Double time wine making.

With wine on the mind or maybe from siphoning the blackberry wine, I was motivated to get two other batches of wine started today. The kitchen was ready or should I say messy so the next phase of wine processing was not a big deal. I have been collecting numerous fruits and freezing them this summer for a day like this. One of the batches is an Asian pear /apple wine and the other a fig wine. Yes that is right Fig. I find making wine from fruit you collect is part of the fun. So each wine has its story on the origins of how I got the fruit.

First wine. Asian pear/apple wine. I had made this type of wine before and figured I would get started with something I was familiar with. I was able to get free Asian pears from volunteering with the Portland Fruit tree project. I came away with around 14lbs of pears and a knot on the top of the head from getting hit by one. No concussion but a nasty knot of the top of the head. I could not pass up enjoying some fresh pears. Needless to say I was 4lbs less of pears. I decided to add 3 frozen apple juice concentrates for the wine. I boiled some water and sugar, put the puree of fruit in the straining bag, and rest of ingredients. Now, the wine is sitting happy for its 24 resting period.

Second wine. Making the brother wine-the fig wine. Figs - where do you get them? I asked myself that too but found out from a neighbor that there was a fig tree just down the street in a vacant lot right along Jenkins St. I went two times to harvest the figs. Bringing along a rake, I was able to pull down the ones that were hanging out of arms length. So if you were driving along Jenkins sometime and saw someone along the road/ditch with a rake going at the fig tree it was probably me. Not a bad harvest with over 8 lbs of figs. On to making of the fig wine. I had no clue of how to make this wine so a quick Google search left me with over a couple hundred recipes to pick from. With a quick glance at the first couple of websites, I was able to pick a recipe that I had all the ingredients for and was off to the races. Luckily, I had frozen the figs already cooked down crushed and mashed so I had one less step to do. Making the fig wine was actually very similar to making other wine steps. Only difference was the ingredient amounts were a little different but the basic principles of wine making was there. Now the fig wine sits next to the pear/apple wine in the kitchen ready for their yeast party tomorrow. In around 4 months the wines should be ready. The beginning of next year there will be 3 yummy wines to try out.

Blackberry Wine

With the excitement of wine harvest in Oregon, it was only fitting Jackie and I dust off our wine making skills and try our hand at making a homemade wine again. What do you get when you combine wild Oregon Blackberries and wild Wisconsin grape juice? A delicious Blackberry wine that is. Yum Yum. It all began on October 10th. We sanitized all the equipment, put the crushed blackberries in the straining bag, poured all the grape juice in, and dropped the rest of ingredients into the pail. It was ready for its 24 hour rest. The first fermentation stage or when the real party started with the yeast was on October 11th. Another two weeks went by with the yeast still enjoying the warm party atmosphere of the hot water closet. On the 3oth, the party ended. Sadly for the yeast but happy for the winemakers. This brings us to today. The wine made it to its final resting place till next year and before the big individual bottling. Another two months of resting for clarity and flavor development. We are looking around the beginning of New Year to try the wine and possibly bottle. The estimation of alcohol is around 11%-12%. As another experiment at that time, we are going to take part of the wine and make a port.