We have elsewhere stated that our only hope for pure wine in this
country is in domestic manufacture. We shall here give two recipes that
will insure better articles than are now offered under the name of
imported wines.
_Currant Wine._--This, as usually manufactured, is a mere cordial,
rather than a wine. The following recipe gathered from the _Working
Farmer_, is all that need be desired, on making wine from currants,
cherries, and most berries, that are not too sweet. Take clean ripe
currants and pass them between two rollers, or in some other way, crush
them, put them in a strong bag, and under a screw or weight, and the
juice will be easily expressed. To each quart of this juice, add three
pounds of _double-refined_ loaf sugar (no other sugar will do) and water
enough to make a gallon. Or in a cask that will hold thirty gallons, put
thirty quarts of the juice, ninety pounds of the sugar, and fill to the
bung with water. Put in the bung and roll the cask until you can not
hear the sugar moving on the inside of the barrel, when it will all be
dissolved. Next day roll it again, and place it in a cellar of very even
temperature, and leave the bung out to allow fermentation. This will
commence in two or three days and continue for a few weeks. Its presence
may be known by a slight noise like that of soda water, which may be
heard by placing the ear at the bung hole. When this ceases drive the
bung tight and let it stand six months, when the wine may be drawn off
and bottled, and will be perfectly clear and not too sweet. No alcohol
should be added. Putting in brandies or other spirituous liquors
prevents the fermentation of wine, leaving the mixture a mere cordial.
The use of any but double-refined sugar is always injurious, and yet
many will persist in using it, because it is cheaper. The reason for
discarding, for wine-making, all but double-refined sugar, may be easily
understood. Common sugar contains one half of one per cent. of gum, that
becomes fetid on being dissolved in water. The quantity of this gum in
the sugar, for a barrel of wine, is considerable--enough to give a bad
flavor to the wine. This is avoided by using double-refined sugar, which
contains no gum. This recipe is equally good for cherry wine.
The following recipe for making _Elderberry Wine_, produces an article
that the best judges in New York and elsewhere have pronounced equal to
any imported wine. Its excellence has made quite a market for
elderberries in New York. These berries are so easily grown, and the
wine so excellent, that their growth will be encouraged throughout the
country. It is not only an exceedingly palatable wine, but is better
for the sick, than any other known.
To every quart of the berries, put a quart of water and boil for half an
hour. Bruise them from the skin and strain, and to every gallon of the
juice add three pounds of _double-refined_ sugar and one quarter of an
ounce of cream of tartar and boil for half an hour. Take a clean cask
and put in it one pound of raisins to every three gallons of the wine,
and a slice of toasted bread covered over with good yeast. When the wine
has become quite cool, put it into the cask, and place it in a room of
even temperature to ferment. When the fermentation has fully ceased, put
the bung in tight. No brandy or alcohol of any kind will be necessary.
Any one following this recipe _exactly_, will be surprised at the
excellence of the wine that will be the result.
Of _Grape Wines_, there are several varieties, whose peculiarities are
determined mainly by the process of manufacturing. A full treatment of
the subject would require a volume. The following brief directions will
insure success in making the most desirable grape wines:
1. Let the grapes become thoroughly ripe before gathering, to increase
their saccharine qualities and make a stronger wine. All fruits make
much better wine for being fully ripe. Cut the bunches with a sharp
knife and move carefully to avoid bruising. Spread them in a dry shade
to evaporate excessive moisture.
2. Assort the grapes before using, removing all decayed, green, or
broken ones, using only perfect berries.
3. Mash the grapes with a beater in a tub, or by passing them through a
cider-mill. "_Treading the wine vat_" was the ancient method of mashing
the grapes, not now practised except in some parts of Europe.
4. To make light wines put them at once into press, as apple pomace in a
cider-press.
5. To make higher-colored wines let the pomace stand from four to
twenty-four hours before pressing. They will be dark in proportion to
the length of time the pomace stands.
6. To make wines resembling the Austere wines of France and Spain, let
the pomace stand until the first fermentation is over, called
"fermenting in the skin."
7. The "must" or grape-juice is to be put into casks, the larger the
better, but only one pressing should be put into one cask. Put in a
cellar of even temperature, not lower than fifty nor higher than
sixty-five degrees of Fahrenheit, and where there is plenty of air.
Prepare the cask by burning in it a strip of paper or muslin, dipped in
melted sulphur, and suspended by a wire across the bung-hole.
Fermentation commences very soon and will be completed within a few days
or weeks according to the temperature. Its completion is marked by the
cessation of the escape of gas. No sugar, brandy, or any other
substance, should be added to the grape-juice to make good wine. They
are all adulterations. The wine having settled after this fermentation,
may be racked off into clean casks, prepared as before. A second
fermentation will take place in the spring. It should not be bottled
until after this second fermentation, as its expansion will break the
glass. While in the casks they should always be kept full, being
occasionally filled from a small cask, kept for the purpose. When this
fermentation ceases, bottle and cork tight, and lay the bottles on their
sides, in a cool cellar. The wine will improve with age.
Sometimes it remains on the lees without racking and is drawn off and
bottled. Frequently the wine does not become wholly clear and needs
fining. Various substances are used for this purpose, as fish-glue,
charcoal, starch, rice, milk, &c. The best of these substances is
charcoal, or the white of eggs and milk. Add by degrees according to the
foulness of the wine. An ounce of charcoal to a barrel of wine is an
ordinary quantity; or a pint of milk with the white of four eggs--more
or less according to the state of the wine.
_Rhine Wine_ of Germany may be made as follows:--
Take good Catawba or Isabella grapes, and pound or grind them so as to
crush every seed and leave them in that state for twenty-four hours.
Fumigate the cask by burning strips of muslin dipped in sulphur as in
the preceding recipe. Strain or press out the juice into the cask
filling it and keeping it _entirely full_, that impurities may run out
of the bung, during fermentation. In the spring prepare another cask in
the same way and rack it off into that. When a year old bottle it and it
is fit for use.
Sweeter wines than any of the above are made by adding sugar to the must
before fermentation. It should be _double-refined_ sugar, and still it
is an adulteration.