2017 Orange Wine

It is December and wife Jenny bought oranges to be healthy, but later we decided we’d rather make wine from it. Orange wine is a little unusual, but there are recipes on line. Jenny and I decided o make a very sweet wine, where the yeast would die leaving the wine sweet.

Orange Wine Recipe
7 oranges, squeezed
1 lemon, squeezed
57 oz orange juice (Meijers Organic)
1 Tablespoon orange zest
3 lb 1 oz sugar
2 g yeast energizer
1 pack Lalvin 71B-1122


I measured the sugar at 13.6% (specific gravity of 13 Brix and a density of 1.05 g/ml). This would make a wine of just 6.5%. I added 3 lb of sugar to just 2.6 L of juice to bring the sugar up to 20%. The idea is for the yeast to die and leave the wine sweet.

I just converted from Red Star to Lalvin yeast. I used 71B-1122, which is for white wines, and especially wines with residual sweetness.

===================================

2020 Follow-up: This wine turned out to be a disaster. It tasted terrible. For a while I thought I could blend it with my Riesling, but it just wrecked the Riesling. I am probably going to pour this down the drain. I mourn the lost Riesling.

2017 Hard Cider

My wife bought a gallon of organic apple juice because she thought it would be good for her stomach. She decided not to drink it, and so it was available to make wine. It is a true juice rather than a cider, so the apple selection is more for little kids rather than adults.

The sugar content was 14% Brix. This should make 7% alcohol.


Hard Apple Cider Recipe

1 gallon Apple Juice  (Organic from Manzana Products, Sebastopol CA)
3/4 lemon chopped with rind
3/4 tsp of pectic enzyme
1/2 tsp of yeast enzyme
1 packet of Red Star Cotes des Blancs

The plan is to ferment to dryness, then rack, filter, chill, add sorbate and sulfite, and then sweeten.

Nebiollo

I had a chance to go to Italy, and stayed in the Piedmont region near Alba. They had this nice Nebbiolo wine made from the grape that is a regional specialty. Wikipedia has an excellent article and a whole paragraph full of alternate names for Nebbiolo.

Anyway, it had a clear taste with nice berry-like fruitiness. I wish I could buy some, but of course I never really have looked for it.

While I was at the restaurant at Villa d Amelia , they had the excellent jam made from Nebbiolo.  It had a rich more complicated flavor. I don't think that is sold online.