How to Fortify Ice Wine With Brandy
Ice wine--which can be fairly expensive, due to the conditions needed to produce it--is a sweet dessert wine produced from grapes that have been allowed to freeze on the vine prior to harvest. A bottle from the store will cost anywhere from $30 to $100. It can be produced fairly inexpensively, however, from a kit, with the finished product coming out at as little as $3 a bottle. Fortifying it with brandy---which is generally done to boost the alcohol content of a wine---will add to the expense of making the wine, but it will also produce an ice wine that is not as sweet as regular ice wine, and which will be smoother to the palate. Does this Spark an idea?
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Instructions
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Purchase one of the ice wine making kits available on the market (see resources below, 'Ice Wine kits'). Many of these kits have won international awards, and are generally the best choice for an amateur wine maker who wants to make ice wine at home. Making ice wine by starting with grapes is an extremely labor-intensive process, requiring much precision and with lots of room for error, so it's a wise decision, if this is your first time making ice wine, to use one of these kits.
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Chose a brandy to fortify your ice wine. Brandy is a wine that has been distilled until it has an alcohol content level of 40 to 60 percent. Grape brandy, which is produced by the distillation of fermented grapes, is a popular choice to use when fortifying wine. You want to look for a brandy that has a high alcohol content, but is relatively inexpensive, as several bottles may be required. Popular brands include E&J, Korbel, and Christian Brothers.
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Add the brandy during the fermentation process. It will arrest the fermentation by killing off the yeast, thus yielding a product with a higher alcohol content. A typical fortified wine is about 20 percent alcohol. The best strategy for making fortified wine is to get as much alcohol content as possible from the fermentation itself (see resource below, 'Making High Alcohol Wines'), and adding the brandy as needed to bring the total alcohol level up to 17-22 percent.
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