Pomegranate Wine

Anyone ever try to make it...or tasted it??? I would think its a very strong flavor wine...those little berries pack a BIG taste...I would be interesting in trying it....whats everyones thoughts????

We made blueberry pomegranate and Cranberry pomegranate from cans of frozen juice. We also made Concord pomegranate using concord grapes. All are really good now that they are fully aged.

I am planning on making some this weekend. As with any fruit wines I have made in the past, the primary fermentation is very violent, and tends to drive off a lot of the fruit flavor that we want to keep in the wine.

My plan is to put about half to 2/3 of the total amount of fruit I have, in the primary. Once the must has been removed and squeezed, rack it onto the remaining fruit that has been macerated and treated with pectic enzyme to help breakdown more of the fruit itself. That way I hope to gain as much of the pomegranate flavor as possible.

I have pomegranate / dandelion going right now. I just re-racked and back sweeten with that pomegranate juice you buy at the store " the one that comes in the weird bottle" and a little sugar. I like the taste but the wife thinks it would be good if I carbonated it.

Bombo80 said:

I am planning on making some this weekend. As with any fruit wines I have made in the past, the primary fermentation is very violent, and tends to drive off a lot of the fruit flavor that we want to keep in the wine.

My plan is to put about half to 2/3 of the total amount of fruit I have, in the primary. Once the must has been removed and squeezed, rack it onto the remaining fruit that has been macerated and treated with pectic enzyme to help breakdown more of the fruit itself. That way I hope to gain as much of the pomegranate flavor as possible.

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Cool...keep us posted. I love Pomegranate and think the wine would be good...keep us updated on here. Thats a good idea..never thought of that. So how do you macerate the poms...just squeeze the juice and add the pectic to stop fermentaion...do you add water to it as well??? Please explain...would love to know. Thanks.

I will make updates as I progress through the process, as well as post my recipe.

I am planning to start this sometime tomorrow afternoon.

I did pom/blu berry from concentrate, came out really good.

Here is what I got started today ......

12# 12oz. Pomegranate seeds - Frozen
2# Raisins - chopped
3 gallons boiling water
Mixed and pulse chopped with stick blender
checked Tartaric acid level
Added 1 oz. Acid Blend
Original reading - 9.6 Brix
Added 7# sugar
23.1 Brix (1.0969 SG)
Added 5 Campden tablets
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Tomorrow morning I will add the pectic enzyme
Tomorrow night I will add the yeast nutrient
and pitch Cote de Blanc yeast

More to come.....

AcmeRidgeRose_Nate said:

those little berries pack a BIG taste

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Pomegranates contain seeds, not berries.

You need special equipment to make your own pomegranate juice. The price of the juice is very high (between 2-4 EUR per litre). In addition, juice concentrates are not sold at all in Finland.

If it weren't for those things, I'd try it. I love pomegranate.

podz said:

Pomegranates contain seeds, not berries.

You need special equipment to make your own pomegranate juice. The price of the juice is very high (between 2-4 EUR per litre). In addition, juice concentrates are not sold at all in Finland.

If it weren't for those things, I'd try it. I love pomegranate.

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maybe some muggles can smuggle some concentrate for you?

After a week in the primary, I strained out the pomegranate seeds and pulp. I ended up with just over 4 gallons of wine.

The next day I thawed out 9.5 more pounds of pomegranate seeds. I put them in a sanitized plastic beer picture and pulse chopped them with my stick blender. Then strained out the seeds/pulp and kept just the juice. I ended up with 112 ounces of juice. This was the perfect amount to top up the 5 gallon carboy of wine.

I tested the juice, and it was at 16.8 Brix. The wine had already come down to 0.986 SG. I have not done the final calculations on the starting SG, after the addition of the juice. I will continue to make updates as this wine starts the next phase of fermentation and aging.


I hope that the addition of the juice, after the initial fermentation, will result in more pomegranate flavor in the finished wine. Only time will tell.

Bombo80 said:

I hope that the addition of the juice, after the initial fermentation, will result in more pomegranate flavor in the finished wine.

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I'm curious to hear how this goes. I really love pomegranates.

What do you mean by beer picture? Did you put them in your plastic fermenter and use the blender inside of that?

Bombo80 said:

After a week in the primary, I strained out the pomegranate seeds and pulp. I ended up with just over 4 gallons of wine.

The next day I thawed out 9.5 more pounds of pomegranate seeds. I put them in a sanitized plastic beer picture and pulse chopped them with my stick blender. Then strained out the seeds/pulp and kept just the juice. I ended up with 112 ounces of juice. This was the perfect amount to top up the 5 gallon carboy of wine.

I tested the juice, and it was at 16.8 Brix. The wine had already come down to 0.986 SG. I have not done the final calculations on the starting SG, after the addition of the juice. I will continue to make updates as this wine starts the next phase of fermentation and aging.


I hope that the addition of the juice, after the initial fermentation, will result in more pomegranate flavor in the finished wine. Only time will tell.

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Did you use Potassium Sorbate and Camden tablets? If you didn't use Sorbate your probably going to get a re fermentation going. But lets hope not.

Here is a similar picture that I used to pulse chop the pomegranate seeds.

As far as adding Campden and Pot. Sorbate, No, I did not add any. I know the fermentation will continue. My thoughts are that the fermentation has slowed way down so some of the flavor and aroma will be retained. I have done this with many of my fruit wines, and seems to work out well.

podz said:

You need special equipment to make your own pomegranate juice.

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If you get creative, no special equipment is required. Jack Keller has a blog post addressing this exact thing. See his June 8th, 2013 post for the full text. Below is an excerpt.

"I separate the fruit and place sections under water to then separate the arils. I bring a cup of water in a large pan to a boil and add the arils of 6 pomegranates, stirring every minute or two but otherwise keeping the lid on. The heat bursts the sacs and liberates the juice, which I then strain thoroughly when cooled. On average, each pomegranate contains a cup of arils and will yield between 1/3 to 1/2 cup of pure juice. By selecting large fruit I can easily get a quart of juice from this method. Repeat the above to extract another quart of juice. I once made a gallon of wine using pure juice with no dilution except for topping up, but my wife complained I was using too many of our scarce fruit (we only have one pomegranate tree).

Alternatively, if you win the lottery you can buy pure pomegranate juice."

My Pomegranate Melomel always turned out well. I don't think you can go wrong with pomegranates.

buzzerj said:

My Pomegranate Melomel always turned out well. I don't think you can go wrong with pomegranates.

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Post some recipes! I can never find good pom recipes.

I use a press to squeeze all the juice out. Its quicker than messing with water in bowls and getting the seeds out.

OK here it is. I used store bought Pomegranate juice just for the ease of preparation.

3 gallons of still Pomegranate melomel

Four - 32 oz. bottles of Just Pomegranate Juice (Trader Joe’s $4.29 each)
Three - 3 lbs. Desert Mesquite Honey (Trader Joe’s $9.99 each)
1 gram (1/4 Tsp.) Go-Ferm to rehydrate yeast
1 Tsp. Fermaid K at end of lag phase
1.5 Tsp. DAP at end of lag phase
1.5 Tsp. Fermaid K at 1/3 sugar break
5 grams packet of Lalvin D-47 yeast
Purchased purified or drinking water to three gallons

Target O.G. = 1.110 Actual OG = 1.105

a. To rehydrate the yeast, prepare a solution of 100 ml tap H2O @110°F + 1 gram Go-Ferm (1/4 Tsp.)
b. Add 5 grams of D-47 yeast when temperature drops to 104°F and let stand 15 - 30 minutes maximum
c. Add 100 ml 30 brix must to the rehydrated yeast and mix well
d. Inoculate the must with the mixture and decant into the carboy

Mixed it up using four 32 oz. bottles of Pomegranate juice and 9 lbs. honey in a cleaned and sanitized three gallon glass carboy. Placed sanitized stopper on top and shook the hell out of it to mix oxygen in there and mix the honey/juice and water well. Used three cleaned and sanitized one gallon glass carboys as secondaries. Yeast rehydrated as above. Pitched the yeast after rehydrating for 15 minutes with 104-109°F water. I didn't add any of the must to it. Made 3 gallons in the 3 gallon glass carboy (primary fermenter). Actually the final volume in the primary will intentionally be less than three gallons and will use more pomegranate juice and water to top up the secondaries. Cleaned and sanitized airlock placed on primary. Tried to keep the primary agitated for good fermentation. Added the Fermaid K and DAP in 100 ml water after one day and the second addition of Fermaid K at 3 days. Every addition may prompt a nice big volcano so will be prepared. Mixed up and temperature of must is 68 degrees F heading into fermentation. Racked after six weeks into three sanitized one gallon jugs. Bottled after six months and tasted at a year. No backsweetening. Yum. So easy and so so good. ~13.5% ABV

My recipe is on page 1. With the additional juice after racking off the must, I have 5 gallons.