For Mom’s birthday party, a family friend brought over a huge box of grapes. These grapes are picked late in the season for raisins when they are sweet. They were delicious! They were sweet and crisp which is the perfect way to eat grapes. Everyone was munching on them through the party, a few people took some home, and we were still left with this huge box! What are you going to do with a box of grapes? Make grape juice of course!
I have a juicer but of course I was at my brother and sister-in-laws house for the weekend so I did it the old fashion way. It was definitely time consuming but it made some delicious juice!
Once I got it down, separating the grapes from the stem didn’t take too long. I found that if you twist them in your hands they come right off. Pulling them breaks the stem instead of removing the grape. Just roll them around in your hands and they come off.
Next comes the mashing. This was the most time consuming by far. Using a potato masher, smoosh all the grapes until the skin on all the grapes have been broken. Doing this in small batches seemed to work the best.
All the smashed grapes go into a pot to boil. They need to boil for only about 10 minutes. You don’t need to cook them, only soften them further. Smash them a couple more times while they are cooking to get all the juice out.
Once they have finished boiling strain them using cheesecloth or a thin mesh strainer. Let all the mash sit in the strainer for a couple hours to make sure you get as much juice out as possible.
In the end I ended up with about 3 liters of juice, well it’s more like syrup. I have to cut 1 part water, 2 parts grape juice because it’s so sweet! I need to try adding sparkling water to it because I bet that would make it even better!
I am thinking about making jelly out of some of it but I have never attempted jelly before. I am nervous about adding the pectin and getting the right consistency. Anyone out there have tips on making jelly? Do I need to add more sugar to it to get it to set?
Diana says
Buy pectin and use the recipe in the box. That’s the way I always did it. You might use that grape juice as simple syrup in martinis too. Yummmmm.
I love your pictures, especially that beautiful one of you holding a bunch of grapes.
Lauren says
Thanks! I will give it a try!
Lily Lau says
Love the straw way more than the juice itself! Hahaha! Thanks for the tip to separate the grapes from the stem 🙂
Lauren says
Isn’t the straw so cute! I love it 🙂