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That nursery sounds AMAZING. I am so envious!

@FlamingoEmporium I think that Lychee tree sounds a lot more fun and a lot less of a PITA! BTW- there's a great book out there called "The Drunken Botanist" by Amy Stewart that might appeal to this crowd! There is a whole section on cultivating vanilla beans. And the rest of it is a fascinating...

We (in Wisconsin) freeze most of our fruit at harvest so that we can make that wine whenever it suits us. Obviously that means a lot of freezer space, but it helps us keep a constant cycle going because we can just pull out whatever we feel like making any time of the year.

@winemaker81 what's your recipe for your extract? Do you use bourbon or vodka and how many beans for a bottle that size? I'm almost out of Eagle Rare myself and it would do quite nicely to reuse the bottle...

@winemaker81 Thank you! 😂 I think the 1 gallon experiments are the way to go and I'll likely tinker with some in this latest batch of black raspberry- I've got extra fruit in there so it has good body and flavor and can probably handle a bit of oak (I hope!). It'll do me good to get over the...

@David Violante thank you for the thoughtful and informative reply- I appreciate it! I have some wild grapes that I know will benefit from oaking (acid-wise) but I'm hesitant to oak up a bunch of other fruits since we aren't generally huge fans of oak-forward wines. I'm trying to better...

Oh sure! I know you CAN, but we all know that doesn't mean you SHOULD! I was more fishing around for what wines would particularly benefit from it or ones that folks have done and prefer oaked to unoaked.

I'm excited to hear how this goes- what variety/varieties of apples did you use?

I'm debating the merits of this for my black raspberry batch I have going now. I've got 6.5 gallons in the carboy and once I rack it, I only have a 5 gallon carboy to move it into, so I'm thinking that last gallon will get oaked as a 1:1 comparison. Thanks for the encouragement!

Okay, I've read a bunch of threads on here about oaking- when to add, what to use, all that jazz, but I'm trying to figure out when/where/how oaking should be applied to fruit wines? I'm assuming I'll be oaking the wild grape batch I've got planned, just to help offset that acids in the skins...

I suppose his recipe is a good place to start and I can tweak from there based on the grapes year to year. Thanks for the suggestion and advice!

I suppose this means I'll need to do more grape-specific research before I venture down this path because that is new information to me! I've only ever added it once during my fruit wine making, so thank you for the info and I'm off to do some learnin'!

I think I got a booster for that this year too!

Yes, I'm used to using the KMeta up front, I was just trying to figure out if adding it after fermentation is in ADDITION to KMeta up front or IN PLACE of?

Is the sulfite necessary? This will be my first grape wine so I'm on much less steady footing with what's necessary and what's optional. Thank you for the thorough reply- I appreciate it!

We harvested some wild grapes from our neighbors last year. Its all frozen and in clusters and is not muscadine, just a standard wild type in northern WI, more seed than fruit TBH. The local homebrew shop owner suggested we make this without adding water to get the best flavor. Since I'm new and...

Fantastic suggestion! I'll look into that!

I only have advice for the 1st question, lemon juice is usually used to stop browning. Could you sub in lemon juice for the acid blend to minimize oxidation to the fruit? I'd recommend tossing the fruit in the lemon juice to coat them well and then move on to the next steps. Otherwise I would...

LOL, this is how I end up taking over the whole basement rather than keeping things nice and tidy inside the pantry, isn't it???

Thank you! I was able to order a 20 gallon Brute online which should work very well for this purpose, I only wish it was going to get her quicker! Can I get this batch started and throw the yeast tomorrow and still top off with the remaining 7 quarts once the new container arrives? Or am I just...