Ok, I ran across this earlier this morning and had to ask:
http://www.wikihow.com/Brew-Cheap-Wine

1) Active Dry Yeast - How would this taste? I mean, I know you aren't
making a "decent" wine, but how do you think this would work with a
Montrachet or some other legit wine yeast?

2) Welch's Concentrate - How much different is this concentrate from
the kits? I'm guessing all of the preservatives, etc.?

3) The balloon technique sounds like a great/cheap alternative that
would work pretty well, anyone else here use it?

I'm curious enough to try this out (with a different yeast tho)...

-Warren

"wpattison" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> Ok, I ran across this earlier this morning and had to ask:
> http://www.wikihow.com/Brew-Cheap-Wine
>
> 1) Active Dry Yeast - How would this taste? I mean, I know you aren't
> making a "decent" wine, but how do you think this would work with a
> Montrachet or some other legit wine yeast?

I use dry wiine yeast all the time. It works great. If you mean bread
yeast, it will stick at a low alcohol level and will not clear easily. It
will definately effect the taste

>
> 2) Welch's Concentrate - How much different is this concentrate from
> the kits? I'm guessing all of the preservatives, etc.?
it is made from different grapes. Welch's read is condord which will make a
clasic "foxy" wine. Some like it others do not. Welchs white is niagara
and will make an excellent white wine. It is also excellent for blending
with other fruit wines.

>
> 3) The balloon technique sounds like a great/cheap alternative that
> would work pretty well, anyone else here use it?
>
The balloon is from back in ancient times (pre 1950's) when good wine
suplies were not available. They leak, they pop, they will add rubber
flavor to your wine. Your wine will probably develope some level of
oxidation using them. And they do not save you money. Plastic airlocks are
cheap and work great.

> I'm curious enough to try this out (with a different yeast tho)...
>
> -Warren
>

If you want to make a cheap good wine where you buy all the ingredients,
check Jack Keller's white Welch's. If you want to make even cheaper wine,
find a fruit that you can get for free, maybe a friend with a fruit tree the
produces more than he wants, and use a good country wine recipe and
procedures. You can get the cost well below $0.50 a bottle.

Ray

"Ditto" to what Ray just posted. My 2nd batch of wine was made from
Welches Niagara concentrate, and it received rave reviews from my
friends. My 1st batch was made from Welches Concord; quite tasty, but
it would have been better as a sweet or semi-sweet dessert wine. The
extra sweetness in a Concord wine helps smooth out the foxiness of it's
American heritage.

In some respects, the Welches concentrates are better than the wine
concentrates. At least that's been my experience. The finished wine has
a lot more fruit; the wine concentrates sometimes produce anemic wine.

Only use bread yeast if you want to make bad wine. Conversely, only use
wine yeast in bread if you want to make bad bread.

Greg