I heard this today. Agree? Disagree? Discuss.

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rs3902

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"making wine is easier than making beer, but its so much easier to make GOOD beer than it is to make GOOD wine"

I heard this from a home wine maker at work. What do you think?
 
Wine making is so much more complex and complicated to me. For one thing there are so many steps spread out over several days (and weeks) that needs to be done, many of the instructions I've seen for winemaking have you do several things over a span of a few days before you even pitch yeast, whereas with brewing in most cases unless doing something like no-chill, all the steps are done in the same period or time and culminate end at yeast pitch. Then for me at least I just walk away for a month then bottle or keg, with nothing really done in between except make sure my temps are favorable.

My few attempts at winemaking have been a lot more difficult, or at least required more time and attention, then beer making.
 
I've made both.

It's hard to wait for a big beer to finish. It's impossible to wait for that bottle of wine to be drinkable.

They are both as easy or difficult as you want to make them.
 
The best wine comes with a screw top, I would not imagine that it is that hard to make.
 
Both are as easy or as hard as you want to make them.
Just depends on the results you want in the end
 
I haven't taken a stab at wine yet. I don't think I could handle the letdown of waiting a year or so for a terrible product if I screwed it up somewhere along the way. I can drink bad beer without too much fuss but there has been more that one bottle of wine that I couldn't drink. I'd like to try it at some point though. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I have nothing useful to add.:eek:
 
You will probably hate me for saying this. But I think the best wine is made by starting with great grapes. Crushing them, putting the juice in a demijohn. And just letting it go (temp. Controlled) . Screw all that adding this and that. Just my 2¢...
 
You will probably hate me for saying this. But I think the best wine is made by starting with great grapes. Crushing them, putting the juice in a demijohn. And just letting it go (temp. Controlled) . Screw all that adding this and that. Just my 2¢...

This for the win
 
I totally agree with the statement. Wine is stupid simple, so it's easy. But it's far more complex- the acidity adjustments, the MLF (if doing), the weather (affects the sugar in the grapes/fruit), etc.

Winemaking is easier in many respects, but it's far more difficult to make a good wine than a great beer.
 
. . . but it's far more difficult to make a good wine than a great beer.
That would depend on your expectations and palette. The difference between good and great is too subjective. You're right in that I've never had a wine that I would consider great and probably never will. I have had great beers. But then I'm not that fond of wine and a week from now I'll find a beer that's ever greater than last weeks greatness.

May be that as beer drinkers, we're just too easy. The stuffy wine drinkers don't know RDWHAHB.
 
May be that as beer drinkers, we're just too easy. The stuffy wine drinkers don't know RDWHAHB.

Oh, I dont' think it's that "we're too easy". I've had plenty of bad beers, especially in competition! But much of the wine I make is "good". Or even "very good". But I only think maybe 2 batches of "excellent" wine- over 10+ years.

But with beer, a bag of grain, a bag of hops, and some know-how can equal excellent. Most are "good" to "very good", but I've had more than two batches of excellent!

With wine, it's so dependent on the quality of the fruit from year to year, as that determines the sugar content, the acidity, and the flavor of the fruit. Those are factors totally out of your control and totally variable. A warm wet summer may make the difference between "ok" and "excellent" for grapes.
 
I totally agree with the statement. Wine is stupid simple, so it's easy. But it's far more complex- the acidity adjustments, the MLF (if doing), the weather (affects the sugar in the grapes/fruit), etc.

Winemaking is easier in many respects, but it's far more difficult to make a good wine than a great beer.

I agree with this, I started making wine, then backed into beer. Wine the work is much more spread out, beer it is more condensed.
 
IMO, wine making is a total art - "pastry chef" stuff - measure, correct for fruit differences, taste, do come chemistry, etc. One year later you find it is okay. My family has made wine (not hooch, wine) for 40 years. Some good, a few great, most drinkable. Beer making is total "good cook" stuff - know your ****, keep it clean and you will have a good beer. Great beer is process control, great wine is a dark-art!
 
With wine, it's so dependent on the quality of the fruit from year to year, as that determines the sugar content, the acidity, and the flavor of the fruit. Those are factors totally out of your control and totally variable.
The flaw in my arguement is that I was equating "easier to make" as the skill involved, not looking at the quality of the end product.

But I suppose my opinion doesn't count. The only thing resembling wine that I've ever made is EdWort's Apfelwein. Doesn't get much easier and I've got some that's a few years old that's pretty tasty. In fact my very first batch of EdWort's was good. Can't say that about my first Mr Beer (Proudly drank it anyway. :p)



Great beer is process control, great wine is a dark-art!
But I have to say that I totally disagree with this statement. The original premise was good vs. good. When you start talking about great vs. great, process control is a must for both wine and beer. For either, reaching true greatness is a dark-art!






. . . on a quest to brew the perfect IPA knowing that with each step forward, the bar is raised a little higher.
 
The flaw in my arguement is that I was equating "easier to make" as the skill involved, not looking at the quality of the end product.

Even without considering the quality of the end product, wine is "easier" to make in most ways.

Consider a stick, a bucket, and some fruit vs. Mr. Beer. You will get drinkable wine with a stick and a bucket, but maybe not drinkable beer with Mr. Beer. In that respect, wine is easier. When you start to think of the quality end, (good wine vs. good beer), beer is easier.

It's harder to make good wine, or rather wine that tastes really good and is comparable to a store-bought wine. It's not very hard to make a commercial quality beer.
 
Is smashing grapes to make wine the equivalent of malting your own barley.

If you consider that buying grape juice to make wine is the equivalent of buying barley that is already malted, then I would say that making great beer is much harder than making great wine.
 
If I were trying to equate, I'd say that smashing grapes is to wine making like crushing grain is to brewing. And since in most cases it is done by an independent malster, malting is not part of the brewing process. I'd think that using juice for wine would be like brewing with extract?
 
I met someone that makes his own wine soon after I started brewing beer. My cousin raved about what he made and he was proud of it too. Sorry, but to me is was just bad wine. Not even close to the type he claimed it was. I also found out about his process and completely see why it wasn't good [IMO]. He did crush his own grapes, but I think his selection was wanting. Don't know, or remember, what he used for yeast, or how long he had it go (think it was far too short a time frame). He also didn't even take the labels off the bottles he used. :smack:

While I've not made wine, yet, I have been making mead. IMO/IME, the processes between making mead and wine are very similar. Not a total match mind you, but very similar. Both take mixing up the correct must, certain C&F at the start, and then time. It can take more than a while for some batches to really come into their own with either. Where it might be not good for drinking after a year, give it another year (or two) to age and it can become something great.

I'm not 20 years into it like Yooper, but I hope to be someday. I'm waiting to find the grapes I want to use for my first batch of wine. I'll probably not go with actual fruit (crushing/pressing them myself) but get it already done. Need to read up on that some more before buying the ingredients.

Also, I see crushing the grapes as being similar to crushing your grain. If you also grow your own grapes that would be akin to growing the grain and malting it. Basically one less step in the grape side of things to get the same ingredient level.
 
. I'd think that using juice for wine would be like brewing with extract?

Yes, that's what I would think also.

Kit wines can be very nice, and they are super easy as the grapes are pressed and condensed and even the acid and brix adjustments are done- so in that way it's very similar to extract. Even buying juice frozen in a bucket is a wee bit more detailed, as you often have to adjust the acid and brix.

Destemming and pressing grapes isn't hard, and not really "part" of it, any more than crushing grain is.
 
I'm just glad I live smack dab in the middle of Oregon's wine country. I live within walking distance of five wineries, and no more than a 20 minute drive to over 100 more. No need for me to dabble in wine making, I focus all my attention on beer. The wife gets frustrated enough with the time I spend on brewing, the marriage might not survive another hobby ;)
 
Made wine last fall. Totally sucked. Way too acidic and tart. Poured them all out.

Is winemaking hard? No. But you can't always just crush some grapes and put it in a bucket and end up with good wine.

It takes a bit of learning, just like beermaking, although to a much lesser extent I think. I think that you can almost always make a great beer with enough knowledge and a few ingredients.

With Wine, you can only make as good a wine as the grapes you use will allow. The knowledge comes in knowing what grapes to use and making the best wine you can with what you get.
 
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