Help!

[Bogac_Erkan]

Hello to everyone. I am pretty new to homebrewing and prepared my 4th beer kit yesterday.

After setting my first kit, I started wondering what other things I can do with the new information sources I was introduced. The first was an dry apple cider and the result was "drinkable". Then I tried a ginger beer and it was a total failure as I tried to squeeze too many eggs into one basket and the end resuld found itself in the sink.

Now I have a strawberry wine in the jug and I am a little confused about how and when to bottle. MY recipe was full of flavour. Here are the details:

2000 gr of fresh strawberries
1300 gr granulated sugar
1 lt store bought apple juice
1 lemon's juice
25 gr ginger
1o gr of cinnamon sticks
20 pc cloves

I boiled everything other than the apple juice, mashed strawberries, stir well when cold, added apple juice, filtered. The OG was 1079.

This mixture is in the jug for the last 11 days and it is still bubbling and I haven't done anything else.

Help... I do not know how to proceed. My aim was to brew a fizzy, sparkling summer drink with strong strawberry aromas.

Any suggestions and comments on how to proceed would highly be appreciated.

Thanks in advance for all your feedback.

 

[mredge73]

Check your FG, should be getting close to 1.00.
If it is the same for 2-3 days in a row then it is done. If it is 1.00 it is done.

Once you determine it is done cold crash it near freezing for a couple of days.
This will make the yeast and the solids drop out to the bottom so you can bottle clear fluid.

For natural carbonation bottle like you would beer. I think it is 1oz of sugar per gallon, there are some calculators that will give you a more accurate answer.
Let sit for 2-3 weeks at room temp to bottle condition.

Result will be fizzy with strong aromas, but very dry. OG wasn't too high so it should be drinkable fresh.

This drink could also benefit from back sweetening, but this is a more advanced task and I wouldn't recommend it without a kegging system or artificial sweetener.
Could make a simple syrup that you can mix in the glass and serve with a fruit wedge.

 

[Drewed]

10 cloves is a heck of a lot of cloves. I use 1 or 2 per gallon.

I'd just sit in a cool dark corner and forget about it for a while. I don't know what yeast you used, so I can only guess at how long. But after the fermentation stops (as noted by multiple stable S.G. readings over multiple days ) rack it in to a secondary fermenter. Check for strawberry flavor, you will likely need to add more strawberries. Then I'd let it sit for a month or so to clear, perhaps with a cold crash in there to accelerate the process. When it is all done, then you can backsweeten to taste, bottle prime for carbonation, let that sit for a few weeks, pasteurize, fridge and enjoy.

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

Thank you for the recommendations... ı think it's still fermenting as ı keep seeing bubbles frequently.

@mredge73, I thought dry means "lack of aroma". I tried adding syrup to my ginger beer after carbonation but they didn2t carbonate well, can this be due to the room temp (around 20C these days)?

@Drewed, should I add more strawberries in the same manner? Boiling and mashing and filtering with less amount of water?

 

[bernardsmith]

Hi Bogac Erkan - and welcome.
I agree with Drewed. I generally use about 10 lbs of strawberries (a scant 5 kg ) for every gallon of strawberry wine I make. There is no free lunch and strawberries do not have a very intense flavor..But you are making a blend of apple and strawberry wine so you may get by with less than 5 kg. No need to boil fruit unless your real plan is to make jam. Freeze the berries then allow them to thaw. The freezing will damage the cell walls of the fruit and allow more of the juice to be expelled. If your concern is that the fruit may carry wild yeast and /or bacteria that might affect your wine you add some potassium metabilsfite (K-meta - AKA Campden tablets) to the fruit 24 hours before you add them to the wine. K-meta produces sulfur dioxide and the SO2 kills bacteria and yeast.
If you are concerned about the pectins in the fruit creating a haze in your wine (the haze is magnified when you heat/cook the fruit) you might want to add pectic enzyme about 12 hours before you add the fruit to the wine. Alcohol denatures the enzyme.

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

Thank you very much for your contribution, bernardsmith. If I understand correctly, I need to freeze and thaw strawberriews, add Campden tablets 24 hours and pectic enzyme 12 hours before adding the batch to the fermented juice and let the final product sit for some more before bottling as usual. Do you add more water at this stage or you only add the filtered juice of the new batch?

 

[Drewed]

No need to add more water.
1. Wash and hull the strawberries. Cut in to smaller pieces if they are monster.
2. Freeze the strawberries ( or by frozen.)
3. Dump the frozen berries into a plastic bowl or some sort of sanitised lidded container.
4. Let them thaw.
5. Add crushed campden tablets, just sprinkle over the top and re-lid.
6. Shake to combline
7. let sit 12 hrs.
8. Add the pectic enzyme if your going to.
9. Shake again
10. let sit 12 more hours
11. Dump bucket in the secondary fermenter.
12. Rack wine from primary to secondary, leaving the lees behind
13. Install air lock device on secondary
14. Wait
15. Wait some more
16. Bottle with either priming sugar, carbonation tablets, or a sugar syrup in the bottle bucket- if you use one.
17. Enjoy.

 

[Darthbrewder]

This is not mead...

 

[mredge73]

@mredge73, I thought dry means "lack of aroma". I tried adding syrup to my ginger beer after carbonation but they didn2t carbonate well, can this be due to the room temp (around 20C these days)?

Dry doesn't lack aroma.
Dry lacks body due to lack of residual complex sugar, like an american light lager or a red wine. It won't have any sweetness left as all the sugars that you are using are simple sugars.

I don't understand your carbonation question, to bottle carbonate all you need is live yeast, a little simple sugar, and time. Dextrose and table sugar both work well.

 

[bernardsmith]

This is not mead...

True. True. Very True... so it was posted in the wrong section, but the questions are still good and the answers (I think) are useful... If the administrators want to move this to the wine making section I am sure they have the power...

 

[Drewed]

Double post! (Dang slow 4g....lol)

 

[Drewed]

This is not mead...

Well, crap. I didn't even notice that. Oh well...

Chuck a pound or two of honey at it and we'll call it close enough!

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

True. True. Very True... so it was posted in the wrong section, but the questions are still good and the answers (I think) are useful... If the administrators want to move this to the wine making section I am sure they have the power...

Ehm... actually I didn't post in the mead section and I think, somehow my post was moved here. As far as I remember, my initial post was in the wine section.

Lots of information... thank you all for your valuable information...

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

Dry doesn't lack aroma.
Dry lacks body due to lack of residual complex sugar, like an american light lager or a red wine. It won't have any sweetness left as all the sugars that you are using are simple sugars.

I don't understand your carbonation question, to bottle carbonate all you need is live yeast, a little simple sugar, and time. Dextrose and table sugar both work well.

I am sorry, mredge73. Rereading now, I now realize I wasn't be able to state what I meant. I will try to be more clear this time.

I read a lot of threads about bottle bombs and I was pretty sure one my bottles will explode and my wife will be throwing me out.

At first I decided to backsweeten and add half the sugar I use for the carbonation of my beer kits.

Then I changed my mind and decided I can give pasteurization a try and it seems I started to get confused at that stage. Being afraid that my ginger turns into something not drinkable by an inappropriate amount of Stevia, I bottled the ginger with 4,2 gr of carbonation sugar. I also had two pet bottles with the same amount of liquid and sugar, for the sake of testing. The plan was to check pet bottles and pasteurize the real deal when the bottles seem to be full with gas.

When I checked my bottles, they seemed to be ready. I opened one of the beer bottles in order to have a look and there was no gas. The ginger thing was tasting awful as well and it was a sheer disappointment for me.

In short, I am also confused about which path to choose and if this strawberry wine fails as well, I might totally give up trying these and concentrate on beer kits.

Thank you very much for all the information.

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

No need to add more water.
1. Wash and hull the strawberries. Cut in to smaller pieces if they are monster.
2. Freeze the strawberries ( or by frozen.)
3. Dump the frozen berries into a plastic bowl or some sort of sanitised lidded container.
4. Let them thaw.
5. Add crushed campden tablets, just sprinkle over the top and re-lid.
6. Shake to combline
7. let sit 12 hrs.
8. Add the pectic enzyme if your going to.
9. Shake again
10. let sit 12 more hours
11. Dump bucket in the secondary fermenter.
12. Rack wine from primary to secondary, leaving the lees behind
13. Install air lock device on secondary
14. Wait
15. Wait some more
16. Bottle with either priming sugar, carbonation tablets, or a sugar syrup in the bottle bucket- if you use one.
17. Enjoy.

This is one of the clearest instructions I came across with. Thank you very much, Drewed. Cheers!

 

[mredge73]

I am sorry, mredge73. Rereading now, I now realize I wasn't be able to state what I meant. I will try to be more clear this time.

I read a lot of threads about bottle bombs and I was pretty sure one my bottles will explode and my wife will be throwing me out.

At first I decided to backsweeten and add half the sugar I use for the carbonation of my beer kits.

Then I changed my mind and decided I can give pasteurization a try and it seems I started to get confused at that stage. Being afraid that my ginger turns into something not drinkable by an inappropriate amount of Stevia, I bottled the ginger with 4,2 gr of carbonation sugar. I also had two pet bottles with the same amount of liquid and sugar, for the sake of testing. The plan was to check pet bottles and pasteurize the real deal when the bottles seem to be full with gas.

When I checked my bottles, they seemed to be ready. I opened one of the beer bottles in order to have a look and there was no gas. The ginger thing was tasting awful as well and it was a sheer disappointment for me.

In short, I am also confused about which path to choose and if this strawberry wine fails as well, I might totally give up trying these and concentrate on beer kits.

Thank you very much for all the information.

Backsweetening and Pasteurization are pretty advanced techniques.
You really need to get the basics down before messing around with them.

Artificial sweeteners can eliminate this need; splenda is supposed to work pretty good and it is mostly maltodextrine so it should help the body. However I have never used it in brewing so cannot recommend it from experience.

As far as non-beer beverages, there is a giant apple wine thread on here that half the people on HBT have made. It is simple, good, and dry. Carbonated and Still versions have been made.
Mead is also super simple, just takes a dedicated nutrient regiment during fermentation and lots of patience.

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

Guys, one more question.

Considering I will be adding some strawberries while transffering to a second fermenter, I was a little confused about how to determine alcohol levels. Should I calculate as usual, using the difference between OG and FG or there is another method?

Thank you.

 

[bernardsmith]

If you are adding fruit (strawberries) then the USDA (dept of agriculture) publishes a list of the standard nutritional values of all fruits and other edibles. You might use this estimation as the basis for calculating the additional amount of sugar you are adding to your wine. There will be some additional liquid (water) coming from the fruit so your total volume will change but you are not talking about gallons of liquid. But the basic idea is to determine (approximately) how much sugar you will be adding (1 lb of sugar (a very scant 1/2kg adds 40 points when dissolved in water to make 1 US gallon (about 4 L)

 

[Bogac_Erkan]

Thank you very much, bernardsmith. I am familiar with that list but never thought I might need it some day (I work in a publishing house and our boss wants to publish a translated version of the list for the last 6 years and we never start working on it. hahahahaha).

Thank you.