Joy of Home Wine Making (22 page)

ORANGE WINE

This wine, like grapefruit wine, is more of a social wine, for sipping in the garden or in the evening with friends. Get organic oranges, since you will be using some of the zest. Otherwise wash them well before scraping the zest.

3¾ quarts water

2 lbs. sugar or 2¼ lbs. light honey (orange blossom is good!)

10 heavy juice oranges

no acid

¼ tsp. tannin

1 tsp. yeast nutrient

1 Campden tablet, crushed (optional)

½ tsp. pectic enzyme

1 packet champagne yeast

Boil the water and sugar or honey, and skim, if necessary. Use the zest of four or five of the oranges. Then peel the fruits, and section them, getting rid of as much white pith as you can. Put the segments and the zest in a nylon straining bag, and put it in the bottom of a primary fermenter. Mash with very clean hands or a sanitized potato masher.

Pour the hot sugar water over the crushed fruit. If you prefer, you can chill and reserve half the water beforehand; if you’ve done so, you can pour it in now to bring the temperature down quickly. Add the yeast nutrient and tannin, but wait till the temperature comes down to add the Campden tablet if you choose to. Cover and fit with an air lock. Twelve hours after the Campden tablet, add the pectic enzyme. If you don’t use the tablet, merely wait until the must cools down to add the pectic enzyme. Be sure to use the pectic enzyme.

Check the PA and write it down.

Twenty-four hours later, add the yeast. Stir down daily. After about one week, remove the bag (don’t squeeze). After the sediment has settled down again, check the PA. If it is above 3 to 4 percent, let the must ferment for another week or so and rack the wine into your glass fermenter. Bung and fit with an air lock.

NOTE: Use this recipe for tangerine wine, too, using as many tangerines or mandarin oranges as oranges. You should add 1 teaspoon acid blend, because these fruits aren’t as high in acid as oranges.

For lemon or lime wine, use only six to seven lemons or limes, with zest from three of them.

Fresh homegrown lemons or limes are the best. If you live in California or Florida, you’ll probably be able to get them from friends or your own tree. Worth doing, if you can manage it. Nice especially in punches and coolers.

Rack the wine once or twice during secondary fermentation.

In four to six months, check the PA. Taste it. You might want to sweeten it when you bottle it. Use stabilizer, and add 2 to 6 ounces of sugar boiled in water. Keep it for six months to a year before trying. Serve chilled, maybe even with ice.

MATCHED PEAR

Use ripe pears only. You might have to buy them unripe and ripen them, which is easy to do in a brown paper bag. Pears make a pleasant mild wine; people have been making pear wine for a long time.

3½ quarts or so of water

2 lbs. of sugar or 2 lbs. light honey (highly recommended)

4 lbs. ripe pears

1 Campden tablet, crushed (recommended)

2 tsp. acid blend

1 tsp. yeast nutrient

¼ tsp. tannin

½ tsp. pectic enzyme

1 packet champagne yeast

Boil the water and sugar or honey, and skim, if necessary. Wash the pears well, remove the stems, cut them in half, and take out the cores. No need to peel. Cut the pears in chunks and put them in a fine nylon straining bag and into the bottom of a primary fermenter. With a sanitized potato masher, mash the pears with the Campden tablet.

Pour the hot sugar water over the crushed fruit. If you prefer, you can chill and reserve half the water beforehand; if you’ve done so, you can pour it in now to bring the temperature down quickly. Add the yeast nutrient and tannin, but wait till the temperature comes down to add another Campden tablet if you choose to. Cover and fit with an air lock. Twelve hours after the Campden tablet, add the pectic enzyme. If you don’t use the tablet, merely wait until the must cools down to add the pectic enzyme. Be sure to use the pectic enzyme. Stir daily.

After a week, lift out the pear pulp, and let the bag drain into the primary fermenter. When the wine settles, check the PA. If it is above 3 to 4 percent, let it continue for another week or so,
then rack the wine off into a glass secondary fermenter. Bung and fit with an air lock. A couple of weeks after that, do it again, making up the level with a little boiled water if you have to.

Rack the wine again in the next two to six months, and wait for it to ferment out and clear. Bottle the wine. This is better when sweetened a little, so stabilize it, and add 2 to 6 ounces of sugar in a bit of water, if you like. Keep six months to a year. Serve chilled.

NOTE: To make perry, which is like hard apple cider, use only ¾ to 1 pound of sugar. It will take less time to ferment out and clear, and it will have less alcohol. Bottle when done and try in two months. I actually like this better than pear wine.

If you know how to bottle beer, you can bottle it in capped beer bottles or in capped champagne bottles, with 1½ tablespoons of sugar per gallon to make it sparkle. DO NOT USE REGULAR WINE BOTTLES for this. Read ahead in the sparkling wine section (Sparkling Wines) to learn how to bottle this way if you don’t know how.

HAWAIIAN PINEAPPLE WINE

Our beautiful fiftieth state produces superb pineapples, which are shipped fresh to us less fortunates. It takes a bit of shopping to find a truly ripe pineapple. When you do, they are frequently on sale, so grab a couple of good ones and zip home with them. Pineapples are ripe when they are fragrant, a little sticky, and the top knot of leaves is loose. Don’t buy them if they are over the hill, because they’ve started fermenting on their own!

3½ quarts or so of water