Making Wine, First Steps

Peter has decided to learn how to make an excellent table wine.  Our prior attempts have been good, but this time he intends to make sure every step is correctly done, and then finally blend three wines and infuse it with home grown peppers.  This also means we are learning as much as we can about tasting, which has been fascinating.  If anyone lives in Utah and wants to volunteer to help us blend the wine (by tasting several of the combinations) it would be greatly appreciated.   

We are now making three wines, a Merlot, a Shiraz, and a Cabernet Sauvignon.  This project begins with 6 gallons of each of grape juice.  In order to make the wine better Peter is testing it at each step.  The thing used to pull the testing wine out is called a wine thief.   

We the add the yeast and things which help it to ferment.  The mixture must remain at the right temperature, 68-77 degrees, so it must be upstairs, as the basement stays cooler than that. 

Now the wine will be imitating a large amount of CO2.   This is really helpful to plants.  Fortunately we are currently growing a large number of plants to be ready to put in the garden soon.  By putting the wine in the same room to ferment we create a symbiotic relationship and can both grow our plants and ferment our wine.

I should note that the dirt, humidity and fermenting wine make this room smell interesting.  While these pails will turn into great wine, and the plants will be peppers of multiple kinds, tomatoes and okra at the moment things are just getting started.