I’ve been making wine from fresh juice since 1994. The juice I use is imported into Canada by Kamil Juices from Ontario. Kamil imports 100% vinifera grape juice from Italian, French and German vineyards. Kamil Juices are not from concentrate nor are they wine kits. Imagine if you harvested grapes from a commercial vineyard. Then you would crush and press these grapes and use the extracted juice to make wine. This is how Kamil Juice is processed. In the environment which I live this may be as close as I’ll ever get to making wine from fresh grapes.
This fall I put down three juices from Kamil. A Merlot and Nebbiolo from Italy and a Cabernet Sauvignon from France. The Merlot and Cab are still in the carboys and the Nebbiolo is bottled. I’ve been using these juices for some time now but this Nebbiolo has to be one of the best. It’s a big wine with lots of tannin and backbone. When I poured this juice into the fermenting bucket I knew it was something special. It’s colour was inky black and it smelled fantastic.
After the juice was fermented I racked it into a carboy and added an American Oak Spiral then left it for six weeks before filtering and bottling. The finished wine is impressive and I may have a potential star ageing in my cellar right now. I say a potential star because I don’t know how it will evolve with time. It’s a big tannic wine that will require some extensive ageing.
I’m very happy with my Nebbiolo right now but the anticipation of something even greater is what drives my passion for this fascinating craft.
