Apple wine - fresh apples or apple juice?

[Brian66]

My son inherited a small wine making kit - 1 gallon I think. He wants to make an apple wine.

We are trying to decide if we should use apple juice or do something with fresh apples?

What type of differences would there be in the finished product?

I understand using apples will be more work (pressing etc). Any other pros/cons to one versus the other?

 

[lumpher]

Use fresh-pressed apple juice if at all possible; much easier than pressing apples. If you don't mind pressing, go for it. You also should use "cider" apples instead of just whatever apples you get from the grocery store. Golden or Red Delicious apples don't make the best cider, but can be used... ANY apples can be used for cider, but you get different quality.

 

[hottpeper13]

I just put together an apple wine with 4 gal of Aldi's organic juice (OG 1.042) and a 6 lb bag of the pure cane juice sugar topped up to 5 gal for an OG of 1.082. It's fermenting now (first week) with TYB's Belgian Dry yeast.
I know that wine and cider taste different but what is the difference between the two as far as process gose? Did I make cider or wine?

 

[fluketamer]

you do know of edworts right?
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/man-i-love-apfelwein.14860/

pappys might be a little less harsh and drinkable earlier. imo

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/pappy-s-pub-cider-award-winner.408610/

its 14 percent ABV

this thread makes really wonderful wines from juice:
https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/supermarket-juice-wine-how-to-guide-and-recipes.49462/

good luck please let us know how it comes out.

 

[Brian66]

Awesome! Thanks for the info!

 

[bernardsmith]

Not certain how many pounds of apples you might need to express about a gallon of juice. I am thinking about 15 lbs or more. If you have many apple trees and trees with tart apples. sweet apples, apples with lots of tannins then I would suggest you use those apples. If you don't but you have access to orchards with apples grown for hard cider making, then I would suggest you buy your juice from them but apples in these parts are not ready for picking until the fall, with more sour varieties ripening later in the season (around Oct in NYS). Otherwise , you might look for juiced apples - preferably not the bright clear bottles of juice but juice that looks brown and has not been filtered.
While many folk on this forum use Safale yeasts to make their ciders and apple wines, 71B has an affinity for the malic acid in apples and will over 6- 12 months convert about 40% of that malic acid to a softer acid (lactic) which is one of the keys to English and French apple ciders and wines. (For the record, most seasoned makers of red grape wines add bacteria to their wines for a second 'fermentation' to transform 100% of the malic acid into lactic Malic acid being quite sharp.