# Quality vs Cost (grapes vs juice)



## brottman (Aug 22, 2015)

I've done a few juice buckets and have been pretty happy. However, I'm interested in starting from grapes. What I'm wondering though is how the quality of wine made from grapes compares to starting with the juice buckets. 

A typical juice bucket costs me around $70 through my LHBS. I have read that it takes 2-3 lugs to make 6 gallons, and at around $36 per lug, that could easily cost more than the buckets of juice. 

Is it worth it?


----------



## ibglowin (Aug 22, 2015)

Yes, yes it is.


----------



## JohnT (Aug 22, 2015)

it is like night and day! wine from whole fresh grapes is well worth a try!


----------



## brottman (Aug 22, 2015)

Thanks, is it possible to do a small batch without a crusher / wine press?


----------



## cmason1957 (Aug 22, 2015)

It absolutely is possible. 100 lbs takes maybe two hours to destemm. Then use a sanitized 4x4 or something like that to crush them. (My wife and I did 300 one year by hand)


----------



## brottman (Aug 23, 2015)

I have some muslin bags. Would that work to put the crushed grapes in for fermenting? I could just wring it out then. I've done blueberry wine this way.


----------



## ibglowin (Aug 23, 2015)

I did a hundred pounds once by hand. Once. Never again.

Started at about 3:00PM finished up at 2:00AM! So like 11 hours. And that was with my wife helping me!



cmason1957 said:


> It absolutely is possible. 100 lbs takes maybe two hours to destemm. Then use a sanitized 4x4 or something like that to crush them. (My wife and I did 300 one year by hand)


----------



## Tony49 (Aug 23, 2015)

Timely post.
The muscadines are now in at the farmers market. 
May have to switch over from fruit wines.
Cheers!


----------



## geek (Aug 23, 2015)

When I started this hobby following a Portuguese friend, I used merely juice buckets the first 3 years. Most Portuguese don't use sulfite, MLB and not even yeast...they trust the wild yeast...my wine was close to "OK", to say it the best way..

Then I decided to try a "small" 6 gal batch with grapes sold by M&M to a local "Big Y" supermarket.
The supermarket was returning some cases since they were not getting sold and started to grow mold on some.

So, I went to the big freezer area with an employee, scavenged like 7 lugs (don't remember) of Merlot and Cab Sav that were in really good shape, no mold at all...he actually helped picked out the best ones and gave me a substantial discount on them. From like almost $40 to like half the price....scored...!!!

That Merlot/Cab Sab blend was my very first wine from fresh grapes and the best one I've ever made at that point in over 3 years..!!

I NEVER looked back and wine from fresh grapes would be the BEST wine you will ever make. You can make good wine from buckets by adding some fresh crushed grapes to improve the tannins but to me fresh grapes makes the best wine, period.
Costs more? yes
More work? yes
Better wine? Big YES.

Start small, you don't really need to buy equipment, have your LHBS do the crushing for a fee, and when is time to press just use a couple nylon bags and do it by hand to squeeze as much as you can, after racking then do MLF.

That is my story and I'm sticking to it...


----------



## brottman (Aug 23, 2015)

Thank you geek! That was exactly the kind of response I was hoping for in this thread. I'm okay with things being more expensive if the quality goes way up. I'll probably still do several buckets this year but maybe try a single 6 gallon batch from grapes.


----------



## NorCal (Aug 23, 2015)

When I hear your guys stories, I am thankful for where I live and trying to figure out how I could help. Typical price for harvested grapes in my container is $.70/pound. From the time they are picked to when they are destemmed is an hour or two. Would it be possible to put crushed SO2 grapes, in a sealed bag, freeze for 48 hours, ship priority mail 2-3 day and get good, usable must to you?

Update - did some checking 3.4 gallons could be shipped for $16...or 7X more than the cost of the grapes. Yikes.


----------



## geek (Aug 23, 2015)

For the upcoming buckets, also buy 1 lug of grapes and divide it up in like around 9lbs, so you add about 9lbs of crushed grapes to 1 bucket and the lug will be good for 4 buckets. Or even better add 12lbs for each of 3 buckets, for red wine.
This would result in better wine than simply using a juice bucket.


----------



## vacuumpumpman (Aug 23, 2015)

Varis -
Yes that is a very good affordable procedure to do. I will save my skins from the fall that I did not fully pressed out everything and add them to the juice buckets in the spring.

But I will admit that fresh grapes are the way to go if you have the time -
From straight grapes I can make Port - 1st run - and then a 2nd run
biggest bang for the buck


----------



## olusteebus (Aug 23, 2015)

Dang it. After three years, I graduated to fresh juice. It may take awhile for me to go fresh grapes.


----------



## brottman (Aug 24, 2015)

Can anyone try to quantify how a merlot made from Lodi grapes (I can get them at a local winery) would compare to an Eclipse Stag Leap Merlot kit?


----------



## ibglowin (Aug 24, 2015)

Just about any fresh grape that is picked at a decent brix and acid level will produce a 10X better wine than ANY kit.


----------



## ColemanM (Aug 24, 2015)

I'd tend to agree with ibglowin. I have three barrels with different wines aging in them. One is a old vine Zin port from frozen must. Full mouthfeel. Very sweet. Legs like a Brazilian supermodel. Next is a Cab/Merlot from frozen must. Very fruit forward still at nearly a year. Full mouth feel and great nose. Next is a petite Verdot with the pressed grape skins of the merlot. Thin. No nose and less than exciting. Before I thought it was amazing, until I made frozen grape wine. Now it falls flat.


----------



## Rocky (Aug 25, 2015)

"Just about any fresh grape that is picked at a decent brix and acid level will produce a 10X better wine than ANY kit."


I hope that Mike does not mean this literally. This statement cannot reasonably be termed simply "hyperbole." It brings hyperbole to an heretofore unattained level. The most I am willing to concede on this point is the following: Given that one begins with good grapes, i.e. proper brix and acid, no mold, no debris, etc., and makes wine adhering to all reasonable winemaking and sanitary procedures in a proper environment, then wine made from fresh grapes will generally, but not always, be superior to wine from a high quality kit made under the same conditions. Additionally, in comparing fresh grapes to high quality kits, I would list the following caveats:

Just how "superior" one wine is over another is subject to debate (but probably is not 10x)
Making wine from grapes involves more work, expense and equipment.
Making wine from grapes creates a greater mess.
Making wine from grapes generally limits one to grapes grown in quantity and locally. 
The farther one is from the source of the grapes, the less the quality of the grapes, i.e. grapes do not benefit from train, truck or boat rides.
Making wine from grapes involves greater risk.

I like wine, make a lot of it for my family and friends and drink a lot of it too. I consider my wine to be good for one reason: the people that drink it, including myself, like it. It may be blasphemous but I am not searching the world for the best bottle of wine extant. After all, it is only a bottle of wine which we enjoy today (and tomorrow it is "buried at sea").


----------



## ibglowin (Aug 25, 2015)

LOL Rocky, just like the *BOLD* print in my sig, It's just my opinion and (perhaps) a few others as well. That and $3 gets you a small cup of Joe at Starbucks. I still make White wine from kits. Still tweak those and overall happy with the tradeoff and feel there is not much difference between a white wine made from a kit and a white wine made from fresh grapes. 

On the other hand I always felt there was a huge difference in taste between a red wine made from a kit and a red wine made from fresh grapes. Something about the 100lbs of skins they are fermented on I guess. 

For me Kits were always just OK, some of our friends just loved, loved loved them. I could always taste some amount of Kit Taste even after 2 years bottle age and 3 months in a barrel. 

If you like the product and are satisfied with the outcome there is absolutely nothing wrong with that!

*Y*our *M*ilage *M*ay *V*ary as they say.


----------



## Rocky (Aug 25, 2015)

Great, Mike! I understand your view and agree with it up to a point.

Fortunately, I am blessed with extremely mediocre taste buds and I am very easy to please. I sometimes I suspect that my taste buds were burned out with all the capsaicin I have ingested over my many years. When we were in Italy, we went to an Olive Oil tasting and I picked the "worst" olive oil for about 7 samples. To me, it was good and the one I picked was about $20 per gallon. The "best" (according to the experts) cost about $85 per gallon. In every challenge, there is a gift.

As I compose this, I am drinking a Kenridge Showcase Sangiovese/Cabernet Sauvignon that is a little over two years old (pre-historic in my cellar) and it tastes great. I am not sure what "kit taste" is but if this wine has it, I like it. Maybe it is the "winery taste" that I dislike!


----------



## JohnT (Aug 26, 2015)

I have always been a "from whole grapes" winemaker. I long time ago, I decided to give a kit a try and hated the results. I simply rules out the use of kits going forward. 

Since then, kits have come a long way. I had the good fortune of tasting a number of them just a couple of years ago (the first kit I tasted in 20+ years) and was simply shocked by the quality.

Kits do make a good wine. I would actually prefer a great high end kit to a wine made from mediocre grapes but would also prefer a wine made from high end grapes over a mediocre kit wine.


----------



## sdelli (Aug 29, 2015)

Yes.... Making wine from grapes is a bigger commitment. But i disagree with availability. I make high end wine from grapes all year round! It is called frozen must. In the last 60 days I have made Sangiovese, Barbera, and Super Tuscan all from Tuscany, Italy.... And my grapes this fall will be from the foothills of the Chalkhill AVA. My taste says if I am going to sit and drink a glass of wine.... It better have some good history! But like all of.... It is about finding your nitch and being happy with it!


----------



## geek (Aug 30, 2015)

@sdelli what's the typical price you paid for a 6gal pail of frozen must and where you buy from?

I assume frozen must would be much more compared to a same size batch from fresh grapes.


----------



## Kiwisholland (Aug 30, 2015)

I can get Lake County, CA grapes from my LHBS. Never tried them, but I wonder how they compare to Brehm and Wine Grapes direct frozen must. 

I wonder if a LHBS in PA, can get better grapes from Cali than Brehm can?


----------



## heatherd (Aug 31, 2015)

M&M sells frozen must all year long, and some are in the $120 range for 6 gallons. I have done this before with good success.
http://juicegrape.com/frozen_must_juice 

I have also made a 12gallon (60 bottle) co-fermented batch of California Cabernet Sauvignon using one fresh juice bucket that was around $52 and one frozen must bucket from M&M that was around $120. You end up with a great quality wine for about half the cost of a high-end kit. The other nice thing about frozen must is that it's crushed and destemmed, so you just have to be able to press by hand.

If you don't have access to a fresh juice and grapes near you, you can replicate what I did by buying a frozen juice pail for around $75 + frozen must for around $120 from M&M. Yield is 12 gallons.

To be clear: frozen juice can be shipped and is available at all times of the year. That's in contrast to fresh juice and grapes, which cannot be shipped, and which is available only at harvest times.

Heather


----------



## NorCal (Aug 31, 2015)

heatherd said:


> M&M sells frozen must all year long, and some are in the $120 range for 6 gallons. I have done this before with good success.
> http://juicegrape.com/frozen_must_juice
> 
> To be clear: frozen juice can be shipped and is available at all times of the year. That's in contrast to fresh juice and grapes, which cannot be shipped, and which is available only at harvest times.
> ...



How much does it cost for shipping? I couldn't find anywhere on where it said that you cannot ship fresh juice or grapes on the USPS, any help there would be appreciated.


----------



## heatherd (Aug 31, 2015)

NorCal,

I am sure USPS will technically ship fresh juice, but fresh juice and grapes would just spoil in the mail at room temperature; that's why (I have always assumed) all the locations make you come pick up fresh grapes and juice during harvest time. My retailer requires that I get there within a few days of the delivery of fresh grapes and juice, and a week is too long; they keep everything cool but not frozen.

Shipping frozen must and juice works because the stuff thaws a bit during shipping but doesn't have a chance to spoil. Once the delivery arrived, it took an additional day or two for the frozen grape must to defrost at room temperature, and come up to a temperature that was within the range of the yeast's liking. M&M also provides the brix/TA/pH for each must so you know what you're getting into; some vineyards will do that with the fresh grapes/juice but not all.

I don't recall the shipping being very expensive, but not sure exactly what it cost. May be worth adding something to your cart on their site to see it.

One thing I do not know, and maybe someone else already does, is whether any of this stuff is pasteurized. I wonder if the frozen items have been pasteurized to make them more stable for shipping.

Heather


----------



## brottman (Aug 31, 2015)

What is the functional difference between a bucket of frozen must vs a bucket of fresh juice? What I'm hearing is that great wine can be made from frozen must, but is it better than you get from a bucket of fresh juice? The OG topic was to compare fresh juice buckets to starting from grapes, but now I'm interested in frozen must as well.


----------



## Rocky (Aug 31, 2015)

Brottman, I have never tried frozen must but I understand that in the red varieties, the grape skins are included in the must. This would be a departure from a bucket of juice. I have used buckets of juice and added my homemade grape packs for additional body and taste. I have also seen that a 6 gallon bucket of must yields only 3 or 4 gallons of wine, likely due to the volume of the skins.


----------



## jsiddall (Aug 31, 2015)

You can consider frozen must as equivalent to crushed grapes (once thawed). Juice buckets are very different because they don't include the skins.


----------



## heatherd (Aug 31, 2015)

Correct. If you want to make wine from grapes, frozen must is something to also consider. At that point, you are getting a 6 gallon bucket of crushed and destemmed grapes and a bit of free run juice.

When I make a red, I am aiming for the most grape skins possible during fermentation. Fresh grapes and frozen must do that. So does adding a lug of grapes or a grape pack to a juice pail, just in a different proportion; you're starting with 6 gallons of juice and adding the additional grapes to that volume in the fermenter, so you'll likely end up with more finished wine going that route.

When making a white, those do not ferment on the skins. So fresh or frozen juice is the ideal situation.

Just depends on what you want to make, and what's available in terms of raw materials.

Heather


----------



## brottman (Aug 31, 2015)

Thanks everyone! I've learned a ton from this thread.


----------



## FTC Wines (Aug 31, 2015)

I just ordered 3 lugs of "fresh" grapes & a 6 gal pail of fresh must from Pardo Wine Grapes in Tampa Fl. Want to compare the difference. Lugs $46.50 delivered to Tampa via refer trucks, $70 per 6 gal refrigerated pail. Prices are a little higher than I see on this site, but the grapes are traveling 3,000'miles. Hope they arrive fast & healthy. Will follow up on this adventure. Roy


----------



## Rocky (Aug 31, 2015)

Roy, the "pail" you ordered, is that straight juice or is it juice and crushed grapes? From the price you have shown, I am thinking it is juice only.


----------



## FTC Wines (Aug 31, 2015)

Rocky, I believe it's juice only. Never did a juice pail before, so it will be interesting. Roy


----------



## Rocky (Aug 31, 2015)

If you are planning to put three lugs of fresh grapes along with 6 gallons of straight juice, you are going to have a very nice wine. You should end up with about 13-14 gallons of finished wine. What variety is the juice and what variety are the lugs?


----------



## brottman (Sep 1, 2015)

Now for the million dollar question. Why does actual grapes and even frozen must cost more than an equivalent amount of a fresh juice bucket? Surely the fresh juice buckets require just as much grapes and more processing. The economics don't make sense to me.


----------



## FTC Wines (Sep 1, 2015)

Rocky, both the juice bucket & fresh grapes are Cab Sav. Thinking of fermenting & aging separately, then just before bottling in a year deciding whether to blend. Would like to see the difference in the two. Will be sure to leave at least 10 bottles of each so I can sample every 6 mo for a few years. 
Bottman, I looked at the pricing more than a few times thinking the same thing. How can a 6 gal juice bucket cost 1/2 the price of fresh grapes. Only answer I can think of is mass production on buckets & higher cost to ship "fresh" grapes.
Time will tell, Roy


----------



## sour_grapes (Sep 1, 2015)

FTC Wines said:


> Rocky, both the juice bucket & fresh grapes are Cab Sav. Thinking of fermenting & aging separately, then just before bottling in a year deciding whether to blend. Would like to see the difference in the two.



Be forewarned, I know little about this topic. Usually, the "ferment-separately-and-blend-later" strategy is a sound one, but it seems to me this case might be different. I could imagine that you won't extract quite as much beneficial stuff from the skins if you do the fermentation separately than you would if you combined them. Anyone know for sure or have thoughts on this?


----------



## jsiddall (Sep 1, 2015)

I would tend to agree with @sour_grapes that you have the chance for better skin extraction if you ferment together in some way. However, you may want to consider keeping them separate by fermenting _sequentially_. Start with fermenting your grapes and after pressing use the pomice in the juice bucket for a second fermentation.

I wish I had a good answer as to why juice buckets are considerably cheaper than the raw material they are made from. I suspect that the quality (and thus cost) of the fresh grapes made available, including boxing and climate controlled shipping to keep them fresh, is more than the cost of dumping inferior fruit straight into a truck that heads to a giant commercial crusher/press/pasteruizer.

Regarding frozen grapes, the cost to freeze and store frozen, plus expedited shipping to prevent spoilage, adds cost that is often above the fresh grapes themselves.

With most things you get what you pay for and in this case I expect the juice buckets are priced lower to reflect the fact that they don't make as good a finished product as the other, more expensive, options.


----------



## heatherd (Sep 1, 2015)

FTC Wines said:


> Rocky, both the juice bucket & fresh grapes are Cab Sav. Thinking of fermenting & aging separately, then just before bottling in a year deciding whether to blend. Would like to see the difference in the two. Will be sure to leave at least 10 bottles of each so I can sample every 6 mo for a few years.
> Bottman, I looked at the pricing more than a few times thinking the same thing. How can a 6 gal juice bucket cost 1/2 the price of fresh grapes. Only answer I can think of is mass production on buckets & higher cost to ship "fresh" grapes.
> Time will tell, Roy



Roy,
My two cents: When I did a double cabernet sauvignon batch with (1) frozen grape must bucket and (1) fresh pail, I co-fermented and co-MLFed. There are lots of reasons to do it that way. Without doing so, your all-skins batch will be great, but your juice-only batch will be poor due to lack of body and tannins from not having any skins. So you'll balance the quality of the batches by splitting the juice and skins equally in them.

The cost is relative to labor, processing, and shipping efforts.

Heather


----------



## Rocky (Sep 1, 2015)

Roy,, of course it is your call, but I tend to agree with Heather on this. I would make one super batch with the juice bucket and the crushed grapes from the three lugs. Doing your experiment will only confirm what I believe you already know.


----------



## kevinlfifer (Sep 1, 2015)

Great thread. I really have nothing of consequence to add, except I have tasted Rocky's wine and there is no way he has a mediocre palate. His wines are really top notch.

I have been adding marquette skins (skins, not grapes) to juice buckets for a couple of years with really good results.


----------



## FTC Wines (Sep 1, 2015)

Thanks Guys, I have a month to decide. Rocky, I see ur point, will give it a lot of thought. Right now I'm knee deep in building a wine press. Roy


----------



## terroirdejeroir (Sep 3, 2015)

brottman said:


> Can anyone try to quantify how a merlot made from Lodi grapes (I can get them at a local winery) would compare to an Eclipse Stag Leap Merlot kit?



I can give it a shot this weekend. I have some two year old Eclipse Stag's Leap Merlot as well as some 2014 Lodi Merlot I made from grapes. Won't be a really fair comparison due to the difference in age, but what the hell, it will still be fun. I will setup a blind taste test for the family and let you know what the consensus is. 

FWIW, I would say the Eclipse Stag's Leap Merlot is probably one of the five top kits out there. 

My perspective is that the most important factor in making good wine is the quality of the raw material. I think some of the kit makers can get fruit that is way better than what I am able to procure and that discrepancy helps the kits to make some really outstanding wines. 

I started making wine from grapes because I wanted to learn more about the process. I am fortunate enough to have space and enough extra cash to afford the necessary equipment like a Vinmetrica SC-300 and a basket press, so it works for me. I think most people will be able to make better wines from top quality kits than they can from grapes as there is much less room for error. I would say the results of amateur wine competitions would support that as kit wines typically do very well.

That being said, I would only recommend the top tier kits if you are shooting for quality. I would stack my CC Showcase Cab Merlot/Red Mountain Cab/Amarone, Eclipse Stag's Leap Merlot/Lodi Ranch 11 Cab, and RJS Super Tuscan/Rosso Grande Eccelente up against any wine made from grapes in my area, regardless of the source, and be happy. Now if I lived in central or northern California I would feel very differently.

Of course, I reserve the right to change my mind when my 2014 Lodi Bordeaux blend has aged another year.


----------



## brottman (Sep 3, 2015)

Terroirdejeroir, I am very excited to hear the results. Please post with an update when you do this!


----------



## terroirdejeroir (Sep 4, 2015)

So we did the blind taste test...kind of. I say that because I realized that all my Merlot from grapes got used in my various blends. Nevertheless, I do have a few bottles of special press run merlot and I used one of them.

Since it was 2014 vintage and had only been in the bottle six weeks, I used one sample that I ran through an aerator, one sample straight from the bottle, and one sample from my 2013 eclipse stag's leap merlot. The results were very interesting. 

Everyone agreed that the aerated sample was better than the unaerated one. Then it got really interesting. The aerated Lodi Merlot was very complex, lots of plums, raisins, etc., while the stags leap was obviously more finished and was silky smooth with notes of chocolate and raspberries. The wines were so different that it would be hard to say which is better, both were excellent. 

I have a feeling that if I repeat the test this time next year the Lodi grapes will be superior, but hard to say. Now if I could only get some grapes from stag's leap to test...

I would still recommend doing several kits before you make the jump to grapes, but it's pretty hard to lose either way.

Now if I can get ibglowin to send me some of that wine that is 10x better than the stags leap I would really be in business.


----------



## ibglowin (Sep 4, 2015)

LOL, the in-laws live in Plattsburg, MO so next time we get up that way we will have to try and do a "meet and greet" in KC, MO and swap some wine!



terroirdejeroir said:


> Now if I can get ibglowin to send me some of that wine that is 10x better than the stags leap I would really be in business.


----------



## terroirdejeroir (Sep 6, 2015)

I am always up for a road trip and a little wine swapping. Sounds great!


----------



## terroirdejeroir (Sep 6, 2015)

Last year I made nine lugs of wine and four juice pails. I added half a lug to each pail. I think I am pleased with this approach, but it is too early to tell. Do those of you who have been doing this for a while see a large gap between wine from grapes and wine from pails? It is tempting to get more juice and add a whole lug to each pail to make the $$ go farther. Any thoughts?


----------

