I harvested wild grapes off our land to make juice as a toast for our upcoming Harvest Ceremony.
To make wild grape juice:
- Harvest the grapes in the fall when they are ripe and bright purple. If you harvest them after a few frosts they will be sweeter.
- Wash the grapes and remove the stems.
- Either make the juice immediately or store the grapes in freezer bags and freeze them. Freezing them will make the juice sweeter. If they are too squishy, freeze them first and it will be easier to remove them from the stems, but cold on the hands!
- When ready to make the juice, put the grapes in a pot and mash them up with a potato masher. If the grapes are frozen, allow them to thaw first.
- Add water to 3 cm or so above the mashed grapes. Put the pot on the stove and bring the water to a steam (not a boil).
- Remove from the stove and press out the juice either by using a wine press (the easiest and best yield – see picture below) or strain through cheesecloth and a colander into a large bowl. Let the mash cool until you can handle it and then wring out the remaining juice.
- Let the juice settle overnight in jars in the fridge, then pour off the grape juice, discarding any sediment at the bottom.
- Sweeten to taste all at once or sweeten as you use it.
- To enjoy, mix 2-3 tablespoons (or to taste) of concentrate with plain or bubbly water. Sweeten to taste if you haven’t already added sugar.
- You can also add pectin and sugar to make the juice into a delicious wild jelly that you can preserve or enjoy immediately.
