Turning Grapes Into Wine

There are over 70 million tons of grapes grown world wide every year,once harvested though they cannot be kept fresh for long.

some are preserved by drying which produces sultanas,raisins, and currants. but the majority of them are fermented and used in the production of wine.

every year 6500 million gallons of wine are produced world wide.

when the grapes have been harvested they are put into large presses to extract the juicethen they are put into a rotating centrifuge where any solid matter like seeds or stems are removed.

the juice at this time is called "must",the must ferments naturaly because of the natural yeast of the grapes converting the natural sugar in the grape to alcohol.

red wine is made from black grapes is fermented at 70-80 degrees Farenheit,for about 2 weeks,the colour which is natural comes from the skin pigment anthocyanin.

white wine is fermented at 50-60 degrees Farenheit for 3-6 weeks, longer than red because of the cooler temperature.

Rose wine is made differently it is made by fermenting black grapes and the skins for 1 or 2 days then the skins are extracted.

after fermentation all of the wines are filtered to remove any sediment,then stored in large steel tanks matured for at least a year and bottled as the wine matures it gains flavour.

for champagne the wine is fermented twice and the carbon dioxide produced by the second fermentation is retained in the liquid to make the bubbles.

have fun.....jimmy