First time wine kit maker / bottling

[Robg260977]

Hi

This is one of those questions that starts "this could be a stupid question, but......"

Never made a wine kit before, but made quite a few beer / cider kits and the famous ginger beer recipe on this site. Am being given a wine kit for my birthday next week.

Don't have any wine bottles.

When it's ready for bottling, is there any reason why I can't put it in a pressure barrel and serve from that at Christmas time ???

Thanks in advance

 

[nixhaz]

Don't see why not, as long as you want a little fizz. If not, bags in boxes are cheap and you won't have to add gas to stop it from oxidising.

 

[RobWalker]

No reason really, but just consider -

1 - Ideally you want it gone in 6 months, plastic is permeable and this might affect the flavour.

2 - Like nixhaz says, It will be sparkling, and hard to keep cool as the weather warms up (6 months from now maybe.) And, if your drunken house guests run out of gas and let an air bubble in, it'll ruin the whole batch.

Maybe you could consider a combination of kegging and bottling. You can use screw tops and they're easily collectable, just tighten the tops with pliers and only use them once. You may lose a bottle or two, but it's very easy and I hate bottling...

Here's the bag in a box that nik mentioned;

http://www.balliihoo.co.uk/1-gallon-5-l ... p-347.html

 

[MattN]

If you already have the gear you can put it in beer bottles with a crown cap on it!

Matt

 

[Chippy_Tea]

i use 1.5 litre plastic water bottles, the wife likes sparkling spring water so i always have a good supply.

 

[Robg260977]

Thanks very much, all seems straight forward enough

 

[craig133]

Free wine bottles from local pub with screw cap work great.

 

[Boatbrewer]

Or hang around the recycling centre and ask people for their bottles.