Plum Wine and Yeast

Hi,

I'm still fairly new to home brewing, but the in-laws had a load of plums and asked if I'd try making plum wine out of them.

I've been following a recipe and have had the plums soaking in water for 5 days and was about to strain into another fermentation bin and pitch the yeast.

I'd bought some champagne yeast for this (as recommended by another recipe (the one I'm following just says wine yeast), and created a starter ready to pitch this evening.

Someone saw the starter, thought it was just some scum in a bowl and washed it down the sink.

What do I do? I have some packets of yeast from some Muntons beer kits (labeled as "brewer's yeast"). Shall I use one of these or buy some more? I'll be looking at at least a couple of days before they'll get here, and there isn't a homebrew shop that I can get to around work. I'm tempted to just create a starter and pitch the nondescript yeast so that something friendly can get a foothold before something nasty does, but I'm not sure if it will affect flavours.

Will the must be at danger if I leave it much longer? The recipe actually said leave for 4 days, but I needed to wait for some muslin bags to arrive, which should have arrived last week.

Or do I pitch the 'brewer's yeast' and get teh fermentation going?

Thanks!

beer yeast won't reach the percentage you want, more than likely. plus it'll taste a bit weird. if you strain the juice into an airtight, sterilized container, you should be cool for a couple of days if you order asap. did you use campden on the fruit?

I didn't use any campden tablets. the recipe said to chop up the fruit and pour on boiling water. Leave for 4 days, stirring twice daily. we are at the fifth day now.

would you crush a couple of campden tablets in and order some proper yeast?

Also, being a UK resident, where would you order from? I've been going to hopshopuk.com, but fear their postage prices on just one bag of yeast.

No idea, everything so far has been from my LHBS. Sadly rates are high for home brewing because everything weighs so much.

Where is it currently contained? Just the fruit submerged in water in a bucket or something? Or is it in a demi-john etc...Campden is pretty standard for killing nasties in fruit, I don't brew without it. I'd definitely order some proper yeast, BUT if you're desperate and don't want to risk anything whatsoever, then you could ferment it with beer yeast and if it dies, restart it with wine yeast. It's not ideal, but it'll work.

Everything is in a fermentation bucket at the moment with a lid on. The lid only comes off to give it a stir and everything is sanitised. I'll crush a few campden tablets in for now and order some proper yeast. It seems like it will be a much better in the long run.

I think so too!

Yeah, that's your best bet in my opinion too. Your fruit won't rot very fast at all in a sterile environment, just ensure it's airtight. A bit of campden will get rid of any bacteria that could potentially start eating your fruit. Even then it'll probably be alright! I don't know how much pectin is it Plums, but are you using Pectic Enzyme in your recipe? If not, I'd add some if you used boiling water...

Apparantly there is a lot of pectin in plums. Friends made jam and didn't need any pectine. The recipe says it needs lemon juice but never says when to add it. I'd assume at the same time as the sugar.

Pectic Enzyme is needed to break down the pectine in your plums. It won't clear well w/o it.