everything is high in Norway. I believe that's why he is living here in the States again. I think the powers that be were closing in on him.

 

[gsganzer]

They're opening a "make your own wine store" in my town. Anyone try this? It isn't cheap, I think I found someplace on their site that they charge between $300 and $600 to make your wine.

 

[Paddy]

Smitesmash,

I know what you mean by from the box it doesn't seam so creative. A friend makes wine and he never reads the instructions. He's buying boxed grape juice. He adds all sorts of fruit and wood (oak and orange tree wood). His turns out great. I have followed the "rules" of the kit so far tasted. They are good but I would not say great. If I lived in wine country, I'd buy grapes and crush them myself.

Paddy

 

[oscer]

Smitesmash,

I know what you mean by from the box it doesn't seam so creative. A friend makes wine and he never reads the instructions. He's buying boxed grape juice. He adds all sorts of fruit and wood (oak and orange tree wood). His turns out great. I have followed the "rules" of the kit so far tasted. They are good but I would not say great. If I lived in wine country, I'd buy grapes and crush them myself.

Paddy

Why not plant a couple vines?

 

[smitesmash]

I've been seriously thinking about that for quite a while. One of my big issues is that I don't know the differnece between a grape vine and a radish. (neigther of wihch grow too much around here)

Apparently the area I live in is only supposed to grow some of the sour white grapes used in some of the dryier white wines, whereas my preference is toward the fuller reds.
I will probably skip out on the "wines" and ferment my own stuff for a while. there is no end of things to ferment around in the area. Apples (cider), pears (perry), blackberry, honey, plums, dandeylion, maple.
and if I ever get bored of this, I can always go back to beer.

Gonna need a wine cellar though, gotta put a back hoe on my list of things I need to buy.

 

[HomeBrew2]

Great thread! And like RobertN's great thread about making hard apple cider, I was inspired. I'm always looking for a heathful breakfast drink ... other than beer. The attached pic is a gallon of "store brand" pasturized grape juice (no additives other than ascorbic acid) with an inoculation of 1/2 tsp Nottingham ale yeast. It seems pretty happy to me

1948berg, there are many of us here in the "states" that know absolutely nothing about the art and rewards of making one's own delicious distilled spitits ... because it's illegal

 

[mjarrels]

Right now I'm getting a long neck bottle of tanduay rhum and a couple bottles of coke cola for about P100 Phillippine peso's ($2.00). Can't make anything at home (Virginia) for that amount of money.

mark