Welch's wine

Hi Luc, I did a Welch once, I don't know what I did because that's back when I didn't keep records but I do know I used the sweetened Welch instead of the pure 100% welches juice. (couldn't find the 100%). It turned out sweet and very pale, sort of fuchsia. Almost a wine cooler more than anything. Louise:o)

Hi,

I got the real juice one but they added a little bit of sugar in it. Basiclly the ingredients are grape juice, water, concentrated grape juice then some sugar and some ascorbic acid. It's not said sweet on the bottle, it tastes sweet. I'll see how it's coming out.

Thank you, Luc

Welch's 100% Juice and Juice concentrates make excellent wines.. Adjust Acidity and SG as needed. I suggest the recipes on Jack Keller's website as a starting point. My White Grape/Raspberry picked up a second place finish last year.

Later, A.J. Rawls Anchorage, Alaska, USA

I made some welch recently. Red came out very sweet. I added way too much sugar to the basic recipe. BTW, I used 100%, second time I used white which is in 2nd stage of racking. I sampled prior to 2nd racking and it taste pretty good so far, very dry.

Hello,

Well, after 3 days the bubbles are going down, so I guess we're going to secondary fermentation soon. The liquid is much more lighter than it was at the beginning. I used red grape juice. The liquid was a purple really dark red. and right now it's a light red. I still cannot see throught which is normal, I think. Like all the alcool I'll let it ferment totally for a month (about) and wait a few months before taste one. I'll let you know what happened.

The receipe so far, I'm having a 1.5 gallon secondary fermenter, I putted in it, real 100% red welch's grape juice (not frozen) and I put the baker's yeast and that's it. It's smelling good so far.

Have a good day, Luc

AJ,

That is fantastic news. Others have said the same thing, that they make fine wines. I guess it doesn't really surprise me, because I know how picky Welch's is about their grapes and the fruit content. My girlfriend works at Welch's, so I have an opportunity to pick up the concentrates or straight juice at very discounted case prices every Wednesday.

Right now, I have 1 gal batches going as samples, and I am waiting for results to see which ones to do in bulk. I like red's mostly, but haven't picked up the concord 100% juice to try yet. I use ec-1118, not bakers yeast and sugar amounts vary depending on the product. (notes not here)

Strawberry/raspberry white grape/rasp white grape white grape peach Orange Pineapple (Not Welch's) Strawberry Kiwi (Not Welch's)

I have just started these batches, well, they are in secondary stage. In your experience,

I will probably do 3 or 5 gal batches if/when I am pleased with the results.

Thanks for all your help,

Greg

Hi,

Follow-up for the batch. I remove the stuff in the bottom yesterday. I can see through the welch again. All the sugar and yeast went down by itself (no bentonite used). Now it's super nice. The welch came back to is original color, dark red. Still doing bubbles. I'll wait a good 2 weeks before thinking about bottling. So far, smells like a fruitty wine. I haven't tasted it yesterday. So far, everything's going well. Hope it taste good. I'll post again later.

This is what I did with the last batch I made from White Grape Concentrate (Niagra):

I usually rack the wine when it appears to be clear and then every two months until it fails to drop any sediment. I try to stabalize/bottle after the wine is clear..

But I found that I need to filter the Niagra every time or it develops sediment in the bottle. I do not know why this does not happen with the Niagra/Fruit combinations.

I use whichever wine yeast I happen to have... I have never used baker's or brewer's yeast. I make White Grape dry... I make Red Grape (Concord) dry... I make all of the concentrates with fruit juice medium... Usually 3 oz of wine conditioner per gallon because that is what my kids like. The wine that took second was semi-sec (2oz wine conditioner per gallon).

My kids tell me the White Grape/Fruit wine need at least 6 months bottle aging.

An observation on making Welch's Niagara wine. I made my first batch this last year. Definately not my last. Started at SG = 1.090 and ended at

Anyone else have this experience? I am suspecting it may be glycerine formation. Any comments? I have tasted Niagara grapes and they do have an unusual taste for a grape. Very honey like.

Ray

Ray, I think this is just the way Niagara grape wines taste. I've made this wine many times and it always finishes with just a hint of sugar that isn't really there. Has to be the grapes....

Jack Keller, The Winemaking Home Page

I am sure you are right, Jack. To me, that would indicate that it would make an excellent base for any fruit wine that calls for grape juice or raisins to add vinuosity as most fruit wines are beter with a hint of sugar. I will be playing with this. I know you already have.

Ray

Hello,

Well, everything went into bottle today. The color is light red. I had a glass with the left-over wine from the 1.5 gal. I got. Doesn't taste bad. It tastes like Welch's with a little bit of alchool. I havn't added sugar so it did a 6% batch. I just restarted one, I did mesurements to get something like 14% alchool. I putted pepper too into it to try a pepper wine. Fermentation is going on since this morning. Next week-end it's secondary time. I'll keep you posted.

Have a nice day, Luc

Transfert has been made. I almost passed out when I had the pepper draft. Well, Maybe I putted too much for the quantity of wine... Experiment... I noted everything anyways and I'll reajust later if needed. Right now, it's making big bubbles in the secondary. Liquid is still unclear.