Different Grapes for Different Wines Articles | Home Winemaking

By: Homemade Vino

Though a wide range of options exist, the tendency is that when most people think about making wines, they are usually thinking of making wine with grapes. Having a winery or being a professional winemaker with a large expanse of land isn’t a criterion for making your own wine. You may have some small space and grow your own grapes or simply purchase the grapes. By using an appropriate combination of different ingredients you can succeed in creating a wine which would cost substantially less than what would obtain in a good liquor store.

Whether you’re purchasing the grapes or growing them on your own, there are a number of different types of grapes that can be chosen from. If you want to make the right wine, then you must understand the differences so you’ll know which kind of grapes should be used in the process. Different grapes have different tastes and this will have an effect on the wine that you make depending on the grapes that you choose to try out.

Grapes tend to be placed into three categories defined on the basis of how sweet or acidic these grapes are. In position one is the category of Native Wild Grapes. Grapes which belong to this category aren’t very sweet and they usually have a sharp taste due to the high acid content. Despite all this, they tend to have a lovely fragrance and unlike other grapes they don’t grow in a bunch but as detached fruits. Some grapes in this category include the Fox, Frost and Scuppernong grapes.

The other category is the group of Native Wine Grapes. These are usually the wine grapes which are native to North American soil and can be found throughout the continent. Unlike the Native Wild Grapes, they have no strong fragrance or full flavor. They tend to have a high acid level in combination with a high sugar content, what this does is that it makes the taste a whole lot sharper but sweeter as well. In this category of grapes you have the Concord, Niagara and the Delaware and Catawba.

The final group of wine grapes would be the European Wine Grapes. True to their name, they were initially discovered in Europe from where they were transplanted to other countries such as the United States. This group is the largest of all wine groups and includes many of the famous names with which most people are familiar with. They include: the Pinot Chardonnay, the Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Other grapes in this category include the hybrid grapes such as the Foch, Vignoles and Reliance. Most of the time, these grapes don’t have a high acid content or sharp flavor, in terms of sugar content however, they rank highest among all three categories.

With the information supplied about the basic categories of grapes, decisions can be made as to the kind of wine you intend to make and the best type of grapes that would be suited for the task at hand.