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Just to demonstrate that wine kits can be pretty good, I did a blind wine tasting with a bunch of 8 friends last week (2 of which "knew smth" about wine)... it was of Sauvignon Blanc*.... 5 wines including my "augmented" homebrew and a £12 bottle of Sancerre.

Which was the Sancerre? 3 voted for my homebrew SB, only 1 got it right
Which was the homebrew? only 2 got it right
Which do you prefer? a 3-all draw between homebrew SB and a rather nice NZ Marlborough

My "augmentation" was to add 50g of tartaric acid powder to the wine kit to give it a bit of zing ! next time I am going to add plenty of elderflower too. To my mind homebrew kit wine may taste OK, but it lacks zing and "nose"... hence the tartaric acid. I may also add citric acid next time.

and all this avoids the £2 a bottle plus VAT wine excise duty.....

* the kit was "California Connoisseur SB" and comes out at less than £2 a bottle materials cost

keep brewing!

Good job Dave

Congrats, always nice to prove that homebrew is as good as shop bought stuff.

I encourage "cheating" -
if your wine needs more zing - add some tartaric acid
if you want an SB cats-pee nose - add some elderflower syrup
If you want some oak, don't buy an oak barrel - get some oak chips and steep them in the wine
If you want to make whisky - just add oak chips to your clean vodka/spirit


any more?

If you want to give the appearance of illusion, employ misdirection

I gave up giving a damn about what others thought when I started making crazy brews (cock ale or energy drink wine for example). If people are going to care I will just cheat and give them kit stuff, otherwise I'll share what I have, including the very nice bottle of elderberry.
Life's too short and brewing too long to waste good wine on people who care more about the drink than the company.

I prefer to drink alone anyway

I've got to admit I do enjoy scaring friends and family with some of the stuff I do (my dad doesn't trust any glass I give him anymore, then again I never tell him what's in it).