Black Currant Wine

I’ve tasted some excellent homemade black currant wines, but that was before I began my hobby of home winemaking. Unfortunately, I’m no longer in touch with the black currant home winemaker so after purchasing about 8lbs. of frozen black currants, I had to do a bit of research and experiment.

A couple of recipes I found did not include pectic enzyme, yet black currants are high in pectin, so I chose to add pectic enzyme.

Now, I do know a professional winemaker who makes wonderful black currant wine. However I was not able to get a recipe from him, but he did give me some advice on yeast to use. My recipe therefore follows his advice.

Black Currant Wine Ingredients

(4 Gallons)

8 lbs. frozen black currants

4 gallons of water

9 lbs. of sugar (you may want to adjust this amount depending on your specific gravity reading).

4 teaspoon yeast nutrient

3 teaspoon pectic enzyme

Yeast: EC1118 AND D254*

The above ingredients provided me with a must with the following values:

Specific Gravity: 1.094

pH: 3.3

Total Acid: Unknown (forgot to purchase a new acid test kit!).

I crushed the black currants in a primary fermenter, boiled a gallon of water and dissolved 4 pounds of sugar.

The water was poured over the crushed berries. I then added three gallons of hot water, and took a specific gravity reading, which was too low.

It took about 4 more pounds of sugar to reach the specific gravity of 1.094.

I then added the yeast nutrient, pectic enzyme and took a pH reading.

Pitched the yeast, and an hour later noted some good activity.

I’ll adjust this recipe as I learn more about making black currant wine – for now, I plan on racking into a 4 gallon carboy in about 7 days, and continuing fermentation until the SG shows dryness. I’ll rack again, add 1/4 teaspoon of sulphite and age for six months, taste, and see what it’s like so far.

I may also adjust the acid content if need be later. The research I did on black currants indicates that it is a fruit that is high in both pectin and acid, relative to other fruits.

If you have any experience with black currant wine, please post your ideas or suggestions to our message board here. Thanks!

* Winemaker Fred Bulbeck of Scotch Block Winery suggested I use both strains of yeast together in a black currant wine.