405 replies to this topic

[DoctorShumway]

It should be alright. How long all told will it be in there before you get to bottle it?

[mig50]

It should be alright. How long all told will it be in there before you get to bottle it?

if i wait, it will be in the carboy for about 2 and a half weeks total.

plus the five days it was in the bucket.

[DoctorShumway]

Oh yeah don't worry about that at all. It should ferment for about 2 weeks as it is, so an extra week won't harm it. Definitely bottle right when you get back though.

[Shervz0r]

I'm racking the cider to secondary after a week of primary fermentation. Took a nip and was intrigued by the sour and slightly bitter flavor. It'll be interesting to see how this matures...for now I'm just excited to have 5 gallons of cider!

Colin and I procured some copper tubing to prepare our wort chillers. Instead of using a hose attachment we plan to just attack some simple clear rubber tubing to the ends of the copper coil. Pictures will be posted as we assemble the apparatus. We also picked up a few buckets to store grain (I jumped in a bulk order of malts with Aaron and ordered 55 pounds of american pale malt) and we'll attempt to use the bottling bucket as a mash tun. We have plans to brew next weekend, sooooooooo...we'll see!!

Over and out!

[CutThroat]

I feel like the goth kid at a pep rally, but anyone ever brew their own wine?

I rode on a train with some guy who had made his own wine with strawberries and yeast and shit. He said it did most of the work in an old Carlos Rossi jug. The shit was good. And mighty strong. Any tips, points in the right direction, etc?

[Shervz0r]

I feel like the goth kid at a pep rally, but anyone ever brew their own wine?

I rode on a train with some guy who had made his own wine with strawberries and yeast and shit. He said it did most of the work in an old Carlos Rossi jug. The shit was good. And mighty strong. Any tips, points in the right direction, etc?

I have some wine aging...crushed the grapes in mid September and fermented. Some of the wine was distilled instead of bottled and aged...lots of absinthe to be had

[CutThroat]

I feel like the goth kid at a pep rally, but anyone ever brew their own wine?

I rode on a train with some guy who had made his own wine with strawberries and yeast and shit. He said it did most of the work in an old Carlos Rossi jug. The shit was good. And mighty strong. Any tips, points in the right direction, etc?

I have some wine aging...crushed the grapes in mid September and fermented. Some of the wine was distilled instead of bottled and aged...lots of absinthe to be had

God I hate being the noob.

*cringes*

How does one ferment fruit?

...and grape absinthe? It's been a while since someone made me fell like I don't drink enough. I'm so lost. Good on you.

[Shervz0r]

Fermentation is usually (always?) done with yeast. Yeast eat the sugar present in malts or fruits and piss out CH3CH2OH, aka ethanol. There are a number of other by products, some desireable, others not, so it's all a matter of doing it properly.

I'm not making grape absinthe! Distillation is the process of isolating the alcohol by taking advantage of its low vaporization point. Once the alcohol has been isolated (roughly 120 proof at this point) one can then go on to make all sorts of tasty beverages...I don't have the recipe for absinthe on hand, but it's all herbs.

[CutThroat]

Thanks for the FMI.

I think making alcohol will be just as addictive as consuming it.

[Shervz0r]

Fuller's clone is in the bottle.

Sherv, I thought distilling involved exploding tanks and stuff. Of course, my knowledge of that comes solely from an episode of the Simpsons where Homer and Bart make whiskey for Moe's speakeasy when the town votes to abolish alcohol. Never looked into it any further.

Haha, you and me both. The apparatus I saw involved a 5 gallon keg with a rubber tube leading out of it which then connects to a copper coil (much like the wort cooler) which is immersed in cold/ice water. Using a very powerful heating pad (some are made just for this use, apparently) and some kevlar/fire resistant cords to fix the pad unto the keg, one can heat the liquid through the keg to the appropriate temperature such that mostly ethanol evaporates. The gas travels through the tube and then condenses in the cold copper coil where it can then be retrieved as a liquid. You can run it unattended and let it go all day long...the only reason to turn it off is for fire preventive reasons (and also when you run out of alcohol to distill).

It's a pretty sweet setup, no open flames and it's very compact. I'd love to try to make some scotch and other hard liquors but the aging on those is far too long for my patience, heh.

[CutThroat]

The simpsons did a lot to deter homebrewing. I know it made me think it was super dangerous/difficult. Serves me right for trusting a primetime sitcom with anything.

[Shervz0r]

Here's a very interesting article on absinthe in the latest issue of Wired:
http://www.wired.com...1/absinthe.html

[CutThroat]

Just as soon as Peeps are for sale again we're gonna make some peeps malt liquor.
It's gonna be incredilble. We'll bottle in 40's.

[Shervz0r]

I went to the Sunset Grill tonight with some friends to celebrate one of them getting a new job (this place has 112 beers on tap and 300 some odd bottles) and I saw a neat little item on the menu:

Sam Adams Tripel Bock from 1998. It had a warning on it saying "DO NOT TRY THIS", so I had to order a bottle. After arguing with the waitress and insisting that yes, I DO want it (I had to tell her about homebrewing and tat I actually know some stuff about beer), I finally got a bottle of it. It came in a nice dark translucent blue bottle, had absolutely NO carbonation, and oozed out like very very old engine oil. It had a peculiar sour smell but the taste was like a mixture of Port wine with raisin bran...and it was HEAVY, like really dense. Taking a gulp in my mouth made me slightly nauseous, but I actually enjoyed it until about 1/5th was left, after which I just couldn't drink any more. It's not something I'd order again, ever, but I'm definitely glad to have tried it!