It’s Grape Crush Time!!
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Living so close to the Sonoma Valley, we thought it would be fun to have our own little ‘crush’ with our one little grapevine. I originally planted this vine as decoration only, as it has gorgeous red Fall foliage (it’s a California native called Roger’s Red). The grape has a ton of little seeds, making it a pain to eat, but since it’s just so beautiful, I didn’t care. However, as the vine has gotten older (it’s about 6 years old now), it’s been producing more and more grapes – and this year was no exception. I was thinking I’d just let the birds eat them, and compost the rest when they started to get over-ripe. One Saturday morning, my daughter woke up and decided she really wanted to make grape juice with all of our grapes. I try and jump on any activity that my 14 year old wants to do with me (they’re getting fewer and farther between….) so I grabbed my husband and we dove right in.
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It was actually easier than I thought it would be. I was prepared for a supreme, messy hassle – having my family abandon me after about 20 minutes of de-stemming grapes, but they hung in there! I must admit, it wasn’t a big deal at all. Then again, we DO only have ONE grapevine (though plenty of grapes for 3 pitchers of grape juice)!
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Below are some photos I’ve taken, documenting our morning’s work.
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Obviously, the first step is to pick your grapes. Remember – all of these came from 1 single vine! (We left just about as many on the vine for the birds – Robins and Mockingbirds really seem to love to eat the grapes!)
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The next step is de-stemming the grapes. This is where it gets a bit tedious – but my daughter hung in there for the 20 minutes or so that it took…I was afraid if we left the stems on, and then they got crushed, it would make the juice taste ‘woody’ or ‘tanic’ or just plain weird…
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After rinsing the grapes, it was time for one of the most critical parts of this process. WASHING FEET!! The whole concept of using feet to crush the grapes who’s juice I would be drinking in a just a few minutes really grossed me out, so I made sure they were squeaky clean before I let her germ-up our juice…
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After about 20 minutes of doing the Lucille-Ball thing….the next step was to separate the juice from the skins and seeds. We used a colander with really small holes in it, to filter out as much ‘junk’ as we could. We also found it helpful to use our pastry blender to sort of ‘mush around’ and press down the skins, allowing more juice to flow.
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Next, we took the juice into the house to drain it, one more time, through cheesecloth – to remove the smallest particles.
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After a quick boil on the stove to gently ‘pasturize’ the juice, we had 3 pitchers of very strong grape juice! We found it really delicious mixed with 7-Up, or Seltzer water. The juice we didn’t drink, we poured into large ice-cube trays and will use them in our Smoothies. Cheers!
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If you’re STILL not convinced it’s a fun and easy project, Jean Ann Van Krevelen has a really great video which shows her family’s version of their own ‘grape crush’. Cin Cin!! (honestly, that’s how the Italian’s spell it!)
September 14th, 2009 saat: 9:25 am
What fun!! We have grapes too, but have never made juice (we either eat them or give them to our sister who makes wine). But you may have inspired me to try it next year
The photos were fun; the write-up entertaining; and the grapes, themselves.. beautiful! How nice they alook along your deck railing.
September 14th, 2009 saat: 9:29 am
I’m so glad this inspired you – honestly, it was an easy project (or I would be writing an entirely different blog – I hate messy projects with little to no rewards!!). The grapes look like they’re on a railing, but they’re actually on my arbor – and yes, they fall like crazy this time of year and get tracked in the house if you’re not diligent about sweeping them up each morning. Another great reason to pick and use them!!
September 14th, 2009 saat: 11:56 am
That looks SO DARNED GOOD. I was happy to see the boiling step after the stomping step…no offense to Emily’s feet!
September 14th, 2009 saat: 12:05 pm
Yes, even though she’s my ‘precious little baby’ it’s still kinda gross if you think about it! Boiling is a crucial step!!
September 14th, 2009 saat: 2:24 pm
What a great idea! Is the juice good as is, or does it need some sugar to temper it? I make spritzers all the time with pomegranate juice, OJ and club soda – I bet this would be a great sub for the tart pomegranate.
September 14th, 2009 saat: 3:41 pm
It was pretty strong, so we diluted it with 7-Up or Seltzer, which was perfect. Ours didn’t need any additional sugar, but I guess that depends on how sweet the original grapes are, or how much of a sweet-tooth you have! Your spritzer sounds wonderful & I think it would taste great with the grape juice!
September 14th, 2009 saat: 4:15 pm
Wow so thats how its done, glad to see this, my cartons of grape juice will take on a whole new appearance having read your post Rebecca. Quite a crushing feat uggghhh
September 14th, 2009 saat: 4:18 pm
That is what I call “toe lick’n good”. The Colonial and “I Love Lucy” would be very proud. Would love to see you do an episode on Vitavitavegimin in-the-garden. Great blog and just my level of fun-in-the-garden. I wish there was a way to stomp my weeds in to juicy goodness! Keep up the good work.
September 14th, 2009 saat: 4:31 pm
Oh, this looks like such fun! My dad did this with us when we were kids – I’d love to do it with my daughter now. I’m sure she’d love it!
September 14th, 2009 saat: 4:57 pm
I’m glad it brought back some good memories for you! If you want to make it even easier, then buy some ‘seed-less’ grapes for your daughter…cuts out about 30 minutes of tedious work!
September 14th, 2009 saat: 5:09 pm
Let me know how the weed juice turns out….wait…isn’t that what the grass shooters at Jamba Juice are?? (They taste like it, at least….)