I have started using a steam juicer with my fresh fruit. Most of the wine recipes that I find call for whole fruit with pulp. Can you recommend a wine recipe using the fruit juice? Should I be able to use a wine recipe that calls for fruit concentrate?…
Name: Missy H.
State: Mississippi
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Hello Missy,
For what ever reason, almost all wine recipes you run across will call for the fruit in pounds not in ounces of juice.
The reason for this is that normally you would have the wine recipe in hand before getting the fruit. This makes pounds of fruit the most beneficial form of information at that point. If you where going to the market to get some raspberries to make some wine and your wine recipe calls for 1 gallon of raspberry juice to make 5 gallons, that wouldn’t be very helpful when trying to figure out how much fresh raspberries you need.
Your situation is the reverse and the least common scenario. You have the juice that you extracted with your steam juicer and now have decided to make some wine. It normally works the other way around.
Another reason wine recipes call for the fruit in pounds is because wine recipe directions instruct that all the fruit is to be added to the wine must, pulp and all. It is simply crushed and added. The reason the pulp is added is because a lot of a fruit’s flavor qualities are in the skin and fiber. During the fermentation the fruit is broken down by the wine yeast, releasing all its goodness.
While you can make a perfectly good wine with the juice only, it will be a crisp-tasting, lighter-boded wine. The perfect type of wine for drinking in the hotter summer months or before dinner. If you want to utilize your steam juicer to make a fuller-bodied wine, you will want to save the fruit pulp after juicing and add it to the wine must as well.
Missy, you also mentioned using a wine concentrate recipe and using your fruit juice from the steam juicer in place of the concentrate. This is not a viable option either. Concentrated juices are much more concentrated than what your steam juicer is producing. What is coming out of the steam juicer should be consider to be fruit juice, no different than if the fruit had been crush then pressed in a wine press. Actual concentrates are 3 to 5 times more concentrated than what is coming out of your steam juicer.
So in the future if you want to make wine with the juice from you steam juicer, you will want to weigh the fruit first. This is the only way you will be able to use any wine recipes you come across.
Best Wishes,
Ed Kraus
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.
Missy, I have used this method for years and have won International awards with my submissions. You can make great wines with this method. The ratio is approxiamtely 60% juice to 40% water/chems/sugar. This si the eay way to preserve your fruit as it ripens as fruit doesn’t always ripen at once. Then you can make wine when you have the time or enough juice to make a batch. This equates to approximately 15 quarts of juice for a 6-gallon batch adjusting for acidity could vary by +/- 1 quart. Cheers!
I also have made wine from apple "nectar" from the steam juicer. The juice comes out so hot that it self seals in clean quart canning jars, which is nice. Mine is never close to sweet enough and needs substantial sugar to adjust the SG. I often combine the juice with fresh chopped apples in a fermentation bag during the primary fermentation.
Missy we make our elderberry wine by steam juicing. It does make a concentrate. We just use our hydrometer and sugar to get a reading and add water to the batch. Dave W has an accurate ratio. We end up with a very full bodied wine. I wish we could get more recipes for steam juiced wines.
The Steamer made in Finland is the best thing ever for wine making, The juice is cooked and wild yeast free with all of the germs and bacteria dead. Adding the pulp only will give its self a great body. Picking fruit in the fall and storing it later is the best idea. I have won many purple ribbons, at my county fair using this methods..this method is great for those seedy fruits like chokecherries ect…. Cheers to you too
Very helpful and encouraging information thank you all for submitting. I too steam juice. experimenting now.
We’ve got a bumper crop of apricots this year….if anyone has a recipe for apricot wine using pure juice extracted with e steamer/juicer, I would be most grateful. And for that matter, has anyone every made wine from Rainier cherries?
when using a steam juice extractor with elderberries I’ve found about 1.5 pints of juice per gallon (8 pints) of wine is about right.
Do you destem the elderberries before steaming?
I have a complete natural wine process that involves steaming the must from the fermenter starting around day 4 or 5 of primary fermentation, reason being, is as the grapes are converting all the sugars, I don’t want to do it at the end. I start off by steaming pressing the juice into the wine, and the fermentation continues …I use a hand colander…at the end of 10 to 12 days…I have had a steady fermentation, all natural…and no need for a basket press…the wine is excellent and interesting…I use lotus flowers as a preservative… and a medicine, Blue Lotus Organic Red Wine…Wisdom of the Universe… I use Organic Old Vine Zinfandel Grapes.
I usually steam my grapes, and put the juice in the fermenter, and add yeast after 24 hiurs. I never add water. Is this wrong? My wines seem perfectly fine, and I sweeten if needed after stopping fermentation and clarifying.