GoddessOboe

Recipes 

I bought the book "Wile Wines" after it got good reviews in a magazine I subscribe to (http://www.amazon.com/Wild-Wines-Creating-Organic-Natures/dp/0757002927). All the recipes in the book have very few ingredients (fruit, water, sugar, and yeast). After doing some reading online I noticed that most recipes have more things than what my book lists. So what exactly are the campden tablet, yeast nutrient, acid blend, pectic enzyme powder, tannin, etc. that I keep seeing in recipes for? Do I need these things? Will the Wild WIne recipes not work as well? I'm sure this info is floating round on here, but I'd really appreciate someone spelling it out for me. Thanks!

2ndGenBrewer

Recipes 

Well the basics of wine making are just fruit, water, sugar and yeast. Most of us use the other ingredients so we can obtain complete fermentation (nutrient, energizer, acid blend etc), for clarifying (pectic enzyme, Irish moss, fining agents), for sterilization (sulfates like campden), or for flavoring/body (both acids and tannins).

When it comes down to it depends how sterile you are when you are putting all the ingredients together, how long you're willing to wait before you bottle or drink, and if you want to save the headache of a "stuck" fermentation.

I hope my list helps you with some of the basics.