Vintner's Best Honeydew Wine Base 5-Gallon Pail

Your Vintner's Best Honeydew Wine Base 5-Gallon Pail is the perfect starting point for crafting a delicious honeydew wine. This blend of juice concentrates, HFCS, citric acid, and natural flavors creates a strong honeydew melon character that perfectly matches the standard. The product is blended, pasteurized, and filled into gallon containers, pails, or drums for convenient storage at ambient temperature. Diammonium phosphate is added as a yeast nutrient to ensure that your honeydew wine ferments properly. This product will provide a delicious, full-bodied wine with a distinct honeydew flavor that will please the most discerning palates.

Your Vintner's Best Honeydew Wine Base is perfect for making your favorite varietal wines all year long. Your wine base is made from all natural fruit juice and does not need to be strained or placed into any sort of mesh bag! Start making your favorite varietal wines today.

No pH or acid adjustments are required. Acidity: 2.4; 2.2 - 2.6 % w/w (as citric acid) (AOAC Method 942.15) 

Brix : 73.1oB min. (as sucrose, corrected for acidity) (AOAC Method 983.17)

Ingredient List : High Fructose Corn Syrup; Apple, Pear & Melon Juice Concentrates; Citric Acid; Natural Flavors; Diammonium Phosphate; Water

INSTRUCTIONS

Add 20 gallons of water to 5 gallons of concentrate and pitch your favorite yeast to make 25 gallons of wine. Distilled water is your best choice because it is guaranteed to be pH neutral which will not throw off the acidity of your wine. If you cannot get distilled water, you can use regular bottled water however, it could make your wine more tart if it is acidic. Tap water is not recommended.  

OTHER PRODUCTS YOU MIGHT NEED 

Yeast

ICV D-47 is the recommended yeast for your Honeydew wine but there are many other yeast options if you have different preferences.  

Potassium Metabisulfite

If you want to age your Honeydew, you will need to add sulfites to prevent oxidation. Sulfites are also an excellent sanitizing agent. 

Fermfast Dualfine Clearing Aid

Fermfast Dualfine Clearing Aid (65 g) is a two stage fining agent package that contains Kieselol and Chitosan. Clears most wines to a brilliant finish in 12-48 hours. One package is sufficient to clear your Honeydew wine 5-gallon batch. It's a great tool to have on hand for any winemaker. 

Wine Bottles

You will need to bottle your Honeydew wine. Clear 750 ml bottles are a good choice for you to show off the color and clarity of your wine. 

Fermenters

A 7.9 Gallon Fermenter with a grommeted lid is the right vessel to use for your Honeydew wine because you need extra headspace to account for active fermentation. Though your batch is only 5 gallons, the larger fermenter will also allow you to make 6 gallon kits making it a versatile choice. It is also good to replace them from time because plastic harbors bacteria. 

Hoses

Many people reuse their hoses for far too long. Replacing your hoses often is highly recommended with winemaking. Even if you have good sanitation practices, hoses are particularly difficult to keep clean. You do not want to risk a bacterial contamination in your Honeydew Wine over something that costs very little to replace.

Siphons

Auto-siphons are a great luxury item to have in your winemaking equipment. Once you have one you will never go without one again. Don't forget to use a heavy duty sanitizer to clean it since you don't want to replace it often as hoses. A good sanitizer for that job is Five Star San. Like hoses, Siphons are also difficult to keep clean so it is advisable to replace them. 

Corkers

Corking can be a big job especially if you make a lot of wine. Also bigger corkers give you the option to use wider corks which are beneficial if you want to age your Honeydew wine longer. The Portuguese Floor Corker pictured here is easy to use and makes corking fun.

Airlocks

Airlocks are another inexpensive product that should be periodically replaced. Though it might be easy to assume bacteria is not a concern with airlocks because they do not actually touch your wine, this is not the case. A small increase in temperature could cause your wine to swell and back up into the airlock. It happens often. You don't want to risk losing your Honeydew wine over a potentially unsanitary and cheap piece of plastic.

Carboys 

Your Honeydew wine is designed to fit a 5 gallon carboy pictured here. Though glass carboys are one of the safest sanitary options for secondary fermentation and bulk aging your wine, they are fragile and break from time to time. If you use glass carboys, a carboy handle or carrier is very advisable. They should not be moved when full without carrying equipment.

Stoppers and Bungs 

Your Honeydew wine will need to sit in a carboy during secondary fermentation and like airlocks, bungs and stoppers should also be periodically replaced, especially if you make a lot of wine. Stoppers are available drilled for use with airlocks or solid for bulk aging after your wine has fully gassed out. The size 6.5 stopper pictured is made for a 6 or 5 gallon carboy. If you have many different sized vessels, universal bungs might be a more economical option.

Hydrometers

Hydrometers can last a lifetime, if they don't break. If you have suffered the disappointment of breaking your favorite hydrometer you can view them here.

Corks

Winemakers always need more corks. Be sure to read the corker requirements of different corks before you make your selection because some cork sizes do not work with all corkers. If you want to age your Honeydew wine denser corks are preferable.

 Mix Stir

You may be using the back of your stirring spoon to degas your wine but a mix stir is the best way to remove unwanted gasses. 

 DID YOU KNOW

Bailan melons, which are known locally near Lanzhou, the capital city of Gansu province in China's northwest, are better known as honeydews in the rest of China.