Quality vs Cost (grapes vs juice)

[heatherd]

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]

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]

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]

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]

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]

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

 

[terroirdejeroir]

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]

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!

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]

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

 

[terroirdejeroir]

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?