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I'm mainly a beer brewer, but I've started making wine when I don't have enough time to brew. I got a pamphlet from my LHBS called "Enjoy Home Winemaking" that has some direction and various fruit wine recipes in the back. Basically you just ad fruit (or concentrate), water to volume, and sugar...

I love the idea of combining the unrackable portions and leftover fruit to make something new. It would be interesting to see what that yeast did. I just started using a back to hold my fruit pulp during fermentation. Before that, I would add the lees (about a gallon of pulp and trapped wine)...

Well, it's got a nice little pellicle forming now. Hopefully the bugs will eat through some of the sludge. If not, I'll have a long wait for 2-3 bottles... The moral of this story is: don't put pumpkin purée in your boil to see what happens.

I'm going for the higher alcohol content (18-20%) of the 2 main sherry type. I don't remember the name but I read the alcohol is too high for flor to develop. I didn't think about not even needing the cotton ball, I wonder if the little tiny ants I keep seeing are bigger than the holes in the cap.

I'm making a sherry this weekend (all fermentation, no hard liquor) and I'm wondering if its possible to get the oxidation you'd get from a barrel. I read on Jack Keller's site that he uses a wad of cotton as a stopper on the secondary to develop the flor (basically a pellicle). Has anyone tried...

I just made a batch and I didn't end up adding any water. I used a little under 4lbs/gallon. Granted I also had a bunch of loss during racking, but I like my blackberry wine really flavorful. I'm not sure what the OG of the must was, but we added 12 pounds of sugar to 6 gallons to get to...

Which cherries would be best to use? The crop seems to be very small this year, so I'm leaning toward mostly canned sweet cherries with 15% or so canned tart cherries and maybe 15% fresh sweet cherries. (Around here we don't get the various varieties, just "cherries".) If I use fresh cherries...

Turns out I got a little bit suckered by the tour guide. Their "special, unique yeast" she called K1 is just Lalvin's 1116 (K1-V1116). I only had to read a graduate degree dissertation to figure it out... I'm going to try that yeast first. Based on the spec sheets from Lalvin, it seems pretty...

The easiest way to sanitize your must (unfermented wine) is to get Campden tablets from the homebrew shop or online. They're pretty cheap, just add one crushed tablet per gallon of must. Then wait a few hours (I think 24 is what is recommended, but I do 12) and add your wine yeast. This way you...

I had a really good Sherry from a local winery called Messina Hof. It's $45 a bottle, so I want to try and reverse engineer it with a fruit wine. Their website describes it as having "... vanilla and creamy flavors, almond and cherry notes with an undertone of white chocolate and truffles." I've...

I started out attempting to made a high gravity porter with a large portion of the fermentables coming from pumpkin. My sparge got stuck, and I still had a lot of pumpkin to use, so I decided to experiment and add it to the boil. What resulted was a nasty sludge of pumpkin goop. It fermented...

The problem with returning samples is the oxidation from pouring it back in (although I do it with my 1gal batches anyways). For larger batches, I have a wine thief that is made especially for returning samples. When you touch it to the bottom of the carboy it pushes a stopper and fills the...

Last year, I used 1118, per the recommendation of the homebrew shop owner. I think it's just a champagne yeast, and it tasted really good. This year, I used Red Star Côte de Blancs per the recommendation of another LHBS owner (I moved). I had to back sweeten last year, and Côte doesn't ferment...

I like that a lot more than cardboard case boxes. This may become a feature when I build a cellar rack in my closet.

I've had several brews finish in less than 3 days. I have a Saison in the fermenter with 566 that finished bubbling just shy of 3 days. With the peach purée, you're also adding a lot of very fermentable sugars. 2 days does seem really fast, but you're also fermenting in the upper 70s which could...

Sorry to revive an old thread, but seeing as it never got answered... Dallas has a BUNCH of recycling locations mostly at schools, libraries, and churches. the website says they take 'bottles and jars of any color'. (It doesn't specifically mention glass, but it can probably be inferred.)...

Hey everyone, As the title says, I'm looking for a SCOBY in the Dallas area. I'd be completely fine picking up one someone would otherwise throw out. Thanks!

Hey, I'm in the Farmers Branch/Carrollton area and do 1 gallon all grain batches. I just started a mead a few days ago, and I've been experimenting a little with wine. What part of Dallas are you in?

I made one a few months ago from a recipe book I got from my LHBS. (it's for 1 gallon, but I scaled up to 3.5 based on how many peaches I had) 1 gallon: 2.5 lbs peaches 4.5 cups sugar 1 tsp yeast nutrient 1.5 tsp acid blend 2 tsp pectic enzyme 1/4 tsp tannin 1 campden tablet 1 packet EC-1118...

I think it's 3 times what you would use dry. I can't remember the original source, but I heard it on Basic Brewing Radio.