Wow! Real Wine!

Congratulations and welcome!

Not a bad recipe, but you might try some wine recipes that are a little more up to date and which should give you a better taste. First, I'm going to give you the one of the best web sites around on making wine at home, it is Jack Keller's site -

Now, if you look through the site, you'll notice you can make this as easy or difficult as you want - it depends on you. I would encourage you to start out on some simple recipes and work your way up. I would also encourage you to use wine yeast, you'll get a better tasting wine, and a bung & airlock (instead of a balloon). Yes, you can make wine from oranges, there should be a recipe at Jack's site. Good-luck.

Darlene

In general, it is better to try to precipitate the cloudiness through one of many "fining" methods (including the simplest method of all --- aging), rather than filtering. Coffee filters will only remove the largest of particles. The various infiltrates that cause cloudines will usually pass right through.

Activated charcoal will remove almost everything of value from your wine --- colour, flavour, acid, perhaps even alcohol. :)

The charcoal may have removed some of the alcohol --- I'm not sure if it does. There are two other possibilities. Firstly, bread yeast will only ferment to about 9% alcohol at best, which is pretty weak for wine. Secondly, it may have stopped fermenting even sooner if the sugar content was excessive, or for other reasons, and the alcohol content may have been even less. I suspect all three may have occured.

Wine, by definition, is alcoholic. However, they do market "non-alcoholic" wine and beer --- which (I believe) has had (most of) the alcohol removed post-fermentation.

If, by cake yeast, you mean bread yeast or bakers yeast: Yes it will work, but it will produce a wine which is so low in alcohol that it won't keep very long, and the wine will probably taste "yeasty". Individual packets of wine yeast (good for 1-5 gallon batches) cost $0.38-$1.10, depending where you buy them. They are well worth the investment.

Preferably you should use other methods first. After the wine stops fermenting, it should be topped up and allowed to sit for about a month. By this time it should be fairly clear. [I suppose you could drink it then, if you wanted, but it will be to your advantage to wait.]

Then it should be racked (siphoned) off the sediment into another container, and topped up again. Campden tablets (or Metabisulphite powder) should be added at the rate of 1 tablet (or 1 tsp. of 10% solution per gallon) at this and all subsequent rackings. At this stage it should be moved into cold storage (28-32ºF), which will help it to clear.

After another 2-3 months it should be racked aagin. If it still isn't clear, you can decide whether to just wait or add any of a number of "fining agents". These "agents" can be as unsophisticated as tea or egg-whites, or they can be special proprietary formulas. Sometimes more than one fining-agent is needed.

Red wines, and other wines with a lot of tannin tend to clear by themselves. White wines and other low-tannin wines usually need some sort of fining.

The ballon "airlock" works, but it is risky. Balloons often become detached and fly away, or they can burst. It's best to obtain a drilled-rubber stopper and a plastic airlock (about $1 each), but you can also use some Saran (cling) wrap with a rubber-band. Best to use two rubber bands, because they do break with age.

The primary reason for racking is to get the wine off the sediment buildup, because it can impart bad flavours and other problems. But [the aeration that occurs during] racking also helps a wine to clear. The metabisulfite also helps a wine to clear, besides protecting it from bacterial spoilage.

You can make a very nice wine with orange juice. Jack Keller has several recipes at his site, as well as excellent instructions for beginners and experienced winemakers alike:

We all were not so very long ago.

We all are. :)

Whoa! Thanks for all the info! There is a saying that " Everyone reduces a complex problem to their own levle of understanding". I am a newbe for sure...Thanks for the insights!

Good group here!

Dennis