[redhed]

The deer got to my elderberries before I did. I had a bumper crop but they stripped every berry in sight. #!$% deer.

I'm hoping to make blackberry wine for the first time. The recipe we were given calls for I think, 7 pounds of fruit, one pack of yeast, 7 pounds of sugar and if memory serves me right, about 3 gallons of water. We use a 5 gallon water jug and one of those little plastic/glass deelie bobs that you stick in the top of it that acts as a vent. Our local winemaker advised letting it cure for 3 months before sampling. The last batch never made it to bottle. We just kept siphoning off a carafe full and having it for dinner every night. Great stuff.

We also have a recipe for peach wine where all you have to do is combine your peaches, sugar, yeast and water in a 3 gallon bucket, snap on the lid and set it in your basement for a couple of months. Supposed to make great wine. We have wild peaches in the field next to our house that we are going to use to give it a try next season.

I can remember my mom making wine from the concord grapes she raised every fall and giving the bottles (she would put the finished product in mason jars) for Christmas gifts.

[Dragunov]

I removed the texting from my Daughters phone and got PLENTY of homemade "Whine".

[Oxford]

I made about three gallons of homemade wine a few years back out of grapes from my backyard vine. Bought a winemaking kit and followed it's directions. Best part of the whole thing was collecting wine bottles from the liquor store. Now the wine in those bottles tasted delicious. Yup, those wine bottles got my interest up and I couldn't wait till I bought the next bottle of a different type.

Then...back to my own homemade wine process. Picked about 10 gallons of grapes, squashed them in 5 gal. buckets...poured in proper ingredients such as yeast and all, and followed step by step each of the directions. Eventually put in the ingredients to make the sediment settle to the bottom...and let gas bubbles finally stop coming to the top and escape...and put in corks...and labeled bottles.

Couldn't wait till I could test the first bottle. Finally, decided it was time. Popped the cork, poured a glass...and sipped a bit.

Wow...that stuff tasted like shyt! So...I tasted it again...and again...and then I knew it was powerful stuff...must have had an alcohol content of 20% or higher.

So...had a few buddies come by from time to time and we tried it again...same results...same bad taste...but same alcohol content.

Eventually got it all down except for one gallon. Let it sit in my cool pantry for about 10 years...occasionally picking it up and watched the sediment cloud up the clear liquid. Figured it was probably vinager by now.

After about 15 years I decided it was time to pour it down the drain.

Haven't had the guts to try making wine again. Think I'll just buy bottles from the liquor store next time.