MAKE YOUR OWN BOOZE
HOW TO MAKE WINE
Rustle up your own house merlot or pinot grigio, and discover the gadgets to help you savour it
We’ve been making wine for thousands of years. Well, not us personally, but humankind. And it isn’t as complicated as you might think. A bit messy, perhaps, but not difficult if you plan your wine-making experience properly and gather up all the supplies you need before you start.
On that note, there are specific tools you’ll need to arm yourself with before you crush a single grape. The first of these is a two-gallon crock pot or glass jar fitted with a lid that enables air flow to enter and escape the wine mix, but without providing an open home to opportunistic bugs.
You’ll also need a one-gallon carboy (essentially a glass container with slender neck), an airlock, some thin plastic tubing for siphoning wine, a thermometer and a hydrometer, plus wine bottles with corks or screw caps (roughly five bottles to every gallon of wine). Oh, and Campden tablets, which are used to sanitise wine ‘must’. Also stock up on a sanitising agent, like Cleaner Steriliser).
