Why arent fruit wines sold commercially (much)?!

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jamesbsmith

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I really don't understand why commercial wine (in the main) has to be made from grapes! I live in the UK (where we don't have many vineyards and much wine making), but I have been making rhubarb wine (often with other fruit / juices) added, and they are absolutely great! As we all know here, loads of other fruits / ingredients can make amazing wines which I would much rather drink than many grape wines! I don't understand why this hasn't been taken advantage of more commercially. In England (and all other colder climes) we should have "vineyards" full of rhubarb etc!

Are there any stories in the wine making world (like that of the home brewers "Brew Dog"), that perfected any great fruit wine recipes and make it big time?! I know that we don't have this hobby with the hope that we are going to commercialise our recipes and take over the world, as its the process of producing poor wines and then making wines you are really happy with and improving them which makes it all so worthwhile, but I am just puzzled why it doesn't appear that anything other than grape is taken advantage of!
 
jamesbsmith said:
I really don't understand why commercial wine (in the main) has to be made from grapes! I live in the UK (where we don't have many vineyards and much wine making), but I have been making rhubarb wine (often with other fruit / juices) added, and they are absolutely great! As we all know here, loads of other fruits / ingredients can make amazing wines which I would much rather drink than many grape wines! I don't understand why this hasn't been taken advantage of more commercially. In England (and all other colder climes) we should have "vineyards" full of rhubarb etc!

Are there any stories in the wine making world (like that of the home brewers "Brew Dog"), that perfected any great fruit wine recipes and make it big time?! I know that we don't have this hobby with the hope that we are going to commercialise our recipes and take over the world, as its the process of producing poor wines and then making wines you are really happy with and improving them which makes it all so worthwhile, but I am just puzzled why it doesn't appear that anything other than grape is taken advantage of!
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I have several local wineries that make fruit wines. The closest makes about half fruit and half grape. Their fruit wines are fantastic! If you ever come to Maine, USA, stop in to Blacksmiths winery in Casco. Free taste testings daily:)
Ditto to liking fruit wines over grape wines!!! Rubarb is a favorite here as well. Grape is the last wine I would chose to drink.
 
I agree, but I think in general there may be an emerging market for fruit wines, and commercial wineries that are forward-looking enough to start making them available at reasonable prices might get in a trend at the ground level.

There are a couple places I know of near me that produce some sort of fruit wines and even brandies, but they're hard to find and fairly expensive. Definitely can't find them in the grocery store, although mead is becoming more available at some specialty grocery stores around me.
 
There are hundreds and hundreds of small to medium sized wineries in the US that make non-traditional fruit wines. Typically, I see cranberry wines in our area, but blueberry wines and peach wines are common as well. In Wisconsin especially (and I think Washington state), I see lots of cherry wines and apple wines. In Upstate New York, I've seen unusual grape wines like catawba grape wines.

I think US wineries produce quite a bit of fruit wines, and that there is a market for them. I am not familiar with fruit wines in other parts of the world, though.
 
Fruit wines are still looked on as less sophisticated than grape wines, in my part of the woods if you give someone a bottle of fruit wine they say I will give this to my wife, she loves fruit wines. I try to tell them this isnt strawberry hill but once a mindset is in place its too much work to overcome it. A lot of the small vineyards new us also make some kind of fruit wines. Our favorite one, Village Winery in Waterford VA, grows their own elderberries and even makes an elderberry juice with chocolate unfermented, talk about experimenting with fruit. I thought you English guys had hedgerows everywhere full of fruit trees and you can just walk down the road with a Tesco bag and pick your fill anytime you wanted? WVMJ
 
Yep, you just have to find a region of the country that is known for a particular fruit, and I can pretty much guarantee that there are winemakers in that area using that fruit. For example, Door County, Wisconsin, is famous for cherries. You can find cherry wine all over the place up there. I betcha can find peach wine in Georgia, blueberry wine in New England, etc.
 
Ya, thanks to Boone's Farm & Arbor Mist, fruit wine is generally thought to be inferior, "cheap" wine; mostly because those are the 1st (and often only) fruit wines people try. This is slowly starting to change, mostly due to small wineries turning out some tasty fruit wines, but there's still a long way to go.

We homebrewers usually make the best fruit wines as far as I'm concerned. I've tasted some pretty good fruit wines from small wineries & honestly, I've made wines that were as good, and a few that were BETTER than theirs.
If I can do it, so can you.
Regards, GF. :mug:
 
We have tons of farms with fruit trees in Bucks County, PA and most of the wineries around here do apple, strawberry, peach and other fruits. They do seem to be a little pricier than the concords and niagaras that most of the grape wines are from however. Here in PA there is a large population that really enjoy sweet grape wines and the wineries cater to that.
 
IMHO only, because fruit wine sucks. Haha. Typically it's too sweet and single note. I've tried tons of fruit wines from many different orchards and other "wineries", just not impressed by the fermented juice.
 
Around here it's growing greatly in popularity. We have a fantastic local winery that makes exclusively grape free wines. The cherry is fabulous, semi sweet, but they also make a dry strawberry rue barb. I way prefer fruit wines to grape
 

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