Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Hawksbill and Hairy Cat's Ear Wine
When one makes dandelion wine, one should make sure she knows what a dandelion actually is. Otherwise she may end up picking what everyone refers to as dandelions, and later having to change the name of her brew to "Hawksbill and Hairy Cat's Ear Wine." It will still taste delicious, and won't give anyone tummy aches, but the name won't be nearly so romantic.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Using a Hydrometer
Here's how it works:
First I filled the tube with plain tap water. The hydrometer floats at the specific gravity of 1.000, or the potential alcohol (PA) of 0%.
Close up of the PA reading:
I mixed the H2O with some sugar and took another reading. It was 7% PA. See:
Then I used it to test my blueberry wine must. In the few days that it has been fermenting in the primary, the yeasties have digested enough of the sugar to take it from a PA of 13% to a PA of just under 10%. See:
That's all there is to it.
First I filled the tube with plain tap water. The hydrometer floats at the specific gravity of 1.000, or the potential alcohol (PA) of 0%.
Close up of the PA reading:
I mixed the H2O with some sugar and took another reading. It was 7% PA. See:Then I used it to test my blueberry wine must. In the few days that it has been fermenting in the primary, the yeasties have digested enough of the sugar to take it from a PA of 13% to a PA of just under 10%. See:That's all there is to it.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Hydrometers
Hydrometers are swell. I love mine dearly. It allows me to know how alcoholic my wines will be. It tells me how much sugar to use. It lets me know beyond a shadow of doubt that my brew is done fermenting and will not explode my bottles. Using my hydrometer provides for ample tasting. Tasting even enough even for two if your lover is a lover of brews. It's easy and quick to use, and it hardly costs a thing. I think mine was $6. I recently bought a wine-thief to make it quicker and easier, I'll let you know how that goes when I've tried it out.
When you buy one, make sure you get a triple scale model. That way you don't have to figure out what brix are, or remember what specific gravity relates to what. You simply look at the cheater's side, the potential alcohol side, and it tells you everything you need to know.
The main reason I use mine is that I like to increase all my recipes by a quarter or so. That way I have leftovers to top up with after racking, instead of water, and my wine doesn't get watery. I have to increase the sugar content and the fruit, and it really helps to know if I've used enough sugar. My calculations are almost always off by a few cups, so it all works out great.
Hell with acid and ph testing kits, hell with everything else, you should have one of these. There's no reason not to. (Did I mention the tasting?)
When you buy one, make sure you get a triple scale model. That way you don't have to figure out what brix are, or remember what specific gravity relates to what. You simply look at the cheater's side, the potential alcohol side, and it tells you everything you need to know.
The main reason I use mine is that I like to increase all my recipes by a quarter or so. That way I have leftovers to top up with after racking, instead of water, and my wine doesn't get watery. I have to increase the sugar content and the fruit, and it really helps to know if I've used enough sugar. My calculations are almost always off by a few cups, so it all works out great.
Hell with acid and ph testing kits, hell with everything else, you should have one of these. There's no reason not to. (Did I mention the tasting?)
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Answers
J9 (my wonderful beautiful friend) asked:
OK:
1. thanks for posting these recipes. I was about to bug you.
2. When you are mixing and stirring, before transferring and airlocking, is this covered? Uncovered? I am guessing not airlocked, at least. I have a bucket with a hole in the middle of the lid - would that work?
3. Leave it alone for how long? Does it clear? Do I rack?
And: what's with the women's names?
I answer:
1) Yay!
2) When I am mixing and stirring the must, or at least between mixing and stirring, I keep it covered with a towel. I secure the towel with a rubber band, string, or by placing the lid loosely over the towel. The must needs oxygen here, but you gotta keep the bugs and germs out. It's best not to use terry cloth for this, muslin would work well. (I'll post pictures when Bran comes back with my camera) The bucket with the hole will work, but you have to plug the hole with cotton or something else to let the gases pass through but not the fruit flies and cat-hair. I find it a lot simpler to use the towel; lids piss me off and hurt my hands, lids are hard to sterilize, towels are soft, towels are easy to clean.
2 1/2) Keep it under the towel and stir daily for your choice of: a few days, or 5-7 days, or until the foaming starts to die down a bit, or (best yet) the potential alcohol drops to 3-4%. That's when you'll want to transfer and airlock it. (Get a hydrometer and learn how to use it, it's easy and you won't be sorry!!) (Next post will be about that.)
3) Yes and no. It should go crystal clear, but only because society finds it prettier that way. If it doesn't clear, it'll still taste just as good. People might be afraid to drink it though. If it's a wine it should clear no problem during the racking phase, which should last from 3-6 months. With some high pectin fruit you want to add an enzyme which digests pectin (in the beginning of the fermentation) and aids in clearing. If it's a mead recipe it's more problematic. Honey has a protein that doesn't like to fall out. A lot of people boil their honey to break up that protein and help the wine clear, but even that isn't 100% effective, because something to do with the molecular structure of the protein isn't destroyed, but merely broken, and in rare instances it puts itself back together and clouds the mead. There are also ways to clear it with chemicals, gelatin, or egg whites (don't ask me about that one because I think that's disgusting and know nothing about it). It's never bothered me enough to research that stuff though. With the exception of the two blackberry meads, everything I've ever made has gone crystal clear, no problem or extra effort, by the 2nd racking.
And remember:
With the wild-ferment, everything is a gamble, and you should plan on some complete and total failures.
As far as the women's names go, it's just kinda hokey and totally for me. It's easier for me to associate a name with a brew then to think to myself, "The wild-fermented strawberry mead that I made last year and Brandon loved," or "the orange wine that smelled funny and I threw out but realize now that I shouldn't have." It's less effort, and it actually works really well. I figured that something made out of honey (made entirely by female bees) or sugar and yeast, would have to be feminine rather than masculine, so there you have it.
P.S. Amazing the things that float around in our brains, isn't it?
OK:
1. thanks for posting these recipes. I was about to bug you.
2. When you are mixing and stirring, before transferring and airlocking, is this covered? Uncovered? I am guessing not airlocked, at least. I have a bucket with a hole in the middle of the lid - would that work?
3. Leave it alone for how long? Does it clear? Do I rack?
And: what's with the women's names?
I answer:
1) Yay!
2) When I am mixing and stirring the must, or at least between mixing and stirring, I keep it covered with a towel. I secure the towel with a rubber band, string, or by placing the lid loosely over the towel. The must needs oxygen here, but you gotta keep the bugs and germs out. It's best not to use terry cloth for this, muslin would work well. (I'll post pictures when Bran comes back with my camera) The bucket with the hole will work, but you have to plug the hole with cotton or something else to let the gases pass through but not the fruit flies and cat-hair. I find it a lot simpler to use the towel; lids piss me off and hurt my hands, lids are hard to sterilize, towels are soft, towels are easy to clean.
2 1/2) Keep it under the towel and stir daily for your choice of: a few days, or 5-7 days, or until the foaming starts to die down a bit, or (best yet) the potential alcohol drops to 3-4%. That's when you'll want to transfer and airlock it. (Get a hydrometer and learn how to use it, it's easy and you won't be sorry!!) (Next post will be about that.)
3) Yes and no. It should go crystal clear, but only because society finds it prettier that way. If it doesn't clear, it'll still taste just as good. People might be afraid to drink it though. If it's a wine it should clear no problem during the racking phase, which should last from 3-6 months. With some high pectin fruit you want to add an enzyme which digests pectin (in the beginning of the fermentation) and aids in clearing. If it's a mead recipe it's more problematic. Honey has a protein that doesn't like to fall out. A lot of people boil their honey to break up that protein and help the wine clear, but even that isn't 100% effective, because something to do with the molecular structure of the protein isn't destroyed, but merely broken, and in rare instances it puts itself back together and clouds the mead. There are also ways to clear it with chemicals, gelatin, or egg whites (don't ask me about that one because I think that's disgusting and know nothing about it). It's never bothered me enough to research that stuff though. With the exception of the two blackberry meads, everything I've ever made has gone crystal clear, no problem or extra effort, by the 2nd racking.
And remember:
With the wild-ferment, everything is a gamble, and you should plan on some complete and total failures.
As far as the women's names go, it's just kinda hokey and totally for me. It's easier for me to associate a name with a brew then to think to myself, "The wild-fermented strawberry mead that I made last year and Brandon loved," or "the orange wine that smelled funny and I threw out but realize now that I shouldn't have." It's less effort, and it actually works really well. I figured that something made out of honey (made entirely by female bees) or sugar and yeast, would have to be feminine rather than masculine, so there you have it.
P.S. Amazing the things that float around in our brains, isn't it?
Mold
In the (little over) year that I have been brewing, I have never encountered mold. This includes at (I think) 4 successful wild ferments. This is pretty amazing, considering that the fruit was never sterilized, but only rinsed gently under cold water.
Alas, today I found little moldy bits floating atop Sylvia, my wild blueberry mead. She will go down the sink today. As far as the compare/contrast experiment goes, this is 1 point in favor of sterile musts and cultured wine yeasts. On the bright side of things, I now have one primary freed up for a new batch. I think I may try another strawberry mead, since I still am interested in comparing a wild vs. cultured experiment, and I have had consistent luck with strawberry wild-ferments.
For the next batch I'll try boiling the honey (something else I've never done) and sterilizing the fruit with the boiling liquid. I think I may get a prettier color set that way. I'll be getting the strawberries from my CSA share on Tuesday. If there are still strawberries the following week, I think I'll try to pull off a sparkling strawberry mead. I've scrapped the lavender mead idea for now, but am still planning a dandelion mead which I have high hopes for, set for next week. I'm hoping to wait for the lavender honey to come out at the market in a month or two and make plain mead out of that. (If it works, we can all have it at Skippy's first birthday party!)
Of course, all this is dependent on me being able afford the honey. So we'll see. Soon though it will be blackberry and huckleberry season, which means free picking and lots of inexpensive wines and jam!
(Christmas wish- Champagne corker, must tell parents)
(Also on the wish list- argon tank)
Alas, today I found little moldy bits floating atop Sylvia, my wild blueberry mead. She will go down the sink today. As far as the compare/contrast experiment goes, this is 1 point in favor of sterile musts and cultured wine yeasts. On the bright side of things, I now have one primary freed up for a new batch. I think I may try another strawberry mead, since I still am interested in comparing a wild vs. cultured experiment, and I have had consistent luck with strawberry wild-ferments.
For the next batch I'll try boiling the honey (something else I've never done) and sterilizing the fruit with the boiling liquid. I think I may get a prettier color set that way. I'll be getting the strawberries from my CSA share on Tuesday. If there are still strawberries the following week, I think I'll try to pull off a sparkling strawberry mead. I've scrapped the lavender mead idea for now, but am still planning a dandelion mead which I have high hopes for, set for next week. I'm hoping to wait for the lavender honey to come out at the market in a month or two and make plain mead out of that. (If it works, we can all have it at Skippy's first birthday party!)
Of course, all this is dependent on me being able afford the honey. So we'll see. Soon though it will be blackberry and huckleberry season, which means free picking and lots of inexpensive wines and jam!
(Christmas wish- Champagne corker, must tell parents)
(Also on the wish list- argon tank)
Friday, July 27, 2007
Towels, Yay!
There are a few things that towels are very good at. One is keeping bugs out, and the other is keeping light out. There are 2 phases of fermentation that wines and meads like to go through, the first needs lots of oxygen, and the second needs an absence of oxygen, thus the airlock. (The Joy of Home Winemaking seems to skip the first most of the time.) The yeast needs the exposure to air in order to reproduce quickly and get a strong ferment going. The faster the ferment, the more flavor get extracted from the fruit into the wine before going off, and tasting funky. That's one reason for using a yeast starter too. You gotta protect your brew from the light too. It keeps it pretty and affects the taste.
Next 2 Meads
Next on the agenda is a lavender mead and a dandelion mead. I'm still trying to decide who will sparkle and who will not.
Brew Pictures
"Yay!" for beautiful, happy yeast starters!
This is the difference between (left to right) blueberry mead with cultured wine yeast, wild fermenting blueberry mead, and wild strawberry. The strawberry is foaming like crazy, the wild blue is just beginning to (it's a day behind), and the cultured blue is going nuts.
These are my newly bottled (and beautifully labeled) dandelions, in my relatively clean kitchen:
And here is the brewer, and those from whence she came:
(don't worry, we all wash our hands before brewing)
This is the difference between (left to right) blueberry mead with cultured wine yeast, wild fermenting blueberry mead, and wild strawberry. The strawberry is foaming like crazy, the wild blue is just beginning to (it's a day behind), and the cultured blue is going nuts.
These are my newly bottled (and beautifully labeled) dandelions, in my relatively clean kitchen:
And here is the brewer, and those from whence she came:
(don't worry, we all wash our hands before brewing)Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Blueberries!
Blueberries! I spent my morning picking them, and the rest of the day turning them into (hopefully) delicious alcoholic beverages. 2 gallons of mead, 1 of wine, and a beautiful pint of brandied blues. It was a busy day, and now my feet and back hurt, but in a very nice way. Here's how it went:
I decided to make 2 gallons of mead as a compare and contrast exercise. My first ever brewing experience was a wild-fermented batch of strawberry mead. It was the simplest, easiest thing ever, and it was incredibly delicious. The thing about wild ferments though, is that sometimes they are incredibly delicious, and sometimes they aren't. My problem is that I don't know how consistently delicious my wild ferments will be. Most mead makers like things more controlled, a sterile must, actual wine yeast, that sort of thing. So I decided to do one one way, and one the other, just to see what happens. I've decided to name my meads, to help me keep track of them. Sylvia is the wild-ferment, and Cynthia is being sterilized right now in preparation for a very controlled ferment. Yesterday I started a wild-ferment strawberry, which I am calling Melissa
After starting the 2 meads, I bottled my dandelion wine. (Beautiful!) I racked the cranberry mead, the pumpkin-apple wine, the rose-hip wine, and stirred the lees for my 2 blackberry meads. Along the way I took teeny-tiny-pregnancy-sized sips. Here's how that went:
Dandelion: very good, really gets better with time
Cranberry mead: weak but yummy
Pumpkin-Apple: strong, but I can't tell that is from pumpkins and apples, still harsh
Rose-hip: the most beautiful color I've ever seen, delicious, gentle
Blackberry mead: tasty and blackberry-ish, gentle and a bit fizzy
Blackberry-jalapeño mead: oh-my-god-good
Then I started the blueberry wine. Magda I think.
Then I made the brandied blues.
Because I am not web-savvy, and know no better way to have a place just for my recipes, I have created a blog to house my brewing recipes. If you should go there to look at them, keep in mind that some of them are only being tested now, and as such, may not be any good. It is: Julia's Brews. All the recipes will be there, eventually with notes on how they come out.
I decided to make 2 gallons of mead as a compare and contrast exercise. My first ever brewing experience was a wild-fermented batch of strawberry mead. It was the simplest, easiest thing ever, and it was incredibly delicious. The thing about wild ferments though, is that sometimes they are incredibly delicious, and sometimes they aren't. My problem is that I don't know how consistently delicious my wild ferments will be. Most mead makers like things more controlled, a sterile must, actual wine yeast, that sort of thing. So I decided to do one one way, and one the other, just to see what happens. I've decided to name my meads, to help me keep track of them. Sylvia is the wild-ferment, and Cynthia is being sterilized right now in preparation for a very controlled ferment. Yesterday I started a wild-ferment strawberry, which I am calling Melissa
After starting the 2 meads, I bottled my dandelion wine. (Beautiful!) I racked the cranberry mead, the pumpkin-apple wine, the rose-hip wine, and stirred the lees for my 2 blackberry meads. Along the way I took teeny-tiny-pregnancy-sized sips. Here's how that went:
Dandelion: very good, really gets better with time
Cranberry mead: weak but yummy
Pumpkin-Apple: strong, but I can't tell that is from pumpkins and apples, still harsh
Rose-hip: the most beautiful color I've ever seen, delicious, gentle
Blackberry mead: tasty and blackberry-ish, gentle and a bit fizzy
Blackberry-jalapeño mead: oh-my-god-good
Then I started the blueberry wine. Magda I think.
Then I made the brandied blues.
Because I am not web-savvy, and know no better way to have a place just for my recipes, I have created a blog to house my brewing recipes. If you should go there to look at them, keep in mind that some of them are only being tested now, and as such, may not be any good. It is: Julia's Brews. All the recipes will be there, eventually with notes on how they come out.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
(a revision)
Apparently I already mixed the pumpkin with apple wine, so pumpkin mead will have to wait for the pumpkins to ripen. And the U-pick raspberries turned out to be blueberries. All plans are being adjusted accordingly.
Oh, and MY BABY IS A BOY!!! It is a fact! He has humongous testicles!!
Oh, and MY BABY IS A BOY!!! It is a fact! He has humongous testicles!!
Brewing Mead
For a while now I've been wanting to brew a lot of mead, really get good at it. Now that all of my traveling is done for the next several months, I'm going to get serious about he brewing. First on my to-do list is rack the dandelion wine, making room for more brews. Later today I'll be picking up my CSA share, which will include a small basket of strawberries and raspberries. I'll be turning that into a gallon of wild-fermented t'ej (Ethiopian mead). Then I'll be topping up a partial batch of pumpkin wine with honey-water to make an experimental pumpkin mead. Next on the list will be a trip to a local u-pick for enough raspberries to make a gallon of wine and three gallons of a raspberry mead (and maybe jam and pie, depending). No set plans after that, but tons of possibilities. High on my list of priorities is a bottle of strawberry wine from a wonderful friend which I have to manage not to drink for a year or two.
Details and pictures to follow. Cheers!
Monday, July 16, 2007
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Don't try this if you're pregnant.
A really good way to hurt your back (besides pregnancy in general) is to wait until you're 7+ months pregnant and then clean the holy you-know-what out of your saltwater fish tank. This involves moving heavy rocks and buckets of water around, bending at weird angles while scrubbing the rocks off outside, and then putting the tank back together. (At which point the tank will still look disappointingly like a fishy cesspool.)
The danger is that when moving large rocks around a glass aquarium, it is very possible to crack the bottom of the aquarium, resulting in a really nasty flood and a husbandly imperative to get rid of all the bloody fish tanks. (And possibly plants, bird and dog.) When a girls then finds what she thinks is the beginning of a leak in the bottom of the tank, there is no turning back, there is no putting it off for tomorrow, the tank must come apart. This is the fun part. Out come the rocks. Out come 20 gallons of saltwater (saved in buckets, not dumped down the drain). Out comes all the extremely heavy wet sand. Then the tank, which itself is surprisingly heavy, gets moved and checked carefully for leaks (none, false alarm) taken outside and scrubbed. Then comes the really fun part, or at least the part that really did my back in. Moving heavy wet rocks from the floor to the tank, and moving 20 gallons of water from the floor to the tank. I trashed the sand, it was a bad idea in the first place. Then mopping up the gallon or so of spilled water from the floor.
My tank looks amazing, except now there are no fishes in it. My back was fine until I sat down for dinner. Once you sit down you're done for, and I really couldn't get up again. So now instead of my pregnant-penguin-waddle, I do the 95-year-old-pregnant-woman-hobble. All to the delighted laughs of everyone in my household.
The point of this story is that I am going to stick to painting from now on. This is what I'm working on right now. Oops, boobs!
The danger is that when moving large rocks around a glass aquarium, it is very possible to crack the bottom of the aquarium, resulting in a really nasty flood and a husbandly imperative to get rid of all the bloody fish tanks. (And possibly plants, bird and dog.) When a girls then finds what she thinks is the beginning of a leak in the bottom of the tank, there is no turning back, there is no putting it off for tomorrow, the tank must come apart. This is the fun part. Out come the rocks. Out come 20 gallons of saltwater (saved in buckets, not dumped down the drain). Out comes all the extremely heavy wet sand. Then the tank, which itself is surprisingly heavy, gets moved and checked carefully for leaks (none, false alarm) taken outside and scrubbed. Then comes the really fun part, or at least the part that really did my back in. Moving heavy wet rocks from the floor to the tank, and moving 20 gallons of water from the floor to the tank. I trashed the sand, it was a bad idea in the first place. Then mopping up the gallon or so of spilled water from the floor.
My tank looks amazing, except now there are no fishes in it. My back was fine until I sat down for dinner. Once you sit down you're done for, and I really couldn't get up again. So now instead of my pregnant-penguin-waddle, I do the 95-year-old-pregnant-woman-hobble. All to the delighted laughs of everyone in my household.
The point of this story is that I am going to stick to painting from now on. This is what I'm working on right now. Oops, boobs!
Monday, July 9, 2007
Death
My saltwater tank has crashed. After 2 years of stunning beauty, and half a year of pregnancy induced neglect and decline, it's all over. My last beautiful fish is dead this morning. Now it's all about starting over and probably at least 3 or 4 months before it's safe to put anything else in there. Here's the ugly damage.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Back from Scotland!
We are back from our family reunion trip to Scotland. We were there for two weeks, spending about a week in Edinburgh, and a week traveling around the highlands. I really loved it and could easily see myself living there, but the husband really didn't like that idea very much. He said he thought he might be able to live there for a month or two. That's alright though, it really isn't a good climate for growing tomatoes (of utmost importance in the place we choose to settle). seriously though, it was one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen.
Here are some pictures from the Highland Romp.
And then there were all the sheep.
To be continued...
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