Kiwi wine recipe: easy steps with video

Homemade kiwi wine is far from the sweet fruit-based wines you buy in the liquor store. This fruity wine is a crisp yellow wine full of tropical flavor with a touch of tart berries. It is a vibrant beverage that adds a unique flair to your wine cellar. 

What is kiwi wine?

Kiwi wine is a fermented alcoholic beverage made from fresh kiwis. Alternatively, you can also make it from nonpasteurized kiwi juice. While these fruits are naturally sweet, kiwi wine has had all its sugars fermented into alcohol. Homemade kiwi wine ferments well and ends up tasting delicious.

Similarly, I made this rosehip wine and pear wine that has been successfully added to our fruit wine cellar.

The uniqueness of kiwi wine is, however, in its ability to preserve its nutritional value through the winemaking process to the final product. Kiwis are often called superfruits and are known for their high content of vitamins C, A, K, E, and B, along with folate, iron, copper, and potassium. So is this fruit wine, rich in vitamins and minerals,  might even be a cure for hangovers.

What does kiwi wine taste like?

Kiwi fruit wine is crispy and tart with a tropical fruity flavor. It is rather acidic than sweet and makes a perfect drink to enjoy on a summer terrasse with roasted pepitas, salad or cheese.

Ingredients

Sourcing The Best Kiwi Fruit For Making Wine

Kiwis are relatively cheap fruits, available all year round. Harvested in various countries during different periods of the year, these fruits are easy to find even in cold winter. While in Spain, kiwis ripen in October and November, New Zealand harvests them from the end of May to November. 

Depending on your location, you may find different varieties of kiwi. From seeded or seedless to fuzzy or smooth, kiwis are available in green, brown, purple, red or yellow-fleshed fruits. 

To make this wine, you’ll need any variety of ripe or overripe kiwis. What matters is their stage of maturity. To make a good-tasting kiwi wine, you want to get ripened fruits before they turn mushy. This stage doesn’t last too long, so it is tricky to gather your kiwis at this time of maturity. One way is to purchase them when they are still unripe and hard and let them rip at home.

Some people suggest buying unripe kiwis, and when they are at their ripest, peel them and freeze them. This will prevent them from spoiling and allow you to control their stage of maturity.

However, they should not have any moldy or spoilt otherwise, these could spoil the whole batch 

Sugar

you can use refined or unrefined. However, If you use coarse or unrefined sugar, you may want to dissolve it in boiling water before adding it to the kiwis. 

If you are using regular, refined sugar, there should not be any problem with it.

Get creative with fruity kiwi wine

Kiwi pears with strawberries so you can add strawberries to get a more fruity and sweet taste of strawberry kiwi wine. You can try other fruits such as grapefruits, ginger or tropical fruit like pineapple.

I love to add herbs to any product I make, and I think this particular recipe would be exceptional with a touch of lemon balm or lavender.

To add herbs, just combine 3 handfuls of herbs of your choice with fruits and remove them at bottling time. 

It is worth experimenting with some combinations to make exceptional unique wine.

Equipment you need To Make Kiwi Wine

One gallon glass Carboy – a fermentation vessel with a narrow neck to hold the wine during the process. This usually comes together with a rubber stopper and water lock, which is a one-way valve that allows CO2 from the fermentation out but prevents anything from coming in to contaminate your wine

Funnel

Strainer

Equipment can have a big impact on how a recipe turns out. Stone bakeware takes longer to heat up than metal pans and also retains heat for longer, which could make the recipe more watery or burnt on the outside.

Fermentation process to make wine alcohol from kiwi fruit

The kiwi wine is made through a process of fermentation. It is a biochemical process where wild yeasts convert sugar into ethanol, carbon dioxide, and other metabolic byproducts. Most fruits, as well as kiwi, contain sugars and yeast. Yeast needs sugar to grow and reproduce; thus, sweet fruits contain a lot of yeast, providing an ideal environment for its growth. When making this Elderflower cider I didn’t use any additional sweetener because the apples were sweet enough. Kiwis, however, are not as sweet as apples so I decided to add sweetener to kick the fermentation process. 

Sanitizing and sterilizing

To ensure that the wine-making process is safe and avoid any contamination, sanitize all the equipment. You can use chemicals such as Campden tablets to kill any wild yeasts. 

I prefer, however, to skip the chemicals and use soapy water instead. Rinse all tools and equipment with pre-boiled water, and let it dry. If you choose to sterilize it with Campden tablets, add one tablet per gallon of wine and wait 24 to 36 hours before proceeding. 

Choosing yeast

Wine yeast is a great contributor to the finished wine. Thus it is imperative to choose the one with moderate alcohol tolerance that only adds light flavors to the final products, such as champagne yeast. 

Just follow the instructions on the packet, but a single packet is usually enough for 5 gallons of wine.

Kiwi Wine Recipe

First step

Start with sanitizing all tools and equipment that will come into contact with the kiwis.

Second step

Pour 12 cups of water into a casserole and bring it to simmer. Add sugar to the mixture, so it dissolves while stirring. 

Third step

Allow the liquid to cool to room temperature.

Fourth step

Chop the fruits, leaving the peel on, and place them in your vessel

Fifth step

add sweet water and lemon juice

Sixth step

Follow the instructions on the yeast package. Mine involves dissolving the packet in a small amount of room temperature water. Wait for 10 minutes to allow the yeast to rehydrate, and add it into the mixture. 

leave 2-3 inches of headspace to allow it to bubble.

Seventh step

Cover the casserole and leave it in a warm place for 7 days. Stir once or twice a day.

Eighth step

After one week, I used a potato masher to squeeze as much as juices from kiwi as possible before filtering out the solids( leaving the sediment and fruit pulp behind)  I suggest using a brew bag and moving the liquid to your fermentation container. Be careful not to expose it to too much oxygen in the process.

Ninth step

cover the fermenter with the lid and airlock, allowing plenty of space as it will start to bubble up in around 24 – 72 hours

Place it in a cool and dark place like a cellar and allow the fermentation to begin.

Tenth step

During the first few days, it should be very active with foam and bubbles forming. After about 10- 15 days, the active fermentation should slow down depending on the weather.  

Allow the mixture to ferment for at least 4 weeks before tasting it.

Eleventh step

In the end, strain the liquid using a brew bag or mesh cloth, leaving the sediment at the bottom of the carboy. At this stage, we aim to get clear wine so you can disregard the sediment and return the clear wine into a clear carboy for another day or two to settle.

Twelveth step

Taste it, and if you find it too acidic, you can sweeten it with simple syrup (optional) and allow it to settle for 2-3 days.

Thirteenth step

Bottling the kiwi wine – If you are happy with the taste, you can rack the wine into a clean jar or demijohn and label it.

This wine needs some aging time (several weeks) before drinking it. The longer you wait, the better the taste is.

Note:

This kiwi wine recipe does not use sulfur dioxide to curb fermentation. So it is not a sweet wine, and the alcohol levels range between 12-15% (depending on the sugar level of your kiwis).