Press or Crush ?

I just got my two specialty yeasts, RC 212 and 1122. Ive decided to go with Alicante and Ruby cabernet, mixed 1-1.

I was given advice on when buying grapes, not to let them separate the skins and seeds, and crush into juice.

The wine gets tannins from the skins/seeds, its better if you ferment with them in the must, also suggested was to let natural fermentation take place, and after a week separate the skins/seeds from the must for it to finish fermenting.

Im not sure which way to go, I prefer to use the yeast I just bought, but I also want a good quality wine.....

Should I get the grapes crushed into clean juice, or what ? Im only making 2 cases, aprox 5gal

What kind of press do you have? Ideally, you'd crush the grapes and use sulfite to kill the wild yeast and bacteria. Wait 24 hours. Then, you'd add your yeast culture and let it ferment for a bit, then press. You'd get better wine, with more depth, by doing it that way. For red wines, it's common to ferment for a short period (5 days or so) on the skins.

If you don't have a crusher or a way to press, then you'd be limited to buying fresh juice. Just as with whole grapes, you'd use sulfite to kill wild yeast and bacteria, and then 24 hours later you'd add your yeast culture.

I dont have any equipment at all, but where you buy the grapes how should I tell them to do it ? Could I ask them to place what they filtered out in a container for me and take those home and perhaps throw like half of it into a grain bag and let it sit together ? ? Will the tannin make much of a difference ? ? To save the trouble of doing this couldnt I just add tannin if its so important ?

Will the tannin make much of a difference? Yes. If you let natural yeast ferment you may also be letting natural bacteria ruin your wine. But luck can happen too

So the suggestion is for me to buy a bottle of tannin and add some into my batch before it ferments ? Im buying 2 cases of grapes and getting them squeezed into juice separating the skins/stems/seeds.

Is there a chance that there may just be enough tannins in the juice already ? Im using dark red grapes ruby cab and alicante.

What kind of wine are you trying to make? If you want a real cab, you have to start on the skins.

Paint strainer bags good for filtering the pulp from juice ? I might just grab one...

I actually just used a grain bag, did the trick although they are very easy to break so I didnt wanna press much. They are disposable ones, this is probobly why.

I ended up buying 1 case of grenache, which gave me 2.5gals pressed.

SG dropped to 1.012 already....im having a hard time believing that these grapes were so sweet to give a 1.070+ starting gravity, next time ill check the gravity before ferment.

Well I noticed there was alot of sediment at the bottom!!! I couldnt even use my racking cane properly, could it be that I used 2x the amount of yeast and it produced way to many lee's or is this perfectly normal to have like 1/2 gall of lee's ?

It was still "sparkling" when I was racking, but I checked SG and it was at 1.000, almost finished, this thing is dropping so fast! Been only 5 days since yeast was pitched!! Not very good for extracting tannins and other goodies from the seeds/skins!!

Say, when bottling with a cane, when you stop the flow to change bottles, is it normal for a bunch of air bubbles to form when you start the flow again ? Or is this just co2 ?

This is really really good, id wish ive bought alot more!!

It taste like a store quality wine, not homemade. Unlike any other homemade wine ive tried!