Rhubarb Wine

[Samurailord]

I started a rhubarb wine with a couple of sticks from the garden about 10 days ago, and it has started to ferment quite nicely now. I used a recipe from John Wright, the foraging fella who hangs sround with Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall.



I have been told that it is a nice wine for blending as it doesn't change existing flavours in the other wine, but I think I will keep it pure as a light, summer's afternoon tipple. (Assuming that we actually get a proper summer this year)



I am hoping that it will be ready to drink in about two weeks time - I will let you all know how it tastes.

Andy

[Jeanied]

Looking good Andy!

[lettucegrow!]

Have never tried making wine and the rhubarb is the only thing flourishing in the garden right now. Is it easy?

[Farmer_Gyles]

Have never tried making wine and the rhubarb is the only thing flourishing in the garden right now. Is it easy?

winemaking is very easy!
the hardest part is getting your head around the vast amount of information .... you'll find 10 people telling you 10 different methods and 10 different recipes .... but then you realise they're all "right" .... and it's easy to stick to basic recipes, basic ingredients, basic methods

[lettucegrow!]

Might give it a go then when we get back from hols.

[Farmer_Gyles]

post on here when you're ready and someone will tell you what equipment to get and how to get started - it's easy

[Hazel at the Hill]

I am hoping that it will be ready to drink in about two weeks time - I will let you all know how it tastes.

By all means have some once is is ready, Andy, but like most homemade wines (at least all those that I have made) I think that you will find that it tastes much better if you can leave it alone for a bit - it's ok after about three months, I think (from memory) but I leave all my wines for twelve months.

I'm on last year's rhubarb wine now, and it is lovely and light - and as you say, just perfect for a summer's evening.

[redser]

I had no idea it could be ready so quickly! A local lady advertised wine making gear for free (her husband was a hobbyist but sadly died last year). I got three demijohns and other equipment and she also gave me a bottle of his plum wine. So kind. After reading this I'm going to get started and try some rhubarb wine this weekend. Thanks for posting!
ps. any chance of a quick rundown of what you did? I have one of those plastic tube thingys in the set. Cheers

[chris]

There's one that ready very fast - in the brewing forum here

[redser]

Thanks! Must get reading!

[Samurailord]

Hi Redser

Like others on here have said, brewing wine is really easy and quite forgiving.

You need

1.5Kg rhubarb
1.5kg sugar
1 tsp Pectolase
1 sachet general purpose white wine yeast
1 campden tablet

To make my rhubarb wine I cut 1.5kg of rhubarb and sliced it into 6mm slices. I should have frozen it at that point but I forgot. (freezing breaks down the walls between the cells and enables more juice to come out of the fruit/veg)

Put your sliced fruit into a sterilised bucket and cover with 1.5kg of sugar. Put the lid on and leave for three days.

Crush the pulp with a potato masher to get all that lovely juice out, then add 3 litres of cooled boiled water.

Strain the lot through some muslin into another steralised bucket and add 250ml white grape juice concentrate (you can get this from Wilkinsons and some larger Tescos if you don't have a local home brew shop). Add more cooled boiled water to make it up to 4.5 litres and add a sachet of general purpose white wine yeast and a teaspoon of Pectolase (bought from the same place you got the concentrate)

Cover and leave for another week, then use a syphon tube to transfer the liquid to a clean demijar and fit a bubble trap. Leave for another three or four weeks and you should find that the yeast has thrown a layer of sediment at the bottom of the jar.

Use your syphon tube and transfer the liquid only to a new jar, make up the volume back to 4.5L with a sugar solution of three parts boiled water to one part sugar, allowed to cool before adding to the demijar. At this stage it doesn't matter too much if you get some sediment in the new jar.

Once there are no more bubbles coming through the trap your wine is ready and can be syphoned very carefully into a clean demi jar (now it is important not to get any sediment transferred) and then add a crushed campden tablet that has been disolved in a little of the wine. This will cause any remaining yeast to drop out of solution to the bottom of the jar, hopefully giving you a clear wine.

Once the wine has cleared (if it won't do it naturally you can buy a product called wine finings which is wonderful for this) syphon into a clean demi john and then bottle.

Have a taste before you bottle it to make sure the sweetness is to your liking - if it is too dry add a bit of artificial sweetner to the demi jar until you get to an acceptable level of sweetness.

It is important not to use sugar for this as that will restart the fermentation process and give you the possibility of bottle bombs if the CO2 build up inside the bottle gets too much.

It can be drunk straight away, but is best to leave for a while for the flavours to develop and stabilise.

Hope this helps

Andy

[chris]

There's one that ready very fast - in the brewing forum here

I had no idea it could be ready so quickly! A local lady advertised wine making gear for free (her husband was a hobbyist but sadly died last year). I got three demijohns and other equipment and she also gave me a bottle of his plum wine. So kind. After reading this I'm going to get started and try some rhubarb wine this weekend. Thanks for posting!
ps. any chance of a quick rundown of what you did? I have one of those plastic tube thingys in the set. Cheers

Realised I hadn't submitted my answer - I'd left a tab open and forgot about it until I just saw it now.

Anyway-

This is the one I was on about: http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...wine_2365.html

[redser]

Thanks very much Samurailord and chris

[redser]

How did it come out Andy? You inadvertantly got me into brewing last June and I've been busy at it since
Started a Rhubarb off last July and sampled some last night. Man, NOW I understand what they mean by 'buttery'. It's pure magic. Going to leave it a few more months though.

[Betty 1966]

Rhubarb wine

Help please !!!!!!!!
Followed the recipe for rhubarb wine and after 3 days the mixture in the bucket had got mould on it !!!!!!!
Also I could not mash the rhubarb as it was still quite hard