4 Key Differences in Quality When Using 100% Pure Juice
We get a lot of questions about what the differences are in quality between our 100% Pure Juice wine kits and the traditional concentrate wine kits. Before we outline the differences, it is important to understand the difference between juice not from concentrate and juice from concentrate.
Juice not from concentrate essentially means that no water has been removed and reconstituted. The juice is freshly squeezed and pasteurized leaving most of its natural flavour, sugars, colour, nutrients, and oils in the juice.
While grape juice from concentrate is freshly squeezed, pasteurized, and filtered, it is then heated to evaporate most of the water content. This results in some of the natural flavour, nutrients, sugars, and oils being extracted. Artificial flavours, colours, sugars, and oils are then added back into the product to replace the natural ones that were stripped during processing.
Now that we have distinguished the difference between juice not from concentrate and juice from concentrate, we can outline the four key quality differences in our winery grade juices compared to traditional concentrate wine kits.
Our winery grade juices are not from concentrate and are made using 100% pure juice with no water added. The four key differences in quality include:
1. Better Taste
The processing of our pure juice wine kits ensures that the natural flavours, sugars, nutrients, and oils are preserved. Giving the finished product a better all around taste from level of sweetness (aka level of dryness) to the fruit flavours being tasted. Being that these winery grade juices aren't stripped of flavour, sugars, colour, and oils, as they are in juices from concentrate, you are also getting a more pure and natural tasting wine.
2. Better Colour
As mentioned above, juice from concentrate tends to strip a lot of the natural colour out of the juice during processing; therefore, our winery grade juices will have a more rich and natural looking colour.
Why does this matter?
To us, consuming wine is an adventure and exploration. Each glass or bottle displays unique characteristics specific to things like grape variety, region, and soil. For example, each grape variety imparts unique characteristics into the wine, and colour is one of those characteristics. Colour helps in identifying the type of wine your are consuming, but it also allows you to compare it to other wines. If the colour is artificially infused it makes it difficult to distinguish grape variety, but also doesn't allow you to accurately compare it to other wines you enjoy drinking.
3. Accuracy of Body
Wines are typically defined as light-bodied, medium-bodied or full-bodied. Our winery grade juices produce a more accurate level of body. Essentially wine body deals with how the wine tastes in your mouth. For example, Vinepair uses a great analogy which is, "a good way to think about the difference between them is the way skim milk, whole milk and cream feel in your mouth."
One key factor that contributes to wine's body is the level of alcohol, because alcohol is what gives wine its viscosity. You may often hear, "that wine is a mouthful," or "that wine is heavy." What people are referring to, maybe without knowing it, is the viscosity of the wine. When dealing with liquids, viscosity refers to the "thickness" of the liquid. For example, cream has a much higher viscosity than skin milk. Therefore, the higher the alcohol content the more viscous the wine will feel in your mouth. The level of body is much more accurate in our winery grade juices, because the juice hasn't been stripped of water and reconstituted.
4. No Synthetic Chemicals
Artificial flavours, colours and sugars are artificial for a reason. They are typically derived from synthetic chemicals that are added to products for a variety of reasons. As mentioned above, traditional concentrate wine kits add artificial flavours, colours, sugars, and oils back into the product to replace the natural ones that were stripped during processing. Think about the way aspartame tastes in diet pop. For us, this low-calorie artificial sweetener gives diet pop a distinct chemically taste, which we have experienced with some concentrate wine kits. We must also remember that synthetic chemicals or additives not only give the wine a distinct artificial taste, but they also aren't great for your overall health.
Thanks for reading our blog. We hope you find this information useful.
Cheers,
Vintner's Cellar Saskatoon
