Wine making kits

[andrewo]

Anyone have any idea where I can get a decent wine making kit (without the wine package) for a reasonable price. Found one for �15 but they wouldn't let you buy it without the wine package! Which was another �30.

I just want to make some wine but have limited space.

Andrewo

[Jaxom]

misspent youth

Here is a subject I know a little about or at least I used to do. When I was eleven my foster brother and I took up wine making for a hobby, Michael was a year older than I was so why we were ever allowed to start making wine sometimes puzzles me still.
We saved up our pocket money and bought a starter kit from Boots the Chemist. We bought the medium sweet white wine kit. A fortnight later we went back and bought a Red kit. Between the two starter kits we had enough equipment to make many batches of wine. The only thing that was missing was the demijohns, airlocks and the ingredients.
The Demijohns and airlocks were sold separately in Boots. We still had bungs left in the kits as well as all the sterilising solution and camden tablets etc.
Wine bottles were not needed as we got empty bottles from the local pub. Recycling in action twenty nine years ago.
The ingredients often came from the fruit and vegetable outdoor market at the end of the day when things were cheep. Other ingredients came off my foster parent�s allotment or from the hedgerows locally. The only thing we had to buy was sugar. We once made fifteen gallons of Elderberry wine in three five-gallon plastic cubes that we got from the local chemist. In those days the chemist sold it by the pint. (I kid you not)
Soon our bed room smelt of fermenting wine. The airing cupboard was so full there was no room for laundry.
We sold the wine for twenty pence a bottle and managed to make a profit on our output. In the end it got a little crazy. But what I think I am trying to say is buy a basic starter kit and then purchase the extras on single basses.
You would be surprised how equipment comes your way when you can trade finished wine for it.
Oh and by the way the carrot wine that the landlord in the Gardeners rest offers round so much is based on a recipe by author C.J.J. Berry and when finished will knock your socks off. I first made it when I was twelve.
C.J.J. Berry
I have found this book by C.J.J. Berry to be the only one I ever needed it is a classic.
hope you have fun if you take up wine making.

[Jaxom]

Anyone have any idea where I can get a decent wine making kit (without the wine package) for a reasonable price. Found one for �15 but they wouldn't let you buy it without the wine package! Which was another �30.

I just want to make some wine but have limited space.

Andrewo

Hi Andrewo
I take back everything I posted in my last post
I have just gone looking on the net and found the whole winemaking/hobby environment has changed.
Shows you how long ago, I last made wine. Where have all the people gone who want to make wine with out using grapes? It seems as though everyone wants his or her wine finished yesterday. When I made wine the process took years. The ingredients took anything from 48 hours to one week in a bucket before it ever got near a demijohn; now everything seems to be ...Have your own supermarket type wine in six weeks.
What ever happened to vegetable wines? The joys of picking your own ingredients from the hedgerows? I think I now feel as old as the first ever winemaker "Noah" I'm going to see if I can find an Ark and sulk.
Jax

[Catriona]

The last time i had homemade wine it was gorse wine and fantastic. Gorse is certainly plentiful and free but does anyone know how to make it? Would love to make it and it was great but dont know how.

[dni_dave]

More wines

Gorse wine? There is a use for it then?

All I need now are wines for the following;

Doc Leaf Liqueur
Chickweed Cocktail
Bramble Brew
Dandelion Distillation

I'm sure there are loads of recipes for the last one already!

[andrewo]

Christmas

I've asked for one for Christmas! It's easier. Not sure that I would want any wine made out of chickweed.

Now pea wine.........that it dangerous.

Andrewo

[Dadnlad]

Jax - Dont despair just yet ! We (me and a 2'6" person aged 2 and a bit), have taken up home winemaking this autumn - great fun
We picked up a 2nd hand CJBerry First Steps on Ebay for a few pence, and have spent many blissfull afternoons wandering local fields and hedgerows in our wellies ! Elderberry(2 versions cos we picked too much), blackberry, damson, sloe, and wild greengage have all been 'appropriated', and turned into wine and a little jam.
I have found it cheaper to pick up 1gall plastic water bottles from supermarket for around 70p than glass dj's(and safer with a toddler!) and many people suddenly remember an old stash of equipment in the cupboard when we mention winemaking
Apart from a little 'taster', we are stowing the finished wines in the loft till their birthdays
Now cant wait for spring to do rhubarb, broad bean, and elderflower !

[dni_dave]

Now cant wait for spring to do rhubarb, broad bean, and elderflower !

Rhubarb wine - so I can grow it for more than just crumble. Good news.

I have also bought CJBerry's book for the good lady's Xmas stocking.

[brewer]

Hi! Catrian and dni dave, I have found one gallon demijohns and larger left next to glass recycling containers as they do not fit in the holes. Generally it is recommend that you brew five gallon loads of stand-by wines such as apple using windfalls from friends. This can be drunk as is, or used to blend with the fruitier blackcurrent/blackberry style of wines. Glass is easier to keep clean as it does not scratch like plastic and in wine making cleanliness is all. . If you wish to make wine from leaves use new growth but you may need to add some other fruit to give the wine body such as grapes or apples. I have brewed with gorse before as previously posted but the flowers are the best bit and rival elder flowers for perfume. The flowers attract insects, that is what they are for, so place in netting and immerse in water untill they all swim out, unless you want the protein???

[Birdie Wife]

Hi brewer, do you have a recipe for heather beer? I think it's hops and heather shoots but I don't know about quantities.

[andrewo]

Heather beer, is made the usual way, but when you strain the beer at the end you run it through heather contained in muslin, you do this several times. You do not put the heather directly into the beer but use it as a straining medium to wash the beer through, you can do this with lavender or rosemary too (however beware of the latter as taken in large quantities it has a hallucinogenic quality).

[Birdie Wife]

Hi Andrewo, thanks for the speedy reply, that sounds lovely. like the idea of using lavender or rosemary as well, and (just realised!) sorry to hijack your thread briefly!

[andrewo]

Oh God no, feel free, hijack away, anything to help, I have had lavender beer and heather beer before and they are lovely and such a simple way, you must make sure though that you do it while the liquid is hot/warm so as to take in the aroma.

[pigletwillie]

Sprout wine?

[sewer rat]

Never tried home made heather beer but there isa commercially available version called "Fraoch" (pronounced froch) and it is really really really nice.