Juicing Blueberries

[elenarain]

Hi,

I have 30 pounds of frozen blueberries that I am planning to make into wine. What is the best way to juice them? Should I add water or should I use all fruit and juice?

Can't wait to get started..I should add that I made a small batch (1 gallon) that I added water to equal 1 gallon with 5 lbs of macerated berries that I left in a mesh bag for one week...It's pretty darn good!~

Thanks!

 

[jswordy]

My advice is NOT to juice them. Stick them directly in one or two sanitized 5 gallon paint strainer bags, tie off, and gently squeeze it to break the skins. Place the bag in the primary and add water according to recipe. 30 pounds will make about 5-10 gallons of wine (3-5 pounds to the gallon).

Sanitize your hands once per day during primary and gently squish the bag a bit.

The reason I am talking about gently so much and putting the berries in a bag is that blueberries put off a LOT of lees, and you can save yourself a whole bunch of clearing work if you bag and get the technique right on the front end. The wine will likely still have heavier than normal lees.

Here is my recipe for Blueberry Bliss, which took a third at the county fair this year. I loved it. If you go 4-5 pounds, there will be even heavier blueberry flavor. Bluebery wine tastes its best aged 1 year plus, BTW.

http://www.winemakingtalk.com/forum/f2/blueberry-bliss-wine-31937/

 

[elenarain]

Hi Jim,

Thanks for the response..would love to taste that Blueberry Bliss...I do remember that a lot of clearing was needed even with my small batch. Hope this is not a dumb question, but is adding water to the blueberry wine "cheating" or should it made from all blueberries and juice?

Thanks again,
Elena

 

[novalou]

Hi Jim,

Thanks for the response..would love to taste that Blueberry Bliss...I do remember that a lot of clearing was needed even with my small batch. Hope this is not a dumb question, but is adding water to the blueberry wine "cheating" or should it made from all blueberries and juice?

Thanks again,
Elena

Adding water to blueberry wine is necessary to cut down on the acidity.

 

[elenarain]

It looks like my first batch was purely beginner's luck. Can't believe how much there is to learn and HOW FUN!

Thanks

 

[Arne]

If you freeze them for a couple of days or so it helps them to break down and free the juice. And like Jim says, get em in some kind of a ferment bag. Saves a bunch of work later. Arne.

 

[wineon4]

Hi,

I have 30 pounds of frozen blueberries that I am planning to make into wine. What is the best way to juice them? Should I add water or should I use all fruit and juice?

Can't wait to get started..I should add that I made a small batch (1 gallon) that I added water to equal 1 gallon with 5 lbs of macerated berries that I left in a mesh bag for one week...It's pretty darn good!~

Thanks!

I make upteen gallons of blueberry because I have 30 tame bushes that are always hanging heavy with large berries so blueberry is one of my best wines. I take 6lb per gallon so you should be fine with a 5 or 6 gallon batch. I put mine in a blender and add a small amount of blueberry juice and liquidfy them then I place directly into my primary ,no bag, this makes the first racking difficult but I think it gives better flavor. I leave in the primary untill around 1.01 then into the secondary and I don't get concerned if some of the berry lees and cap transfer in fact I try and transfer some. Leave in the secondary until .996 or lower then rack again stabalize and store for a few months. I know most use the bags but I never have with my fruit wines. My main passion are fruit wines and I have had some great success with them. Good luck, I can't wait until my berries are ready for this year.

 

[UBB]

FWIW, I made 10g of blueberry wine last fall and put them loose in the fermenter and used a industrial sized potato masher on them. Never again! Racking was a huge PITA. I would highly recommend using bags for the fruit.

 

[wineon4]

Yeah racking is harder but I like the flavor that comes from my method and will put up with the racking. I make primarly fruit wines and seem to get some great wines using this method. Just got a Gold for my Black Raspberry at Pittsburgh and it was made this way I used almost 10 of berries per gallon, what a project racking that wine was. I also freeze the fruit first and don't cook it as some do. With my banana I only use the peeled banana, NO peels in my wine. I blend them and don't cook the bananas either, made 12 gallon with 80 lb of bananas, it got a Silver. I might try a bag this berry season on a batch and compare the results.

 

[jswordy]

Easy as 1-2-3-4...

1. Put blueberries in bag and bag in bucket.

2. Put on disposable nitrile gloves. Sanitize with kmeta.

3. Gently squeeze bag to crush berries.

4. Dispose of gloves. Continue.

I've done it both ways. The lees are tremendous with loose berries. If you go the loose berry way and the berries are fresh, put them in a plastic gallon ziplock bag, squish them up, dump in bucket, repeat til done.

There is an intermediate step with loose berries that helps the secondary lees a lot. Buy several paint strainer bags and sanitize. Place one in a fiver. Transfer berries and liquid to strainer. When half full, remove and twist strainer to extract fluid from berries. Dump berries, if necessary dump fluid into a larger container, repeat.

When the bag gets clogged with lees (after about the second go-around), swap to a new bag. You may go through several bags, but the resulting wine will be a lot more fluid and a lot less lees for your secondary.

You can also immediately re-use the castaway berries with Welch's grape concentrate (use the basic Welch's recipe) for a concord-blueberry wine. I call mine Bell Bottom Blues.

 

[elenarain]

Thanks for all your comments! I am mashing my frozen berries today with a commercial potato masher IN a large fermentation bag..will leave the bag in the primary for the first week, while gently smushing them during that week. I want the color and added flavor from the seeds and skins...so hopefully will get that infusion during the first week. I love the idea of using the must to make a grape/blueberry wine! Thanks Jim..can't believe I didn't discover winemaking earlier..what a BLAST!

will let you know how it all turns out
¡SALUD!


elena
btw..nice label on the BBB

 

[wineon4]

May try that. I use a funnel with a screen. Nice looking lable, your bottles look great. I second run my berry lees also but I usually make a sketter pee with them I have a Lemon/blueberrry that is just awsome.