How to Make a Gallon of Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented grape juice. The alcohol content of wine isn't concentrated through distillation and is primarily determined by the sugar content of the grape juice. You'll typically need to add sugar to the grape juice in order to get the maximum alcohol possible through fermentation. A gallon is a common quantity of wine to make at home because plastic jugs are commonly available in this size. Add this to my Recipe Box.

Instructions

1

Obtain at least a gallon of grape juice. This may be whole grape juice in bottles or frozen grape juice concentrate. Make sure the grape juice doesn't have any preservatives such as benzoate of soda, which will prevent the yeast from growing.

2

Place a saccharometer in a sample of the grape juice and read the value at the surface level of the juice. This will give you the concentration of sugar in the grape juice.

3

Add enough sugar to make the grape juice 24 percent sugar. The amount of sugar to add to a gallon of wine is given as (2 -- x/12) pounds where x is the sugar concentration of the unsweetened juice. Grape juice is typically about 16 percent sugar, so you'll need to add about 11 oz. of sugar.

4

Pour the sweetened grape juice into a 1-gallon plastic jug and add a pinch of yeast. Punch a hole in the cap of the jug and place it on the jug. Allow the juice to ferment undisturbed in a cool, dark place for one to two weeks. If you seal the wine in an airtight container before the fermentation has completed, you can make sparkling wine.

5

Decant the wine into bottles, leaving the dregs in the first plastic jug. You may need to decant more than once in order to get a clear wine. You can drink the wine in about a month, but it will get better with age. White wine will continue to improve for at least a year, and red wine improves for at least two to three years.