Tomato Serum Wine Adventure

[Agent]

So let me preface this post with the fact that I'm a long-time beer brewer who has struggled to make good wines. A substantial part of the problem is that I don't follow recipes for one reason or another.

This year's dilemma is that I have a garden from which we preserve a lot of stuff. This year was our tomato year. And we do alright at growing the buggers. Alright as in this is my 3rd 100lb batch of tomatoes for the year.

My sanity saving method of making a thick and easy tomato sauce involves freezing and thawing the tomatoes. This causes them to release a fairly clear juice - our Magical Tomato Serum! Naturally, I'm going to try making wine out of this.

 

[Agent]

Step one is to pick and prep tomatoes for freezing. I wash, de-stem, trim bad spots, and quarter/slice so no piece is more than say an inch thick. Then I put them in grocery bags and freeze them.

Once you are either ready to go, out of tomatoes, or out of freezer space, it's time to thaw. Plan ahead, as in two to three days in my case. It takes a while to thaw out this much stuff.

 

[Miraculix]

I salute you sir, for this marvelously a bit disgusting idea. I'd really love to try the end result.

 

[Agent]

When it's go time, you'll have to devise a way to strain the tomatoes from their serum. We have a nice not-too-fine-not-too-coarse colander that works perfectly. And the less you stir or agitate the tomatoes, the less fines that will be released into your serum.



The tomatoes go into the food strainer to get sauced, I pour a Quad to get sauced, and the serum goes into a bucket. Repeat until its hard to stand.

And there's a fine tomato sauce bound for any sort of canning desire without so much as a minute of simmering done to it.

 

[Agent]

In this go-round, I collected 4.5 gallons of serum to which I added 9lbs of sugar, 5 crushed and dissolved Campden tablets, and enough water to reach 5 gallons even. Strikes one and two, as I forgot to add my DAP and pectic enzyme. Strike two and a half, because I went nearly 40 hours before pitching two packs of CY-17 that I got somewhere on clearance for $0.10 each.

The extra time allowed a lot of the solids to settle nicely, so I held back the last quarts of tomato slurry that were in the bottom as I transferred into my carboy.

Oh yeah, that's a good look. SWMBO was not amused at the airlock aromas - I thought it was quite pleasant. I'll be letting this settle a bit before first racking.

 

[Agent]

I salute you sir, for this marvelously a bit disgusting idea. I'd really love to try the end result.

The core inspiration came from a local gentleman who made excellent wines from everything under the sun. He took grand champion at our fair one year with a tomato wine that was, in fact, very tasty. He has since passed, so I can't ask him about the details.

And unfortunately every recipe for tomato wine involves 3.5 quarts of water and 4-6lbs of tomatoes. We'll see if too much tomato is a thing or not.

Worst case, have y'all ever seen tomato brandy before?

 

[Miraculix]

The core inspiration came from a local gentleman who made excellent wines from everything under the sun. He took grand champion at our fair one year with a tomato wine that was, in fact, very tasty. He has since passed, so I can't ask him about the details.

And unfortunately every recipe for tomato wine involves 3.5 quarts of water and 4-6lbs of tomatoes. We'll see if too much tomato is a thing or not.

Worst case, have y'all ever seen tomato brandy before?

That's the spirit!

Quite literally if it doesn't go well .

 

[Agent]

I ran through the start of another batch today.

Of notable measurements, the serum had 4.2 Brix OG, and 0.35% TA.

For a 5.5 gallon batch I added in a Tsp of tannin, a Tbsp of nutrient mix, and 4 Tbsp of acid blend. That should get me just over the 0.6% TA which is generally accepted as the minimum in wines. I also added sugar to hit 23 Brix for OG.

I pitched two packs of CL-23 yeast, curious how a dry white wine yeast will perform.

 

[Agent]

People aren't kidding when they say that tomato red does not stick around.

12 hours post-pitch on the left, and original batch on the right.

Also, racked the original batch off the gross lees. Even without tannin or acid, it has a nice bright white wine flavor with a long lingering tomato aftertaste. We'll see if it's pleasant enough to drink up 10-15 gallons per year worth...

 

[Miraculix]

Man,

You. Are. Fearless.

Tomato wine...

 

[Agent]

Man,

You. Are. Fearless.

Tomato wine...

When in Rome
Do as the Romans do
When in the Sticks
Drink your veggies too!

 

[Agent]

Racked the second batch off the gross lees yesterday.

It seems to have good color and clarity. The flavor is prominent Tomato on the first sip with a notable lingering acidity that seems to give it a lot of body. A faint tomato flavor returns three minutes after you finish the glass.

Interesting stuff. Let's see what a little aging holds in store.

 

[Agent]

Racked both batches into their final carboys.



Batch One went 1.090 to 0.992 for 13.6% ABV. With no added tannin or acidity, it comes off as a white wine with just a hint of something else.

Batch two went 1.096 to 0.994 for 14.3% ABV. There is some tomato flavor in a subtlety good way, but a distracting acidity in that mucus-in-the-mouth sort of way.

Will let settle once again before bottling and unleashing on unsuspecting family come Christmas time.

 

[lumpher]

Very good and detailed write-up. Here's another 1 from antiquity by our friend and wine expert Yooper that came to mind as I was reading this:

Thread 'Tomato Wine' Tomato Wine

 

[Agent]

Very good and detailed write-up. Here's another 1 from antiquity by our friend and wine expert Yooper that came to mind as I was reading this:

Thread 'Tomato Wine' Tomato Wine

I basically used that as my touchstone as to what I should do for this go.

The big question was the difference between 4lbs tomatoes in a gallon of water versus a gallon of frozen tomato liquid. Tentatively, I'd say not a lot!