Kai
Well-Known Member
I recently helped my roommate ("Cambo" on this forum) with a Maplewine. I don't have the vitals of it at hand, but it wasn't rocket philosophy. As I recall, the fermentables were about 60:40 maple syrup:brown sugar, juice of one lemon, diluted to - and I may be misremembering - 1.130, yeast energised, and inoculated with some wine yeast or other. I'll have to ask Cameron for the details.
He left it at room temperature until airlock activity ceased, then he killed the yeast, filtered, and bottled it. I don't know if he took an FG reading.
Either way, right off the bat, the stuff is delicious.
Aroma is very alcoholic, unfairly dominated by hot alcohol, with some non-specific sweetness. Doesn't smell promising. But the flavour is incredible; starts very sherry-like, with the alcohol warmth up front, and opens into a delicious balanced maple flavour, ending with a heavy, very sweet maple-candy finish. This can't have attenuated very far, and the mouthfeel verges on, well, syrupy--like a cream sherry--but it works. You wouldn't want more than a sherry glass of the stuff, after supper seated around a cozy blazing radiator.
I'm going to see if I can get Cam to post the recipe properly. I think we'll definitely make a larger batch of this soon.
For fun, we calculated the cost of this as less than $5 per 750ml bottle, as compared to $15 for 250ml of the only commercial maplewine I've seen.
Has anyone else tried this?
He left it at room temperature until airlock activity ceased, then he killed the yeast, filtered, and bottled it. I don't know if he took an FG reading.
Either way, right off the bat, the stuff is delicious.
Aroma is very alcoholic, unfairly dominated by hot alcohol, with some non-specific sweetness. Doesn't smell promising. But the flavour is incredible; starts very sherry-like, with the alcohol warmth up front, and opens into a delicious balanced maple flavour, ending with a heavy, very sweet maple-candy finish. This can't have attenuated very far, and the mouthfeel verges on, well, syrupy--like a cream sherry--but it works. You wouldn't want more than a sherry glass of the stuff, after supper seated around a cozy blazing radiator.
I'm going to see if I can get Cam to post the recipe properly. I think we'll definitely make a larger batch of this soon.
For fun, we calculated the cost of this as less than $5 per 750ml bottle, as compared to $15 for 250ml of the only commercial maplewine I've seen.
Has anyone else tried this?
