Search results

I guess the issue for me is the cost of the "wash" you want to use as your test. If you are already an experienced wine maker (or beer brewer), and you have a couple of weeks you might buy a gallon of sorbate-free apple juice, add a pound and a half sugar and make a quick apple wine at about 13%...

Easiest method , though is a pH meter. You measure the chemical base Na OH you add drop by drop to a sample of mead or wine (Morebeer suggests 15 ml) and you stop when the pH hits 8.2. THAT is the precise point when the indicator would change color. Testing Wine Musts For Sugar, pH, and TA |...

I would add that if all the flavor is in the honey , then a lower ABV mead would have very little flavor strength. Sure, hydromels (session meads) are fine to make - their lower ABV suggests shorter shelf life - but if you carbonate these - either by adding a controlled amount of sugar after all...

But you mention "boil" Is there a reason for a boil when you are making mead in 2023. Obviously in some countries and some parts of the US your drinking water ain't potable, but assuming you can obtain spring water, and assuming the honey is being extracted using current best practices , boiling...

Definitely don't pretend to even play an expert on this forum but I have a question and that is why do you need a filter? If you are using a tabletop still, that sounds like a version of a pot still, and so if your washes are well made as drinkable wines, and you are not using "turbo" yeasts and...

I tend to always use pectic enzyme - and that is my only clarifier when I make cider, but I am making 4 batches of cider at this time and the one into which I pitching Nottingham yeast has cleared the brightest fastest

I am currently making three batches of cider with different yeasts which I started at the beginning of February and I am really surprised that the batch into which I pitching Nottingham has cleared bright the fastest. I mean clear as in being able to read a newspaper through. Too early to offer...

Hi Jordanbachmanwork, and welcome to this forum. The one tool you might find useful in helping you relax into your new hobby is an inexpensive hydrometer. Wine makers use this to monitor the progress of their wine. Before you pitch the yeast, you look for a density of the mixture of honey and...

I would think that if you focus on growing your yeast, and as you do , you tweak the environment, then the yeast that will be able to routinely bud and reproduce in the environment you are creating will have the propensity to survive and thrive in it. Those that are too stressed or are unable to...

Hi Rabidbadgr37, These wines look delightfully clear. Are you using some kind of automatic filler? I would suggest that you fill the bottles a little higher into the neck. You want perhaps an inch , not much more, between the cork and the wine.

Your call, of course, but if you are making vanilla extract, presumably you don't want the flavors of the alcohol to swamp the flavors of the vanilla. In my opinion, the better distillate to use would be vodka rather than rum. I just began macerating about 10 beans I halved lengthwise and then...

I would suggest you begin with what is called a traditional mead. Honey, water, yeast and nutrients. Forget the fruit until you can make a delicious simple traditional mead. The base unit is 1 US gallon, and you might mix 2.5 lbs of honey with quality spring water to make 1 US gallon. That will...

Looks like the walls of this carboy are insufficiently rigid for you to create a vacuum to pull out the CO2. What you might do - despite you wish to use a pump to make a vacuum, is to attach a stirring rod to a hand drill and use that to stir the gas out. You might want to raise the temperature...

Tartaric acid is the predominant acid found in grapes. You could try adding some tartaric but it sounds as if these grapes were not optimal. Not sure how much tartaric you would need to add to 18 gallons to bring your pH down by a factor of 10 (from 4 to 3).

Worst fruit? Watermelon - because the flavor is so thin and it is likely to oxidize and/or spoil before the lag time for the yeast has ended. To even think about making watermelon wine you need to have a very large yeast starter very actively fermenting before you even cut the melon.

One of the things about bulk aging is that quite besides the fact that a good mead (or wine) improves with age (a poor wine simply gets older), lots of particulates drop out of solution even when the mead or wine is apparently bright and clear. I think those particulates affect the flavor and...

If you are planning on carbing, then you are planning on making the entire batch brut dry. Is that what you want? You might after racking and aging, rack half the cider into another half gallon container and then stabilize and back sweeten so you have half carbonated and half with some...

Hard to tell from the photo you attached but is the airlock suggesting that there is no CO2 coming up from inside the fermenter pushing that column of water up? In other words, is the column of water in the airlock the same height on both sides? If it is then either the fermentation has ended or...

If you added water - diluting the apple wine (cider is really not going to be made with the addition of sugars or honey - but then I am a purist) - then you have diluted your original wine... and if it tastes OK diluted then perhaps your recipe was not quite what you thought it was .. Me? I...

I don't often make kit wines (I much prefer country wines and mead) but I have yet to find a kit that asks me to add any sugar, still less, a kilo. What kits do you make that are not concentratted pressed juice with some modifications for pH, and tannin? Totally unfamiliar with the brand Wilco...