Fruit wines are a special category.
At first glance, the technology for their preparation is no different from the production of grape wines, but some nuances still exist.
They are caused, first of all, by the biochemical properties of fruit and berry raw materials, affecting the quality and taste of wine.
Gooseberries are called "northern grapes." But with some external similarities, the same valuable biochemical composition and varietal variety of berries, from the point of view of the requirements for wine materials, gooseberries are inferior to grapes in the content of juice, sugar and acid. However, the taste diversity brought by other fruits besides grapes does not stop home winemakers from striving to create new wines. In addition, grapes are a culture more demanding on soil and climatic conditions, and the vast majority of its varieties are not grown in areas remote from southern Russia. But other fruits are regularly and universally given generous harvests to summer residents and residents of the countryside, making it possible to prepare not only preserves, jams, compotes and juices, but also regularly replenish the home collection of wines.
Gooseberry Wine - General Technological Principles
As noted above, for the manufacture of wine the most important criteria for the selection of raw materials is a balanced content of sugar and acid, as well as the ability of the fruit to separate the maximum amount of juice. According to these parameters, grapes are considered the best raw materials for winemaking. As for the rest of the crops, including gooseberries, it requires the use of special preparation of raw materials before the fermentation process begins.
Gooseberries, all one and a half thousand known varieties, have a significantly higher acidity than any grape variety, as well as significantly lower sugar content. Therefore, gooseberry juice before setting for fermentation must be improved: add sugar and water.
Wine made from natural gooseberry juice, without the addition of sugar, has a low spirituality and is not stable, quickly loses the qualities inherent in good wines.
Dry gooseberry wines have a strength of up to 12% and are stored for no more than 6-8 months. The fortress gives wine a raw material containing a large amount of sugar, which is not enough in gooseberries. There is a simple formula for increasing the strength of alcoholic beverages: 20 g of sugar increases the strength by 1%.
On average, gooseberries contain 9% sugar. Based on this value, we add the necessary amount of sugar, based on one liter of juice, to obtain the necessary strength.
It is best to make strong, dessert and liquor wines from these berries. A good result can be achieved by blending (mixing) finished wines or wine raw materials during its processing. Gooseberries are not “grapes”, they belong to the genus of currants, so its combination with any kind of currant is very harmonious and complementary. In principle, gooseberry berries do not have a sharply defined smell and taste, therefore this culture can be used in the preparation of wine not only with any fruit, but also to create good vermouth compositions, which, as you know, are prepared with the addition of alcohol and various spicy herbal compositions.
Water in the manufacture of wine from gooseberries is necessary in order to balance acidity and increase the volume of juice. Gooseberries contain 2.5% acid. To obtain a good quality wine, acid is half as much. Accordingly, the juice or pulp must be increased in volume using a neutral liquid exactly twice. High acidity of gooseberries is a prerequisite for the instant "occupation" of the wort by a colony of microorganisms that create vinegar rather than wine. Wine yeast, of course, acid is also necessary, but in much smaller quantities than its content, even in ripe and sweet gooseberries. It is important at the same time to comply with the measure and not try to add water more than the specified value so that the wine does not turn out cloudy, with a rapidly developing putrefactive odor. Use good quality distilled or purified water. Despite the fact that water is considered a neutral medium, everyone remembers that it is a good solvent and has a taste that it will convey to the wine. In extreme cases, just boil it, let it stand and carefully pour into another container before adding it to the future wine. It is even better to add water with sugar, making syrup.
It is possible to improve the separation of juice from berries by preliminary fermentation of the pulp. To do this, gooseberries are sorted, carefully sorted, removing moldy or rotten berries, they are cleaned of dry inflorescences, stalks, but are not washed in order to preserve wild yeast that lives on the surface of all fruits in natural conditions. The degree of maturity of the berries also affects the juice separation: from green berries you can never squeeze more juice than from berries that have reached technical maturity. But at the same time, over-ripening should not be allowed, since the opposite effect begins: the amount of juice in the overripe berries decreases, and their taste becomes worse, which will necessarily affect the quality of the wine.
The prepared berries are crushed, sugar or honey is added, the container is covered with gauze folded in several layers to leave oxygen accessible and to protect the wort as much as possible from dust, debris and bacteria harmful to wine. Immediately after the start of fermentation, a water shutter is installed, or a rubber glove with a small hole for the release of accumulated gas is put on the neck of the bottle. For the gas released during fermentation inside the tank, free space must be left, for which the bottles with the “playing” wine are filled in no more than ¾ of the volume in order to avoid rupture of the filled vessel.
Given the high acid content in gooseberries, choose the right utensils and tools to work to prevent oxidation.
Recipe 1. Gooseberry wine dessert, sweet
Fortified dessert wines contain more sugar than table ones - up to 20%, but this does not mean that all the necessary sugar must be added immediately. Everyone knows that in jams and jams, fruits and sugar are also present, but fermentation does not occur. Why?
Excess sugar inhibits the work of yeast, and its addition in large volumes gives the effect of conservation. Even the simplest living organisms are programmed by nature in such a way that a too favorable living environment, an excess of reserves act on them relaxingly. Simply, sufficient supplies of food and energy suppress the spirit of competition and “struggle for a place in the sun”: why hurry up and push each other in line if there is enough sugar for everyone. Therefore, to create semi-sweet, sweet and dessert wines, add sugar in parts, with an interval of 7-10 days, so that the yeast is not lazy.
Composition:
Mash (crushed berries) 7.1 kg
Water 3.6 L
Sugar 3.8 kg
Fortress - 15-17%;
Acidity - 0.8%
Yield: 12 L
Cooking:
From the kilogram of gooseberry comes the same amount of pulp - chopped or crushed berries. From the same amount of raw materials, you can get up to 550 - 600 ml of juice. The volume of loss of the finished wine will depend on the method and quality of the extraction and subsequent clarification, filtration, but should not exceed 10%.
7.1 kg of berries = 4.44 l of juice, unclarified. The color of the finished wine resembles the color of freshly brewed black tea.
Sugar must be divided into approximately 3 equal parts. From the first portion, boil the syrup, adding an equal volume of water. The color of the syrup is golden brown. When preparing it, remove the foam. That is, you need to take 1.25 kg of sugar, add the same amount of water, boil the syrup and cool it to 20 degrees, pour into the pulp. Boil the rest of the water, cool to the same temperature, mix with the contents of the bottle and hold the bottle with a sealed gauze filter or cotton swab. For 3-4 days, before the start of the active phase of fermentation, mix the wort 2-3 times a day. When bubbles appear, install a tight shutter, allowing air to move only to the outlet. After 10-12 days, add the second part of sugar, and after a week - the rest.
In the process of fermentation, keep the wine at a temperature not lower than 16 degrees. The optimum temperature is 20-22 degrees. Avoid direct sunlight. When the active fermentation ends, that is, the visible signs of gas evolution disappear, try wine. At this time, if desired, you can increase the sugar content and put the bottle in a cooler room for clarification. When sediment appears at the bottom, pour the wine using a tube, being careful not to shake the settled small particles. If necessary, repeat the operation after a couple of weeks. Pour the wine into bottles, seal and store in the basement.
Recipe 2. Gooseberry wine fortified, semi-sweet
Fortified wine with the addition of alcohol, wormwood notes and other spicy herbs can be prepared from gooseberry berries. The composition of the herbs depends on personal preferences, but the presence of alcohol, sugar and herbal flavors greatly ennobles even unstable wines such as gooseberry wine.
Composition:
For strong gooseberry table wine:
Wine Yeast 300 g (1 sachet)
Sugar 1.8 kg
Gooseberry Juice 3.5 L
Water 5.3 L
Dry bird cherry (berries) 150 g
For tincture:
Alcohol, purified (96%) 1.0 L
Herbs, dry:
Wormwood, Alpine
Schisandra
Melissa
Nutmeg
Chamomile
Cinnamon
Vanilla
Cardamom
Roasted coffee
Cooking:
Grind all dry herbs into powder, making a composition at random according to your taste. At the end of the infusion, you should get a strong drink with a very rich aroma and taste: Remember that they will need to add wine.
The duration of preparation of strong wine from gooseberries reaches two months. All this time, the alcohol tincture must be stored in a tightly closed container, in a dark place and shaken regularly. Before topping it with wine, it must be carefully filtered.
For the wine, prepare the berries, mash them and combine with half the sugar. Boil the water, cool it to 22 degrees, add the second part of sugar and stir until the lumps are removed. Add the yeast water to the must, warmed to the same temperature. Add cherry berries to the wort. Mix thoroughly before fermentation begins, and immediately install the shutter. After fermentation is complete, remove the wine from the precipitate and add the purified tincture. Stir and, tightly closing the container, remove the vermouth for a couple of months to ripen in a dark place. At this time, storage at room temperature is already allowed. If necessary, re-remove from the sediment, after which the drink can be sealed in bottles.
Recipe 3. Gooseberry Wine - A Refreshing Cocktail
Sometimes a well-prepared home-made wine is a little “out of reach” in taste or alcohol content. The problem can be solved by mixing two or three types of fruit wine, choosing them depending on the properties that need to be obtained in the final drink. For example, to flavor a gooseberry wine, you can combine it with raspberry or strawberry wine, in equal parts, or add more raspberry aroma. Mixing the finished wines can lead to repeated fermentation, especially if they have different strength and sugar content. To prevent this from happening, the wine is sealed by adding alcohol or vodka to it. You can use other, stronger drinks, giving the wine a new taste.
Composition:
Gooseberry wine, table (12%) 3 l
Peppermint Liqueur (40%) 0.7 L
Lemon tincture (93.6%) 300 ml
Sugar 1.2 kg
Water 1.0 L
Cooking:
Boil the syrup, removing the foam. Mix syrup purified and cooled to 25 degrees with wine, liquor and tincture. Soak the drink for at least 7-10 days, placing it in a place inaccessible to sunlight.
Recipe 4. Strong gooseberry wine
Composition:
Sugar 6.0 kg
Gooseberries 10.0 kg
Tea, black (large leaf) 20 g
Water 0.25 L
Vodka 2 L
Cooking:
The volume of juice from the specified number of berries is approximately 6.0-6.3 liters. To this volume you need to add 4 liters - the volume of sugar. For wine fermentation, you must select a bottle with a volume of at least 12 liters.
All preparatory stages for the preparation of liquor wine are similar to those described above. Cooked pulp is mixed with sugar in stages, dividing it into three parts. After the start of fermentation, the pulp is squeezed. The cake is poured with vodka (40%) and infused until the juice is fermented. After the alcohol tincture is filtered and added to the purified and clarified liquor.
In this recipe, water is practically not used, with the exception of a glass of boiling water for brewing strong black tea, which is then cooled and added to the finished liquor at the end of fermentation. Warm tea is added to brighten the liquor. In addition, the tannins contained in it improve the quality of the liquor, extending its shelf life.
After clarification, the liquor is removed from the precipitate and alcohol tincture is added to it. If necessary, after a week, the removal from the sediment can be repeated and bottled. Store liquor in a dark place.
Recipe 5. Gooseberry and Raspberry Wine
Composition:
Gooseberry 3 kg
Raisins (for starter culture) 400 g
Honey 2.2
Raspberry 5 kg
Water 4 L
Cooking:
In advance (5-7 days), put raisins for fermentation in a jar, pour it with warm boiled water and cover the jar with a cotton-gauze napkin.
Mash the berries in an enameled bowl, add liquid honey and sourdough. Tie the container with gauze folded in four layers. Stir in the morning and evening, placing in optimal temperature conditions (22-25 degrees), away from drafts. After fermentation starts, clean the wort with a press and filter, after combining it with warm boiled water. Pour into the bottle and install the shutter.
A description of the further cooking process is described in detail above.
Gooseberry Wine - Tips & Tricks
The best containers for storing and aging wines are oak barrels. But at home it is difficult to use such containers, not only because they are expensive, but also because it is not always possible to place them. Try to resort to a little trick: get an oak bark in a pharmacy and, packing it in gauze bags, put it in a container with wine.
