Hi all!
I'm from the Netherlands and I just started making wine, I hope. I just started without learning a lot about the process, and I just used a simple step-by-step tutorial provided with a starter wine-making kit. I came up with this idea because two friends of me just bought a house with grapes (and they weren't going to eat them, so I harvested them all when they were on vacation
)
I thought that all was going superb, but now I'm not so sure. Because I think the fermenting (is that the right use? The bubbling thing with the water seal?) stopped really soon. So I was wondering if I'm doing OK and if I maybe should add something/do something. I could really use some tips! I will try to explain my steps with some pictures.
So first, I don't have a hydrometer (yet) but I've read somewhere that grapes have the perfect balance between amount of sugars/sours/etc and juice. So I kinda decides I just use pure juice and no water and no extra sugars, just pure wine from grapes. Later on I realized that that way of thinking is probably not very good, and that I will be better off if I measure stuff. But anyway I'm now halfway the process and I can't turn back time
I started with cleaning and plucking the grapes from the bunch (am I saying that correctly?) and I crushed them all with my hand in a bucket (see attachment step 1, step 2 and step 3). I then added some enzymes and I waited approximately 12 hours with the lit on the bucket and a water seal on it.
After the 12 hours, I opened the bucket and I added yeast nutrition and i stirred, and I sprinkled yeast on top of the crushed grapes. Then for a week long I opened the lit every day to push the grapes under in the juice (step 4 and step 5 in the attachments) the fermenting was going really hard (I heard the water seal all the time) and it kinda stopped on day six/seven. That was also the time withing my step-by-step tutorial for separating the mush/pulp from the juice. So I used a cloth to separate the mush/pulp from the juice (see step 7 in the attachment) and I poured it all in a (I think it's called a yeast bottle?) and I sealed it with a water seal.
Note: I cleaned everything before using it with a combination of sulfite and citric acid. I've read that I also must use that in the wine, but it doesn't say so in my step-by-step tutorial, so... Should I still add it? And how much?
Anyhow. After separating the mush/pulp from the juice, at first a saw a difference in the water on the water seal. But the water is already in balance three days later in the bottle with the water seal! (attachment, step 7) should I add some yeast nutrition? Or citric acid? Or sulfite? It also kinda looks like something is forming on the surface of the wine, but I'm not sure. According to the step-by-step I should do nothing for another 4 days, and then I must put the bottle in a cooler place for one to two months
Thanks in advance!
I'm from the Netherlands and I just started making wine, I hope. I just started without learning a lot about the process, and I just used a simple step-by-step tutorial provided with a starter wine-making kit. I came up with this idea because two friends of me just bought a house with grapes (and they weren't going to eat them, so I harvested them all when they were on vacation
)I thought that all was going superb, but now I'm not so sure. Because I think the fermenting (is that the right use? The bubbling thing with the water seal?) stopped really soon. So I was wondering if I'm doing OK and if I maybe should add something/do something. I could really use some tips! I will try to explain my steps with some pictures.
So first, I don't have a hydrometer (yet) but I've read somewhere that grapes have the perfect balance between amount of sugars/sours/etc and juice. So I kinda decides I just use pure juice and no water and no extra sugars, just pure wine from grapes. Later on I realized that that way of thinking is probably not very good, and that I will be better off if I measure stuff. But anyway I'm now halfway the process and I can't turn back time
I started with cleaning and plucking the grapes from the bunch (am I saying that correctly?) and I crushed them all with my hand in a bucket (see attachment step 1, step 2 and step 3). I then added some enzymes and I waited approximately 12 hours with the lit on the bucket and a water seal on it.
After the 12 hours, I opened the bucket and I added yeast nutrition and i stirred, and I sprinkled yeast on top of the crushed grapes. Then for a week long I opened the lit every day to push the grapes under in the juice (step 4 and step 5 in the attachments) the fermenting was going really hard (I heard the water seal all the time) and it kinda stopped on day six/seven. That was also the time withing my step-by-step tutorial for separating the mush/pulp from the juice. So I used a cloth to separate the mush/pulp from the juice (see step 7 in the attachment) and I poured it all in a (I think it's called a yeast bottle?) and I sealed it with a water seal.
Note: I cleaned everything before using it with a combination of sulfite and citric acid. I've read that I also must use that in the wine, but it doesn't say so in my step-by-step tutorial, so... Should I still add it? And how much?
Anyhow. After separating the mush/pulp from the juice, at first a saw a difference in the water on the water seal. But the water is already in balance three days later in the bottle with the water seal! (attachment, step 7) should I add some yeast nutrition? Or citric acid? Or sulfite? It also kinda looks like something is forming on the surface of the wine, but I'm not sure. According to the step-by-step I should do nothing for another 4 days, and then I must put the bottle in a cooler place for one to two months
Thanks in advance!
