From cultivating and maintaining prized vines to picking, fermenting and aging, the most exceptional wines take years to produce. Or maybe not—what if you could turn a bottle of grocery store grape juice into drinkable wine with your Instant Pot?
One food blogger and recipe developer in New Jersey seems to have accomplished this and with surprisingly good results. David Murphy, who blogs at Foodnservice.com, flipped his Instant Pot to the yogurt setting and filled it with Welch’s Grape Juice, sugar and red wine yeast. The result was wine that he describes as similar to a Merlot with a hint of a dark cherry and chocolate aroma.
In his blog post about his vino venture, Murphy points to a meme as the source of his inspiration. He says he enjoys a challenge, so he took this on. And everyone who has an Instant Pot is rejoicing.
House Wine
Murphy explains all the steps he followed to cook up his wine. He started by sterilizing his Instant Pot. This easy but important step kills bacteria with a diluted bleach solution. Nobody wants random bacteria in their wine (or anything else you’re cooking in your Instant Pot, for that matter).
Then, the grape juice, granulated sugar and red wine yeast spend about 48 hours in the Instant Pot. After that, Murphy transferred the juice back to the plastic juice bottle to rest for up to a month. The color and taste evolved over time, and the fizziness from the CO2 diminished.
You can check out Murphy’s detailed instructions on his website.
“Pleasantly Surprised”
Murphy shared his first batch of Instant Pot wine with brave friends, who were pleasantly surprised. Murphy is optimistic about developing additional varietals and trying his method with different grape juices and blends. He encourages fellow Instant Pot owners to do the same. Time to stock up on grape juice and maybe invest in another Instant Pot!
Also, it’s worth noting that Instant Pot representatives confirmed to “Today” that it is safe to attempt to make wine in the device.
What do you think? Would you drink wine made in an Instant Pot?
Written by Jennifer Nied for Simplemost.
