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Are you around to babysit if for the first 5 days or so? If so a tub of water and some ice. The more water the better as it prevents those temp swings you are worried about. Put the fermenter in the water and add ice as necessary to keep the temp in the band you want. you could also build...

To answer the OP, I am in Windsor and mine are not ready yet, still feel soft, not the tissue paper feel I think they should have. But last year I did pick about now, so I think it changes by the year. Second, to derail the thread, I will have some chinook I would love to trade for some local...

And bleme for the win with the most brutal story of the week. ouch

I set it about 95 or 100 degrees and 8 hrs will do it. But I also live in Colorado so it is very dry air.

Good point. the pressure at my tap is usually about 40 psi. So if you had a keg connected directly to the water line you would need 40+ psi to get CO2 into the water. Otherwise water would be forced into the CO2 line. When the lawn watering system starts and the tap pressure drops to 30...

That would be the solution, just make sure it is a good one rated for whatever pressure differential you expect based on CO2 pressure used.

yes - they will be fine. They are dry so no cell damage is happening due to ice crystal formation. Thaw and refreeze cycles of things like fruit will turn them to mush due to the ice crystals destroying the cell structure.

Until you lose water pressure and feed carbed water and then your CO2 tank contents back into the water lines.

Two things naturally stop the yeast. Either they consume all the sugar so there is nothing for them to become active about (assuming not back sweetening). The other one is they exceed their alcohol tolerance. Essentially they poison themselves in alcohol. If either of those happens you don't...

I would not so much use the rind as the zest. The white pith can give a bitter flavor that takes a long time to age out. But if you grate off the zest you will get a nice orange flavor. Do a search for Joe's ancient orange mead if you would like a good recipe.

very good point on the PH.

Not sure what a mashy taste is. Also not sure how much grain got into the kettle. But if it was significant and you then boiled that grain you certainly would have extracted tannin and other flavors that would not be normal.

50 is not advanced years. Just old enough to no longer make a fool or yourself very often and hitting your stride in life....with the occasional limp

Is that even possible? Perhaps heating up some leftovers can be accomplished without a glass of wine or beer, but no real cooking.

So you are sure that white powder was not left by the birds? Unless we have a botanist that has studied grapes among us, it is a guess as to what the white powder is. That makes it hard to have an opinion. But glad to see you went forward, experimentation is at least part of why most of us...

At this point I would cold crash it and rack. Then bulk age until you can read a paper through it. I have had the fruit not drop and found it always did when I cold crashed it.

You could always try humor. Send him a copy of the applicable statutes, a get out of jail free card, and a soap on a rope.

Bottle him up a few but tell him to be quick on drinking them.

Although I fully acknowledge the risks of glass. If the original request for a 5 gal fermentor is valid, i.e. planned batch sizes are 4 gallons or less, the risk is reduced. The smaller the carboy (assuming no manufacturing defects) the less the risks of breakage. Smaller carboys weight less...

The problem with any larger volume vessel and not using CO2 is that as you use the product you are not replacing the CO2 so you end up with more and more air filled head space. What you are referring too is exactly what was used 150 years ago, a cask ale. To avoid the eventual sour you...