Grape Wine Prelude

Tomorrow, I will be making wine from concord grape concentrate, and grape juice from a recipe derived from Jack Keller's Welch concentrate wine recipe (below).

Welch's Frozen Grape Juice Wine

• 2 cans (11.5 oz) Welch's 100% frozen grape concentrate

• 1-1/4 lbs granulated sugar

• 2 tsp acid blend

• 1 tsp pectic enzyme

• 1 tsp yeast nutrient

• water to make 1 gallon

• wine yeast

Bring 1 quart water to boil and dissolve the sugar in the water. Remove from heat and add frozen concentrate. Add additional water to make one gallon and pour into secondary. Add remaining ingredients except yeast. Cover with napkin fastened with rubber band and set aside 12 hours. Add activated wine yeast and recover with napkin. When active fermentation slows down (about 5 days), fit airlock. When clear, rack, top up and refit airlock. After additional 30 days, stabilize, sweeten if desired and rack into bottles.

For my wine, I will be using 2 64oz bottles of Market Basket's 100% concord grape juice from concentrate, in addition to 1 can of Market Basket's frozen grape juice concentrate. This additional can will compensate for flavor lost through adding syrup initially, and will also bring total volume up to at least 1.2 gallons. This is so that we will end up with 1 gallon after the first racking, with a bit more to taste.

Grape Juice details-

• 2 bottles of 312g sugar + 1 can of 246g sugar = 870g sugar 
• Acid is unknown. According to nutrition facts, total should be around 2800% of daily intake on a 2000 calorie diet, according to Market Basket. This could be anywhere between 2 to 3.3 grams of Vitamin C (ascorbic acid).
• Frozen concentrate comes in 12oz cans, and makes 48oz of juice. Ascorbic acid added.

To start this wine, no acid will be added as people have complained about concentrate wines being too tart, and we are adding an additional can of frozen concentrate. Grape juice is also more sweet than our previous apple wine, and less sugar should be needed to get to the 1.090 SG mark.

Tentative Procedure:

1. Pour juices into plastic fermenter, after thawing out frozen concentrate.
2. Rinse out concentrate container with water and throw into pail.
3. Add 1 tsp pectic enzyme to mixture. Not heaped, but better to be over than under.
4. Make sugar syrup by mixing 1 cup of sugar into 1/2 cup of boiled water. Add slowly into wine to get it to 1.090 mark. It should not need the entirety of the solution, maybe only three quarters. (note: record the amount of sugar used)
5. Add 1 tsp yeast nutrient, make sure must is at a good temperature (60-80 degrees F)
6. Pitch 1 packet of Montrachet yeast by sprinkling on top.
7. Cover with cheesecloth and let primary ferment for 1 week. Airlock should be fitted after 3-5 days.

I will also be include wine tannin, as concord grapes naturally have low tannin content. 1/4 tsp wine tannin as per the previous apple wine should do. Concord grapes have a low tannin content and high levels of Methyl anthranilate, which is the taste of grape juice or jelly. This is the difference between concord grapes (Vitis labrusca) and typical wine grapes (Vitis vinifera).