This wine was started in March of 2019. I am still catching up, but I will get there soon.

Blackberry wine is one of Scott’s favorite berries, so for his first batch of wine where he would be doing everything solo he choose unsurprisingly something with blackberries. What was surprising was he chose a mix (well maybe not since we already had a batch of Blackberry mead going). For the fruit mixture he choose the Kirkland Triple Berry mix from the Costco frozen food section.

Ingredients

• 1 packet Yeast – EC-1118 Lavin
• 4 lbs Kirkland Triple berry mix sold at Costco
• 3 tsp Pectic Enzyme
• 8 lbs Sugar (see notes at bottom as this was not enough)
• 1 1/2 tsp Citric Acid
• 1 Campden Tablet
• Boiling water (enough to fill primary fermenter to 5.25 gallons)

Basic Steps

1. Sanitize all the items you will be using
2. Boil water adding sugar as you go stirring continuously until all the sugar is dissolved into the water. I don’t have a pot large enough so I complete this step in batches.
3. Add water sugar mixture to the primary fermentation container (I use a bucket designed for this purpose)
4. Place berries in a must bag and add to the fermentation container
5. Once the water / sugar mixture has cooled to about 97 degrees add the pectic Enzyme, citric acid, and Campden Tablet to the mixture. Cover and let sit.
6. 12 hours later add the yeast and stir. *This wait is necessary as the tablet will kill the wine. I don’t do this step in several of my later wines.
7. Cover & let the mixture sit for one week stirring daily making sure to push down the bag to let all parts of the berries submerge.
8. At one week remove the must bag (I like to squeeze out the juices in the bag) and move the mixture to a sanitized secondary fermenter (usually a carboy).
9. Place an air lock on the carboy and wait..and wait…and wait..
10. Approximately every 2 months rack the carboy to remove the sediment at the bottom
11. When the Specific Gravity is 1.0 and the liquid is clear it is ready to bottle. You can add potassium sorbate at this point to kill the liquid, but I like to add as little chemicals as possible to our drinks.
12. Transfer the the wine to bottles and then…more waiting!
13. I usually open a bottle at month 3 to test if it is ready yet with most wine ready at about 6 months and getting tasty at about 9 months.

Notes & Follow-up

This wine ended up being a little bit sharp for our taste (a theme in 2019 it seems) so we back sweetened with 4 cups of a grape juice and white sugar mixture and had to wait for it to go still again before bottling. Next time we make this I will be increasing to closer to 12lbs of sugar.

It is 2024 and the wine is still a little sharp, but not has mellowed considerably. It still is a bit tart, but we lean into it and add some Lingonberry or cranberry juice to it for a sharp drink or it to some sprite for a refreshing summer drink.

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