I have a lot of splits and rot on my apples this year and I was thinking about making a bunch of apple wine.
Would it be possible to make good wine from just grinding the apples into a must and add water and sugar and fermenting as opposed to pressing the apple juice and fermenting it?
I make peach wine from frozen peaches with the pits removed without pressing into juice before fermentation. Pectic enzyme helps break down the peaches during primary fermentation and the material is strained through a pressing bag before it is placed into the secondary.
I would like to avoid pressing the juice from the apples if possible since I don’t have a suitable press and I would rather not build or purchase one.
There are lots of windfall apple wine recipes involving cutting them into pieces and topping with a minimal amount of water like you describe. Jack kellers wine website has several.
Thank you. Recipe looks great. 24 pounds of apples, 5# sugar and 1 gallon of water. Wonder if it will fit into my 7.5 gal food grade bucket or should I get something bigger?
not sure, but if you are into making wine in larger batches anyway, you won’t regret getting one of those like 15-gallon primary fermenters…I use it anytime I make a 5 or 6 gallon batch, and even for a lot of 3-gallon ones, although I also use a couple 6-gallon buckets I have
FWIW we used to get 30 pounds of sliced granny smith apples frozen in four gallon buckets- also had a little sugar and such in there; I think at nearly twice that volume your mix might fit. I don’t know what kind of a krausen you will get fermenting your apples, but I’d imagine that you want at least a few inches of head space. I think it’s worth a shot.