Banana Toffee Wine

Ok, I'm doing this tonight. After a lot of research, I'm going to attempt to "mash" (in a beer-making sense) the mashed bananas. I'm also planning on splitting this batch once it is finished (depending on how well it goes etc) into:
1-Plain wine (just rack final product into bottles)
2-Fortified Banana Port (add some more sugar until it finishes at about 1.030, then fortify and age)
3-Banana Eiswein (rack into bottles, freeze & extract water)


Anyway, recipe is:


Recipe: Banana Toffee Wine

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.080 SG
Estimated FG: 0.997 SG
Estimated ABV: 11%

Ingredients:
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Amt Name
2.00 g Pectinase
1.50 kg Fruit - Banana
0.80 kg Caramelised Sugar
0.10 kg Honey
0.10 kg Fruit - Raisins
5.00 l Canberra Water
0.3 pkg W-yeast 2046
5.00 g Yeast Nutrient


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Full Body, Batch Sparge
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperat Step Time
Mash In Add 2.75 l of water at 70.0 C 65.0 C 60 min

Sparge: Batch sparge with 1 steps (0.75l) of 75.0 C water

I think it worked!

I tasted the left over banana this morning, and it has very little flavour an no sweetness, so I assume it's all gone into the liquid that I extracted.





It has, however, turned into jelly. I believe this is due to pectin extraction, so I recommend using pectinase (or whatever it is called) to anyone who wants to try something similar.


I caramelised the sugar about 75 mins in total. The below picture shows (from top to bottom) 0 mins, 30 mins, 45 mins, 60 mins, 75 mins.





The yeast love it! Fermentation has started almost straight away, and in less than 12 hours it has a nice bit krausen kicking off.





After adding the pectinase + DAP and giving it a swirl (and grabbing a better camera)

With the light behind (to get an idea of the colour):





Super Active!:





I came back today (after being away for 2 days) and it's going crazy! I'll see if I can upload a video, it's really really active!

This looks and sounds fantastic. I might have to try this when I have a few kits under my belt.

It's hard to imagine that much fermentation activity on 3/10 of a package of yeast. Or did I read your recipe wrong?

Yes, you read that correctly. I only had 1/3 of a packet left, but it's only a 1 gal batch, so that makes up for it a bit I guess?



Super Active Fermentation Power!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/78456231@N05/7027555507/in/photostream/lightbox/



Every now & then it also has mini "explosions" of activity. Little eddies will form, and bursts of particles will swirl around up to 2-3 times faster than what's in the video!

This is one that probably needs a blow-off tube, as the airlock got blocked twice last night.

Fruit has all dropped, starting to clear a bit, and no longer really gassy.

SG has dropped to 0.997, so sitting around 11% at the moment.

There is a nice bit of banana aroma / taste, but I think I might add another one or two, as it's a bit mild.

SG got down to 0.995, so I racked it off the lees and added some extra honey (100g) and some more mashed banana juice (350g banana). This brought the SG back up to 1.007, and started fermentation again.

Cool. I'm thinking of doing a nutmeg bochet (caramelised honey mead), so if I come down to Canberra to visit family it might be cool to swap/compare/blend a few bottles. Have you considered putting nutmeg in it? I've heard it goes well with banana.

Hmmm, no I hadn't thought of nutmeg. That might be nice actually...

That would be cool, it might be some time before it's ready though

I am planning on doing a bochet some time later this year, still not entirely sure if I'm going to do a plain one, or flavoured with something

I won't be down for a while anyway. And there's nothing in particular motivating me to actually get around to MAKING this bochet...

Maybe bottle some, then steep some on nutmeg.

Any chance if a simplified set of instructions for this recipe? Bit of a noob here but this sounds really really delicious!