Country/Fruit Wines

Are produced from virtually any plant matter that can be fermented. Country/Fruit wines have traditionally been popular with home winemakers in areas with cold climates. In the warmer climates such as Africa, India, and the Philippines, wine is also made from bananas.

Country/Fruit wines are made from a variety of base ingredients (other than grapes) there is a wide variety of flavours taken from fruits, flowers, and herbs.
country/Fruit wines are usually defined as by their main ingredient (e.g., elderflower wine or gooseberry wine) because the general reference to wine states that it is made from fermented grape juice.

In Britain, fruit wine is mainly called country wine; the term should not be confused with the French name Vin de pays, which is grape wine.

Most fruits and berries have the characteristics to produce wine. There are many ways of extracting juice and flavour from the fruits or plants being used.
Stewing, pressing the juice, and fermenting the pulp of the fruits are popular methods. Few ingredients other than grapes have the equivalent quantities of sugar, tannin, acid, water and nutritive salts for yeast feeding to produce a drinkable stable wine naturally; Consequently, most country wines are altered in one or more respects at the stage of fermentation.

However, some of these country wines do require the addition of honey or sugar to make them drinkable and also to increase the alcoholic content (sugar is converted to alcohol in the process of fermentation).