
Wine making has been done with just two ingredients for centuries: juice from grapes and yeast.
Many fruit juices have been used over the years as well, but grapes are by far the most popular. Yeast
creates the wine making magic. Many types of yeast have been grown, many for just the purpose of
making wine. Yeast is a living organism that uses sugar from the grape juice for it's energy. This
reaction is called fermentation, and is how wine is actually made.
Calories in wine depends on grapes type.
During the fermentation process yeast spores will multiply rapidly until all of the available grape juice
sugar has been consumed. The sugars used during this process are turned into carbon dioxide and
alcohol. The yeast will also affect the taste of the wine depending on the variation of yeast used and
the temperature used during the fermentation. Once all the sugars have been used the yeast will filter
to the bottom of the container used for the fermentation. The wine is removed from the container and
stored elsewhere for bottling.
The color of the wine made is dependent on the color and type of grape used in making it. Did you
know that almost all grape juice is almost clear, or maybe a little golden in color, even the black
grapes. The wine the wine absorbs the color from the grapes is by soaking the skins in the juice while
it is fermenting. You can even make a white wine from black grapes if you remove the skins before
the color is soaked out of them. This is how Champagne is made. By raising the amount of time the
grape skins stay you will enhance the color of the wine. The longer you leave the skins in, the darker
the wine will become.
Many things influence the taste of wine, even though there are very few ingredients used. Of course
the most important is the type of grape used. Every variety of grape has it's own unique flavor, color,
smell and texture. Even the condition in which the grape was grown will effect the flavor of the
grape, and of course effect the flavor of the wine. The soil and the temperature during the growing
season will effects making wine.