Make a False (Second) Wine August 21 2014, 0 Comments
Looking to stretch your wine grapes even farther this year or want to try something new? Make a "second" or "false" wine with your grape skins. Here's how it works:
- Crush your red wine grapes and carry out the primary fermentation as normal.
- Press the juice from the skins and drain into the secondary fermenter as normal.
- Instead of tossing the skins, put the skins back in the fermenter and fill with water up to 1/2 the amount of wine you just pressed. That is, if you initially made 6 gallons of wine, add up to 3 gallons of water. If you want a little more color and body, add 1 liter of red grape concentrate per gallon of water.
- Add 2.5 lb of sugar (you may want to boil the sugar in the water you added in step 3 and cool down to room temperature before adding to skins), 3 tsp. acid blend, 1 tsp. yeast nutrient, and 1/8 tsp. wine tannin per gallon of water you added.
- Stir and cover. You don't need to add yeast, because the skins have lots of yeast left over from the first fermentation.
- Make the wine in the same fashion as your other wines.
