Huh? You don’t get red eating grapes? We get both in the UK
The irony of all this is that before this thread was started, I was thinking that maybe I should get some kind of jam or jelly to have with my coffee and toast in the morning, and then thought, no, I can do without the sugar and extra calories. But now, curses, I’m remembering how much I used to like grape jelly, and I’m gonna hafta get me some!
Now that you mention it, I have seen jars of grape preserves in the gift shop at wineries now and then. Never bought one, though. I always assumed it was a way of using up (getting rid of) extraneous harvest, rather than a dedicated, intentional product.
There is a Crémant producer here in Luxembourg which bottles their extra grape juice, with a similar justification: if it’s going to be discarded anyway, might as well trim the waste margin by throwing it in a bottle with a label. That, I have occasionally bought, because my younger daughter likes it.
It’s definitely a niche product, though. We grow a lot of apples and make a lot of cider, so apple juice is, unsurprisingly, a lot easier to come by.
Also kosher grape juice used in place of wine when, for whatever reason, use of wine is not desirable.
It was my understanding that concord grapes make TERRIBLE wine, which is why they add a ton of sugar to it to make it palatable (rather than the grapes making super sweet wine by themselves).
I grew up on the stuff so i love it 
Where are you, @chappachula? Here in the midwest USA, I regularly see several varieties of grapes for eating, including green (“white”), red, and dark purple (“black”).
Grape jelly isn’t a thing here in England, except as a conspicuously-US import (such as might be found in the ‘imported foods’ section of a supermarket.
The default purple flavour here is usually blackcurrant or maybe blackberry. Sometimes damson or blueberry (including bilberry, which is our native species of blueberry).
You’ll occasionally see grape jelly in the US sections of UK grocery stores, or specialist American shops. You also see the abomination that is Smucker’s Goober grape & peanut butter spread.
No. At least, not in the jam/jelly/preserve space, as @ctnguy already said.
There is South African grape syrup, called moskonfyt. That occupies more of a honey/maple syrup space.
It’s definitely not made with Concord grapes - traditionally, it would be Hannepoot (Muscat) grapes but nowadays other varietals would also be used. But not Concord, we don’t grow those here at all.
Add me to the ‘huh?’ chorus. I’d say here in SA, black (and red and pink and purple) grapes are more popular for eating than green ones.
The distinctive flavor that a lot of American grapes have is called foxiness, because it derives from the Fox Grape – the ancestor of the Concord grape, which was bred, as the OP notes, in Concord, Massachusetts.
Native American grapes are Labrusca, and they all have that “foxy” taste – Delaware, Diamond, Catawba, Nagara, New York, and a string of others. For some reason, Concord grapes became the most popular and the most cultivated. I’ve seen jellies and jams made from other varieties, but not in stores – only roadside stands and the like. (I make grape pies, myself. Usually Concord, but Ive sought out other Labrusca varieties for their flavor).
European grapes, on the other hand, are Vinifera – “wine-making”. They lack foxiness. You can’t make a good grape pie out of them, either, but I think I’ve seen Vinifera preserves.
A particularly American problem is an aphid-like insect called Phylloxera, which can infest the vines. Labrusca grapes have dveloped defenses, but when they tried to grow Vinfera grapes here Phylloxera found out about it and decided that these tasted fine, and without the nasty aftertaste of labrusca. Then they hopped over to Europe and threatened to kill off vinifera for good. The wine growers discovered that they could graft vinifera vines onto labrusca roots, and it would “take”, and survive phylloxera. But the grapes (and the wine) ended up tasting “foxy”.
You can read all about it here:
Japanese love strawberry jam. Or orange marmalade. Well, they eat a number of different flavors, but not much grape jelly and looking online I mostly see US manufacturers for grape jelly. I’m not sure if I’ve seen it sold in the stores.
I loved that stuff when it first came out around 1970. Haven’t had it in ages, though. I didn’t even know it was still around.
People sometimes wonder why artificial grape flavoring doesn’t taste like grapes. And of course, as illustrated in this thread, artificial grape flavoring does taste like grapes. Just specifically concord grapes.
sorry , folks…it turns out that I really could get grapes for eating in both green and red . But in my house, they’re always green. I never realized how deprived I am.
But I just want to point out one common element in this thread: Everybody who is rhapsodizing about Welch’s grape jam is doing so in the past tense…as memories of childhood. 'Cause, as I mentioned above, the stuff is perfect for kids. Adults prefer jam with real fruit.
I’ve noted elsewhere that Artificial Grape flavoring more closely resembles Concord Grape than anything else, but it’s a slander on Concord grapes to say that it tastes “just like” concord grapes.
I grew up eating concord grapes off the vine and grape jelly sandwiches. It doesn’t taste like that artificial stuff. And I don’t think concord grapes are “sickly sweet” at all.
You put “just like” in quotes and I’m just noting that it isn’t a quote from me.
I’ve had actually Concord grapes before and it was a revelation. Oh, now artificial grape flavoring makes more sense.
There are seedless eating grapes that are other colors, though the most common ones are green.
And you can eat Concords; though in most areas they’re not sold for that purpose, because they’re not seedless and the skins aren’t as tender as the skins of the seedless grapes commonly on the market for eating. But they have actual flavor.
Those standard green eating grapes seem almost tasteless to me. I’ll eat them if they’re in front of me, but I wouldn’t bother buying them. They’re like most modern watermelons, just sweet water, no flavor.
Sweetness of grapes depends on growing conditions and time of harvest at least as much as, probably more than, the variety of the grape. (Ever had an ice wine? Delicious, even for many of us who don’t like most sweet wines. Wine grapes, harvested very late in the season, naturally partly dehydrated on the vines, harvested while frozen on the vines.)
Concords can make a naturally sweet wine, if harvested late in a good growing year (not as late as ice wine, though.) They can also be used to make wines with added sugar, if the grapes didn’t ripen to a high enough sugar content or if an even sweeter wine is desired. And they can be used to make a semi-sweet or even a dry wine, depending both on the harvest timing and on the winemaking techniques. Whether it’s good wine may depend on the taster. It doesn’t taste quite like wine from European wine grapes. Again, I’ve had some I liked a good deal.
If muscats will grow in your area you probably wouldn’t be growing Concords, no. Muscats need warmer climates. Concords do very well in colder climates.
This is true – but it’s also true that Concords. Delaware, and Niagara don’t taste anything at all like each other. Catawbas taste a little, but not quite, like Niagaras. Isabella tastes rather like Concords, but I think it’s disappeared. I’ve never had New York. There are, as you say, a lot of others.
That’s because they’re the heaviest producers, and a bit hardier than most of those others; so they were the most grown, and people got used to that flavor.
Delaware has nearly disappeared also, which I think is highly unfortunate; but it’s a much lighter producer than a lot of other grapes. You can once in a while still find a Delaware wine; and it was also my favorite as an eating grape (I’d rather have seeds and flavor than no seeds and no flavor) and makes quite a good jelly IMO. Again, while it is one of the “foxy” grapes, it has an entirely different flavor than Concords do.
– I used to be a grape grower; and am still living in grape country.
Even if it were colder, we wouldn’t grow Concords. Because we have a sense of taste.
There are plenty of wineries in the Finger Lakes of upstate New York that make wine from Labrusca grapes. They tend to be sweet, but not as syrupy sweet as Mogen David and Manishevitz are. Some of them are surprisingly “dry”. I love them all. When I lived in upstate NY I used to get Widmer’s Lake Niagara all the time (and I wasn’t alone – there were billboards for it all over.) Diamond grapes can make a very concentrated taste in a wine.
On the other hand, Bully Hill winery makes a lot of non-sweet wine from native Labrusca grapes. Unfortunately, most of their varieties aren’t sold out of state You can get their Fish Market White and Goat Label Red in Massachusetts and Ne Hampshire, but you gotta go to Finger lakes liquor stores or to Bully Hill itself to buy some of their offerings.