# Ruby Red Grapefruit wine



## Cxwgfamily (Aug 25, 2017)

Anybody out there have a good Recipe / Procedure / advice for making a batch of Ruby Red Grapefruit wine??? I have about 4 gallons of juice in my daughter's freezer and she is wanting me to get it out. Any and all help will be very much appreciated.
cxwgfamily


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## BernardSmith (Aug 25, 2017)

I suspect that making a very drinkable grapefruit wine will be a real challenge. Remove the sweetness and the acidity may be overwhelming. CJJ Berry uses grapefruits (skin and juice) to pair with grape (white wine) concentrate but you might check out how grapefruits are used in fruit mixes and cocktails and the like - I think it pairs well with vanilla and with pineapple or mango. Oranges pair well with chocolate but I don't know how well cocoa and grapefruit go together 
A grapefruit wine might need to be made with a fair amount of residual sugar and you may need something to cut the acidity. Check out recipes for Skeeter Pee (uses lemon juice). Grapefruit might be a good enough substitute for lemon. 
One last point: people taking certain medications should not eat grapefruits. I am not sure but I think the grapefruit buffers the way that those meds are metabolized by the body and so increases the effects of normal doses - sometimes to the point of life threatening toxicity...But I am not a doctor or organic biologist, so I may be waaaaay off base here, however, if I were you I would make certain that anyone you offer a glass to knows that this wine is grapefruit


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## fruitgirl2021 (Jan 18, 2021)

You could try this recipe: Ruby Red Grapefruit Mulled Wine Recipe | Farm Fresh Fruit Gifts


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## winemaker81 (Jan 25, 2021)

This thread is a bit old so advice won't help the OP ... but anyone with an interest in grapefruit wine might find this recipe useful.

From: [email protected](au)
Newsgroups: rec.crafts.winemaking
Subject: Re: Grapefruit wine
Date: 29 Apr 1998 00:43:49 GMT

Grapefruit wine
4 quarts of fresh grapefruit juice
6 cups of sugar
2 lemons cut into 1/4" slices
8 peppercorns
1 pkg of dry granulated yeast

This wine is best made in a glass container, such as a gallon sized wide mouthed jar. Squeeze juice from grapefruit. Strain to avoid seeds and white membrane, which impart bitterness.

Dissolve sugar in 2 cups of the grapefruit juice over a low flame. While still hot, pour into original juice.

Add sliced lemons and peppercorns. This makes more than a gallon of juice; reserve balance in a clean sterilized lightly corked bottle to fill the jars as the wine works over the top. Sprinkle dry yeast over the surface and cover with ordinary table saucers, bottom side down, so the the wine is free to work out from under them. Set in a warm place to ferment for three weeks. Stir twice a week.

At the end of the three weeks, siphon off carefully into another clean gallon jar, avoiding any settlings at the bottom of the original jar. Let ferment for one week longer.

Then siphon into clean sterilized bottles, cooking lightly. When fermentation is over, cork tightly and seal with paraffin. Keep for six months.


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## hounddawg (Jan 25, 2021)

only thing i can add is it suppresses antibiotics ,,,
and like this thread I'm old too,
Dawg


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## cmason1957 (Jan 25, 2021)

I made grapefruit wine a few years ago, maybe twice. This is profanity a good start to what I did. 

Grapefruit Wine from Fresh Fruit

Makes three gallon.

Ingredients:
For a medium body wine: 
18 Grapefruits 
18 pints Water (to three gallons plus)
6 -3/4 lbs. Sugar – about 1.090 SG
3 Campden Tablet, crushed
3/4 tsp. Tannin
1 pkg. Champagne Yeast

Keep your acid tester and hydrometer handy. As with all wild fruit the sugar and acid content varies greatly from year to year and even from one location to another. The recipe above is a general recipe to use which, you may have to adjust.

Directions:

Grate rind from 6 grapefruits; exclude any of the bitter white part.
Peel fruit and separate segments. Place fruit and grated rind in nylon straining bag.
Using the nylon straining bag (fine mesh) squeeze and strain juice into primary fermenter. Tie straining bag and put into primary fermenter.
Add warm water and all remaining ingredients, except yeast. Stir well.
Cover primary fermenter.
Wait 24 hours, then add yeast and re-cover primary fermenter.
Stir daily, check S.G. and press pulp lightly to aid extraction.
When S.G. reaches 1.040 (usually 3-5 days), strain juice from bag. Then siphon juice into glass container and attach airlock.
When S.G. reaches 1.000 (usually about 3 weeks), fermentation is complete. Siphon juice off sediment into clean glass container. Re-attach airlock.
To aid in clearing, siphon again in 2 months and again, if necessary, before bottling.
Allow the wine to age.

To sweeten this wine, at bottling, add 1/2 tsp. stabilizer. Then, add 1/4 to 1/2 lbs. of dissolved sugar per gallon.


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## beano (Jan 26, 2021)

hounddawg said:


> only thing i can add is it suppresses antibiotics ,,,
> and like this thread I'm old too,
> Dawg



Also cholesterol meds. Getting old ain't for sissies.


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## BernardSmith (Jan 26, 2021)

Does anyone know why grapefruit is in fact contra-indicted with certain meds? What is it in grapefruit that is not in oranges or lemons or in other fruit that interferes with how medications are metabolized (it seems to over-increase the effects of some meds and depresses the effects of others, but what is in grapefruit that it behaves this way?


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## hounddawg (Jan 26, 2021)

beano said:


> Also cholesterol meds. Getting old ain't for sissies.


did not know that
Dawg


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## hounddawg (Jan 26, 2021)

BernardSmith said:


> Does anyone know why grapefruit is in fact contra-indicted with certain meds? What is it in grapefruit that is not in oranges or lemons or in other fruit that interferes with how medications are metabolized (it seems to over-increase the effects of some meds and depresses the effects of others, but what is in grapefruit that it behaves this way?


no, that's way above me,,, 
Dawg


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## cmason1957 (Jan 26, 2021)

BernardSmith said:


> Does anyone know why grapefruit is in fact contra-indicted with certain meds? What is it in grapefruit that is not in oranges or lemons or in other fruit that interferes with how medications are metabolized (it seems to over-increase the effects of some meds and depresses the effects of others, but what is in grapefruit that it behaves this way?



The great god google knows all - Grapefruit Juice and Some Drugs Don't Mix


> if you drink a lot of grapefruit juice while taking certain statin drugs to lower cholesterol, too much of the drug may stay in your body, increasing your risk for liver and muscle damage that can lead to kidney failure.
> Many drugs are broken down (metabolized) with the help of a vital enzyme called CYP3A4 in the small intestine. Grapefruit juice can block the action of CYP3A4, so instead of being metabolized, more of the drug enters the blood and stays in the body longer. The result: too much drug in your body.
> The amount of the CYP3A4 enzyme in the intestine varies from person to person, says Huang. Some people have a lot of enzymes and others just a little. So grapefruit juice may affect people differently even when they take the same drug.
> 
> ...


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## RickD (Jan 26, 2021)

winemaker81 said:


> This thread is a bit old so advice won't help the OP ... but anyone with an interest in grapefruit wine might find this recipe useful.
> 
> From: [email protected](au)
> Newsgroups: rec.crafts.winemaking
> ...



Peppercorns! Fascinating.


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## Fencepost (Jan 26, 2021)

Well.... I've tried it twice... got a big grapefruit tree so plenty of juice... both of mine taste a bit like the pith. I tried not to "over juice" the grapefruit and avoid the pith, as well. But I was able to have limited success by checking with the experts on this forum and tried egg white fining (twice) and tried gelatin fining.... both improved the taste... not great but better now, it is a wait and see but really not expecting much. Last shot will be to make a grapefruit wine will be with the Skeeter Pee recipe but using grapefruit instead of lemons. By the way, the grapefruit juice itself is great to drink... sweet and tart, but in the wines it seems to bring out a pith flavor, not sure why.


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## hounddawg (Jan 26, 2021)

Fencepost said:


> Well.... I've tried it twice... got a big grapefruit tree so plenty of juice... both of mine taste a bit like the pith. I tried not to "over juice" the grapefruit and avoid the pith, as well. But I was able to 'limited success by checking with the experts on this forum and tried egg white fining (twice) and tried gelatin fining.... both improved the taste... not great but better now, it is a wait and see but really not expecting much. Last shot will be to make a grapefruit wine will be with the Skeeter Pee recipe but using grapefruit instead of lemons. By the way, the grapefruit juice itself is great to drink... sweet and tart, but in the wines it seems to bring out a pith flavor, not sure why.


yeah, i love drinking and eating grapefruit, but i like the ones they call white grapefruit, i ain't a clue since the color is yellow,
Dawg


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## cmason1957 (Jan 26, 2021)

hounddawg said:


> yeah, i love drinking and eating grapefruit, but i like the ones they call white grapefruit, i ain't a clue since the color is yellow,
> Dawg



No matter the color of the grapefruit the wine comes out white.


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## hounddawg (Jan 27, 2021)

cmason1957 said:


> No matter the color of the grapefruit the wine comes out white.


that blows my mind, but i was taking straight up fruit juice or real fruit for eating, i can't believe i'm saying this, but red grapefruit juice is to sweet for me, i like the white kind to drink the juice ,, but i'd never thought if made into wine they'd look the same, whelp the saying is true you aint never to old to learn,
Dawg


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