ingredients and equipment before you start.
Make sure everything is clean and sanitized.
Follow measurements. Don’t guess.
Do the best you can, and don’t worry. This is supposed to be fun, remember?
EQUIPMENT AND ITS CARE
P RIMARY F ERMENTER
You need a large container to hold both the liquid and the solids and all the froth the fermentation kicks up. You need to be ableto stir the must , which is the water, sugar, and fruit before fermentation has set in, and to make additions to it. You also need to be able to keep it away from the open air.
Large equipment, left to right: Six to seven-gallon primary fermenter and lid, four-gallon primary fermenter showing hole for air lock in lid, one-gallon jug, five-gallon carboy, and a racking tube carefully draped over all.
People used to use stoneware crocks as primary fermenters. Sometimes they even put a piece of cheesecloth across the top to keep the flies out. The wine turned out well often enough to make it worthwhile doing again.
These days home winemakers mostly use six- or seven-gallon food-grade plastic bins as primary fermenters. They are easy to keep clean. They don’t weigh much. They come with lids with a handy hole the size of a small rubber bung (a bung is like a plug) so you can fit them with an air lock. You can use them for the primary fermentation of one to five gallons of wine. The wine will always be fine as long as you practice good sanitation.
An alternative that’s good for smaller batches of wine and that doesn’t take up so much room is a smaller food-grade polyethylene bin or a glass jar. You need more room than one gallon, even for one-gallon batches, because the fruit takes up more room, and some wines make a lot of foam. So an ice cream tub won’t work. You might have a friend in food service who can provide you with a small bin with a tight-fitting lid in which you can cut a hole for the bung and air lock. Bakeries and delis also have these bins and like to get rid of them.
Always make sure it’s food-grade plastic and didn’t contain vinegar or pickles. Don’t use plastic bins from construction sites, or plastic wastebaskets.
Metal is out. In one of my favorite old out-of-print winemaking books, How to Make Wine in Your Own Kitchen (McFadden Books, New York; (1963), Mettja C. Roate advocated using un-chipped galvanized canners as the primary fermenter. Don’t . Food-grade plastic wasn’t as easy to find in those days, and she was doing the best she could. Don’t use anything but glass or food-grade plastic, or maybe a new crock.
I’m lucky to have some two-gallon clear glass jars that a friend gave me. She works in a lab, where they were unused surplus. Great for small batches of wine. I believe they were going to be used for pickling pathologic specimens!
If you happen to have a nice new stoneware crock (one that has never stored vinegar, and that is free of cracks or chips) that you know has a lead-free glaze, use it if you want to. Keeping itairtight will be a bit more difficult, since crocks don’t come with airtight lids. You could use a sheet of food-grade plastic tied down with a giant rubber band (try making one out of a cross section of an old inner tube) as the lid. You will still have to sanitize the thing, don’t forget. And it’s heavy!
----
A NOTE ON CLEANING: To sanitize the primary fermenter, proceed as you would for bottling or the gallon jug, although chemical means must be used. You can’t boil anything this big. Rinsing it out with boiling water alone IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH. You might get away with it once or twice, but eventually, time and Mother Nature will punish you. Either soak it in the mild bleach solution for twenty minutes (including the lid), or swish it out carefully with Campden solution. You can use sulphite crystals if you like, but you must measure them accurately; for a sanitizing solution, mix 50-60 grams per 4 liters or a gallon of water. Like the Campden tablets, this solution can be
Make sure everything is clean and sanitized.
Follow measurements. Don’t guess.
Do the best you can, and don’t worry. This is supposed to be fun, remember?
EQUIPMENT AND ITS CARE
P RIMARY F ERMENTER
You need a large container to hold both the liquid and the solids and all the froth the fermentation kicks up. You need to be ableto stir the must , which is the water, sugar, and fruit before fermentation has set in, and to make additions to it. You also need to be able to keep it away from the open air.
Large equipment, left to right: Six to seven-gallon primary fermenter and lid, four-gallon primary fermenter showing hole for air lock in lid, one-gallon jug, five-gallon carboy, and a racking tube carefully draped over all.
People used to use stoneware crocks as primary fermenters. Sometimes they even put a piece of cheesecloth across the top to keep the flies out. The wine turned out well often enough to make it worthwhile doing again.
These days home winemakers mostly use six- or seven-gallon food-grade plastic bins as primary fermenters. They are easy to keep clean. They don’t weigh much. They come with lids with a handy hole the size of a small rubber bung (a bung is like a plug) so you can fit them with an air lock. You can use them for the primary fermentation of one to five gallons of wine. The wine will always be fine as long as you practice good sanitation.
An alternative that’s good for smaller batches of wine and that doesn’t take up so much room is a smaller food-grade polyethylene bin or a glass jar. You need more room than one gallon, even for one-gallon batches, because the fruit takes up more room, and some wines make a lot of foam. So an ice cream tub won’t work. You might have a friend in food service who can provide you with a small bin with a tight-fitting lid in which you can cut a hole for the bung and air lock. Bakeries and delis also have these bins and like to get rid of them.
Always make sure it’s food-grade plastic and didn’t contain vinegar or pickles. Don’t use plastic bins from construction sites, or plastic wastebaskets.
Metal is out. In one of my favorite old out-of-print winemaking books, How to Make Wine in Your Own Kitchen (McFadden Books, New York; (1963), Mettja C. Roate advocated using un-chipped galvanized canners as the primary fermenter. Don’t . Food-grade plastic wasn’t as easy to find in those days, and she was doing the best she could. Don’t use anything but glass or food-grade plastic, or maybe a new crock.
I’m lucky to have some two-gallon clear glass jars that a friend gave me. She works in a lab, where they were unused surplus. Great for small batches of wine. I believe they were going to be used for pickling pathologic specimens!
If you happen to have a nice new stoneware crock (one that has never stored vinegar, and that is free of cracks or chips) that you know has a lead-free glaze, use it if you want to. Keeping itairtight will be a bit more difficult, since crocks don’t come with airtight lids. You could use a sheet of food-grade plastic tied down with a giant rubber band (try making one out of a cross section of an old inner tube) as the lid. You will still have to sanitize the thing, don’t forget. And it’s heavy!
----
A NOTE ON CLEANING: To sanitize the primary fermenter, proceed as you would for bottling or the gallon jug, although chemical means must be used. You can’t boil anything this big. Rinsing it out with boiling water alone IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH. You might get away with it once or twice, but eventually, time and Mother Nature will punish you. Either soak it in the mild bleach solution for twenty minutes (including the lid), or swish it out carefully with Campden solution. You can use sulphite crystals if you like, but you must measure them accurately; for a sanitizing solution, mix 50-60 grams per 4 liters or a gallon of water. Like the Campden tablets, this solution can be
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