Winemaking is like cooking. With cooking, if you like to eat, the more you cook, the better you get.  The same is true of winemaking.  The main requirement is an enjoyment of drinking good wine.  Unlike cooking, however, which one engages in almost every day, winemaking, using fresh grapes only happens once per year.  An avid home winemaker who makes wine every year for ten years really only has about ten days experience. 

With good commercial wine in such abundance and so reasonably priced, why would anyone even bother making wine at home?  Although homemade wine rarely compares to the level of a top Napa Valley Cabernet or a great White Burgundy, homemade wines often surpass the $7 to $10 California varietals or French Vin de Pays in character and individuality, if not quality.  The great thing about homemade wine is that if one can drink it without prejudice, it almost always tastes really good no matter how different it may be from what commercial wineries consider marketable.

LET’S MAKE WINE
   So, if you like the idea of turning grapes into wine, here is what it takes. *

1. Find a source for ripe grapes.  Fresh California grapes can be ordered and picked up at various wine grape sellers in traditional Italian neighborhoods throughout the U.S.  Just about any state with a wine industry has growers who sell grapes directly to home winemakers too. If you live in California, it is very possible to purchase premium grapes from prestige appellations.  If not, the California grapes that get shipped out of state to home winemakers will undoubtedly hail from the Lodi/Woodbridge area of California’s Central Valley. This area is a great source for Zinfandel, Syrah, Muscat and Chenin Blanc but not well suited for premium Cabernet or Chardonnay production.   To my taste, grapes from the Great Lakes Region of New York, Ohio and Michigan, especially hybrids, make much tastier wine than California Central Valley grapes although blending in some of these California grapes does reduce acidity and increases tannin making the final wine feel softer and more velvety.
2. Don’t mess around with really small batches.  Too many things can and will go wrong.  Get yourself six 32-gallon Rubbermaid plastic garbage cans and fill ‘em with grapes.  This would be about 900 pounds that will end up making about 60 gallons or 300 bottles (more or less a year’s supply).
3. You do not need to crush or destem red grapes when making red wine.  Avoid making white wine until you really know what you are doing! Just leave the red grapes in the tub (‘tub’ sounds much better than ‘garbage can’).  Add freshly hydrated yeast, and cover the tub with a sheet of plastic and snap on the lid tightly.  Then, two times per day, remove the lid and plastic and take a blunt object like a 2x4 or a cricket paddle and push down the grapes packing them tighter and tighter into each of the tubs. Push them down like this twice daily until liquid covers the grapes (2-3 days).  Continue to submerge the grapes twice daily (called ‘punching down’) until fermentation has nearly subsided (7-10 days). You can tell when the fermentation slows down by putting your nose close to the grapes.  If it doesn’t burn your nose like Japanese wasabi paste, then fermentation is really slowing down.
4. Press the grapes. To buy a press which you will only use for a couple of hours per year might be too expensive but, many winemaking supply shops and grape sellers have presses and will press your grapes for a relatively modest fee. 
5. Put the fresh wine into 5 gallon or larger air tight glass or stainless steel containers fitted with air locks** and wait.  Once there is a clear definition between the wine and the sediment (about two weeks), the wine is ready to decant, sulfite and place in a larger container.  New 55-60 gallon American oak barrels can be purchased for less than $200 each and will act as an ideal container to age and flavor the wine with that unmistakable smoky, vanilla-like smell and taste.
6. After the fourth of July, the wine can be bottled.  For most home winemakers, it is best to bottle in the fall when new wine is ready to fill the barrels as soon as the previous vintage is bottled.  The “wine out, wine in” method assures the winemaker that the barrel will never dry out or become infected with bacteria.
7.  Enjoy!

RED OVER WHITE

To make white wine, it isn’t a bad idea to try purchasing juice from a local winery or even frozen concentrate until you get the hang of it.  Red wine, however,  must be made from fresh grapes.  It is not possible to make red wine that tastes anything like commercial red wine from juice or concentrates.

 Once you’ve made a few batches, here is what you can expect the quality level to reach.  The wines reviewed here are my homemade 2003 Millot (70% Michigan Millot and 30% California Rhone-style grapes) and 2004 Rhone-style Red (70% California Rhone-style grapes and 30% Michigan Millot).  Total cost of production (not including my labor) is about $2 per bottle.  Following are the comments of Tasters Guild President Joe Borrello.

“Just tasted your 2003 and 2004 Michigan Vintner wines.  Nice, distinctive fruit in both.  The Millot is very prominent, but the wines were nicely balanced and had good mouth feel.  They were both similar, but the ’03 was definitely smoother and easier on the palate.  Barb agrees.  You did a nice job balancing the wines; I was somewhat surprised that the fruit and flavor held through to the end so well.  Quite frequently, as you know, homemade wines go in strong and disappear in the mouth.  Obviously, you’ve conquered and surpassed the intermediate stage of winemaking.  The ’04 has a bit of a tannin bite that will dissipate with a little more bottle age, much like the ’03 has.  Again, nicely done.”

*For a more detailed step-by-step, day-by-day explanation of this process email Brian at michiganvintner@earthlink.net