Fun and Summery Peach Wine

Peach wine is a sweet, golden-colored wine that is full of the ripe flavor of summer. I like to drink it cold, like a glass of sweet white wine, or mixed with a bit of sparkling water for a refreshing afternoon cocktail.

The Perfect Fruit and Peach Wine

The recipe is written for using just peaches, however, I usually make a blended peach wine by using a mix of peaches and other fruit. It just provides a more full and balanced flavor.

Peaches provide both sugar and acidity required to help this wine ferment properly. As such, you don’t want to replace more than 1/4 to 1/2 of the peaches in the recipe below. To replace a portion of the peaches, exchange them by weight and follow the rest of the instructions just as they are written.

Here are a few recommend peach wine fruit mixes with the amount of fruit that should be used in combination with the peaches.

1. Rhubarb: I know it’s an unusual mix, but it is my absolute FAVORITE. Something about the tartness of the rhubarb just tastes right when combined with peaches. Replace up to 1/4 of the peaches with finely diced rhubarb stalks.
2. Berries: For a cup full of summer, replace up to 1/3 of the peaches with ripe, fresh berries.
3. Plum; Plums contain a lot more of the necessary nutrients for winemaking. You can easily replace up to half of the peaches in this recipe with plums.
4. Pear: Pear and peach wine is a delicious combination. The pear perfectly complements the flavor of peach without masking it in any way.

Wine-making Tips and Tricks

The recipe is written for someone who already knows a bit about how to make wine. If this is your first time, I recommend reading some of my general winemaking posts.

• To learn about equipment needed, how to rack and bottle wine, and everything else you might need to know check out my general post on How to Make Cider and Wine.
• Here’s a post on How to Use a Hydrometer, to help you determine the alcohol content of your wine.
• The fermentation of alcohol also can involve a small amount of methanol production. However, the amount of methanol produced from wines (commercial or homemade) is very low. The danger comes from distilling wine into brandy, which concentrates the amount of methanol. Regardless, the best way to prevent methanol production is to make sure that your ferment is not contaminated with pectin-loving bacteria, yeasts, and fungi. So sanitize EVERYTHING!
• Since peaches don’t contain all the necessary tannins and nutrients to feed the wine yeast, you need to add them to ensure a good ferment. If you skip using them, then the yeasts will die off quickly resulting in a very sweet, low alcohol wine.

Print