...experiment

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EyePeeEh

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I'm still new to brewing (second batch is conditioning in the bottle now) but I want to do something with chai I scored for free.
So I want to try a chai tea concentrate hooch for buzz and giggles. It is water, cane sugar and honey based with black tea and all sorts of yummy spices. I don't want to mess with it too much and I'm not expecting too much, but I want to give it a go and see what fermented chai is like. The starting gravity is 1.060 straight out of the box. My thought is to boil it down to about 1.090 with the aim of finishing at 1.020 (9.2%.)
1) Are there any serious flaws in my logic that would stop me dead in my tracks?
2) Is there a way to estimate how much I would need to reduce the volume in order to take it from 1.060 to 1.090?
3) If I get the fermentation going and samples show desireable alcohol and sweetness, can I/ should I do something to stop it so it doesn't dry out?
4) Are there any yeast strains that might be complementary to my plan?
5) If I prepare a yeast starter for a two gallon batch, should I use the boxed concentration or the boiled down one?
6) Any advice?
 
Wow, numerous potential problems with this, but if you want "hooch" this will certainly make that. Looks kinda like a strong mead?

The only suggestion I would have is ferment it colder and long, otherwise the flavor of alcohols will overpower any tea flavor. After fermentation you can rack and stabilize using sulfites, then backsweeten with honey, it might make a good mead that way, otherwise maybe honey hooch. Depends what you want.
 
Try the kombucha section... those people tend to know a lot more about fermenting tea. Although with tea you generally want low alcohol. Going so high is likely to be quite awful.
 
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