The Fruits of Labor

5/16/2011

I got my first batch of elderberry wine bottled. I have to say that it turned out a lot more dry than I had hoped. Very bitter but I have already downed two bottles. I was surprised that the buzz from home brew is different than the buzz you get from store bought. It was a cleaner and happier buzz than I have ever gotten from a wine at the store. I have to admit that if I had known this before I would have started brewing years ago.

Seeing how dry this is let me know now that I need to add some sugar to what is still going. This was from an earlier batch and not the first batch. So, the alcohol content is less than the gallon I have had going for months. I have to admit that I am really looking forward to the oldest batch making it to the end and being put in the bottles. It will be sweeter and it will have to have one hell of a kick. But the trick at this point is to keep a little more sugar in the must than the yeast will be able to eat. I will just have to slowly sweeten to taste at this point. Adding a half cup of sugar and letting it go a little longer then taste and add more sugar if needed.

There is no reason to bother clearing the wine. You can't see through it to even know if it is clear. It looks like red, thick oil but has the consistency of wine. If you can't see through it then how can you even determine if it is clear?

Now! What is going on with more brewing? I put in a couple grape vines two years ago when we first moved into this house. This year the white grape vine is actually going to produce enough grapes that I might have enough to do a full gallon of it from the grape juice alone. The second vine never did like me and has never done well. So, when the grapes are ready I will be making a nice white wine. We also put in a small orchard in the lower yard and I am looking forward to next year when we will have apples, peaches, cherries and plums. OK, I am really only looking forward to the cherries and peaches. I remember what fresh from the tree peaches taste like from my childhood. I think they would be a better choice for wine than anything I can get from the store so I will wait for them. My wife is talking about putting in more grape vines since I have had so much luck with the one that is taking over the side of the house. We are deciding if we want them on the fence or if we are going to make a place through the mini orchard for them. Either way I know that it will take two years after they are in the ground before I can expect any kind of return from them.

Maybe in a couple of years I will have a full blown microbrewery going. I know that I would rather spend my time brewing then having a job in the computer world now. Who knows. What we are planting now may liberate me from a mundane job and actually allow me to start doing this as a small business. Probably need to look into what I would need to do to be a legal microbrewery here in Arkansas before I let my dream get any bigger than it is now. Probably so much red tape that it would not make it worth while.

OK! Until next time keep the bubbles going!!!

Chuck

Flowers?

5/02/2011

It has been a few weeks since my last post. Not much has happened here in the brew department. I did the second racking of the elderberry wine. Very uneventful. The flavor is very good. In fact it is as good as the first gallon that is still bubbling away. Nice little bitter bite to it. I think that bitter bite with the sweetness is what I like the most about the elderberry.

I did try an experiment that didn't get past the boiling. I have a recipe for honeysuckle wine. I have to admit that I picked a lot of flowers and even picked up a couple of ticks in the process. After I had about 6 cups of flowers pressed into the cup I added a half gallon of water to the flowers and went to the three hour boil of the flowers. I have to tell you, when you boil a flower it does not smell like the flower. In fact after 3 hours of boiling I had to throw the whole half gallon of tea out. I am not sure how people can make wine out of flowers after this. Think I will stay with berries.

Short but sweet this time. Still waiting on the elderberry wine and berries to ripen.

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

First Shot!

This is my first batch of Elderberry Wine.
Can you see how red-black it is?

You can not see the sun through it at all!!!

04/12/2011

One of the things I never did get into any detail about was the first runs of elderberry wine. Back on February 23^rd I got the call to go pick up 8oz of dehydrated elderberries. I got this home and it was one of those times that things didn't quite go right but it did set the way I did the second batch. I put all the berries in a pan full of water. I got things boiling for a while, maybe 30 min, and I got the call to go get a piece for our washing machine that we had ordered. I moved the hot elderberry liquid to the back of the stove to steep. When I got back with the piece the berry tea has been working for an hour. I poured everything into the primary fermenter and added one gallon of water. This is on top of the half gallon that I had as berry juice. I added 4.5 cups of sugar and let her ferment for a week.

After 7 days I gave the liquid a first racking keeping all the berries in the primary fermenter. I added another gallon of water since the liquid that was left was blood red. That starts the second gallon on what is more diluted elderberry juice. I added 4.5 cups of sugar and let that go for a week.

After 7 days I gave the first batch a second racking and I racked the batch in the primary fermenter. Things were bubbling along and after a week I gave the second batch a second racking.

Now on about the 31^st I gave both gallons a racking. The fermentation process is slowing. I took both batches and timed the bubbles that the airlock gave off. The batch that was started on 02/23/2011 I get a full bubble every 4 min. On the batch that was started 03/03/2011 I get a full bubble every two min.

The flavor is different between the two. This is what got me to doing a full two gallon shot this last time. The second gallon is weaker in the elderberry flavor. If you hold a flash light up to the second batch you can see the light penetrate the liquid an inch or so. On the first gallon the light does not penetrate it at all. So I have elderberry wine and light elderberry wine.

I am not sure how much longer the fermentation process will last. I am really wanting to get this first batch bottled and at least one bottle chilled and one on my wine shelf. I don't think the alcohol content will be all that much and both batches will have to stand on the elderberry flavor be it good or bad.

There we go. A little catch up on something I didn't go into because sometimes life happens and you don't have any time to update a blog, that at the time, was not being read by anyone outside family. Now I kinda need to keep things rolling a little bit here since I am being read by people as far as the middle east and Asia. More coming soon!!!

Keep it bubbling!

Chuck

Elderberry First Racking

4/10/2011

 Yesterday, I took the must and tried to scoop out as many of the elderberries as I could. I really thought that I had gotten most of them out of the must. I added a little sugar. Let things set until today to do a first rack. Last night I did the calculations to change sugar from weight to cups. I was a little light on the sugar. It is about 2 cups to the pound.

So, today I racked the two gallons that I was shooting for. I had a little trouble with the second gallon and there are a few berries that made it past siphon. We'll just deal with those later. I did have to move some of the content in the first gallon to the second. I went to add some extra sugar into the first gallon and things started foaming. I really didn't lose enough to worry about and it evened things out between the two gallons. I added about a cup of sugar into both one gallon secondary fermenters. They are on the brew shelf and we have bubbles.

Now we will wait for about a week to ten days and then do a second racking to get the crap that will build up in the bottom. After that we will rack this once every 21-28 days. This will help clear the wine. Even though there is really no need for this wine to totally clear since it is so dark you can't really see through it. My wife commented on how it looked like I was doing a blood transfusion between the bucket and jug. I noticed the first time I did this, I got the must into the secondary fermenter it looked like I was brewing blood wine for a few weeks before it started clearing. My wife and I took a good taste of the new batch and it has the characteristics that we are looking for. A very strong elderberry taste with that nice soft bitter flavor you expect in wine. I think that I may have gotten this right a second time.

The elderberry wine I have been working on for a while now is getting closer and closer to ending fermentation. It tastes good and I am looking forward to bottling this in a few weeks to a month. Least that is the guess. Being he little yeasties are living things I am pretty much at their mercy. I know if I was them I would not be looking forward to my habitat becoming something that I could not live in anymore.

Keep it bubbling!!!

Chuck

Sugar

4/06/2011

Thought I would give a quick update on the primary fermentation of the new batch of elderberry wine.

Sugar is what makes all this happen. Yes I am sure there are some sugars in the berries but there is never enough. (I am working on adding sugar by measurement and not weight so you will see me add by the cup.) I can tell you that when you make wine by the gallon you are going to use around 4 cups of sugar. My primary fermentation suddenly came to a halt so I popped open the bucket. I stirred things around and took a small taste. What I tasted was out of sugar. I added one cup of sugar per gallon and added hot water from the tap to a glass. It was not too hot and it mixed in all the sugar. Dumped the sugar water in, gave it a quick stir and closed things up.

Now at this point fermentation is going slower than at first but it is steady. I think I should have started this recipe out with 4 Cups of sugar per gallon. I am finding that is a really common starting point for most wine. Well, it is up to 4 Cups per gallon now and blooping away. I am more confident at giving this must a first racking at day 7 or 8. That means that we will be first racking this Saturday or Sunday. Probably Sunday though.

I will probably work in a later posting to take a closer look at sugar and exactly what it means to a brewer. May even have to look at what different types of sugar can do to the flavor.

Keep it bubbling!!!

Chuck

Waiting For Your Fruits

4/03/2011

This is the part that totally sucks. You get your must going. You get it into the primary fermenter. You wait, then get it into the secondary fermenter. You wait then rack it, test it, and taste it. At this point you get a really good idea what you will end up with. Now you have to wait for a very long time before bottling happens. This is the waiting that really sucks. You get very few bubbles but as long as they are coming the fruit is not ready. All you can do is keep out of it and not sip away at what will be your finished product. You just have to keep in mind that what you are waiting for will be better than what you have in the brew shelf.

My brew shelf is my desk. Not my computer desk. That is on the other side of the room. My desk is where I deal with paper work and all that needs done off the computer. The room is already naturally dim and few lights. I kinda like the cave feel. I guess this is where they get the whole “Man Cave” from. Who knows. I do know it is nice to sit there dealing with whatever needs taken care of and I get to look up and see what it is that I am working for. The only issue with this setup is with the primary fermenter. The room smells like CO2 for days. I can tell you that this smell is not like that of bread being made. It is a acidic smell. There is nothing like it I have ever smelled. I am not saying that it is a nasty smell but I am saying that by the time it gets into the secondary fermenter I am sick of the smell. I am glad warm weather is here. Now I can open the window and the gas gets pulled or pushed out of this room. I would rather smell the sweet country than the smell of CO2.

The image today has not been pulled form the internet. That is taken on my back deck. It is the elderberry wine that I have so much hope in. This is the bottle of liquid gold that has inspired me to start a two gallon version. The flavor is that of wine and I can understand why there are songs about this. I am having a hard time waiting and not grabbing a measure of it every so often. I use the term measure to equal to a shot glass. You would not think that a measure is that much but when you do measure after measure it all adds up. I keep thinking that by waiting I can enjoy a chilled glass of wine and not a room temperature measure that is only a teaser.

We all hate waiting on something that we know is about to be something good but we have to. I plan, at this point, to start getting the equipment to start five gallon shots at this. Looking at only five bottles per gallon is kinda bleak when you think about the months that goes into each shot. I am glad that I did start with gallon shots instead of five gallon shots. The mistakes that I made are easier to stomach. I would have hated to throw out twenty five gallons of mistake instead of the five gallons that I did throw out. However, now that I have an understanding of how to make wine I think I am ready to go for the five gallon shots so when I get it right I get twenty five bottles of wine and not five. But I am a few months away from that investment.

Until next time keep it bubbling.

Chuck

Elderberry Wine

4/02/2011

OK, I started a new batch of Elderberry wine. Here is the recipe I used. Now I will list the one gallon version. Double this and you have what I am making. I am doing 2 gallons so I can give some of it away.

I used 8oz. of dehydrated elderberries in this.

4-5oz dehydrated elderberries

3 cups of sugar (at this point)

1 tsp acid blend

1 tsp yeast nutrient

yeast

I boiled the elderberries in water for one hour. Yes, I wanted everything out of those dried up little chunks of gold. After this I added the sugar to make sure it was incorporated throughout the liquid. Added acid blend and yeast nutrient and blended that in thoroughly and added the extra water. All this was placed in a primary fermenter and covered with plastic lid with an air lock I added yeast when it got down to under 100 degrees. Within three hours I have bubbles coming out the air lock. I was rather shocked by this. And relieved. Please note!!! I did not remove the boiled elderberries! I left them in the primary fermenter and will remove them when I rack the first time. If a few make it by and are in the secondary fermenter that is no big deal. We will get them on the second racking.

In 7-10 days I will rack into secondary fermenter and add probably two cups of sugar. After 7-10 days I will rack into another fermenter and leave there until the liquid gold completes fermentation. At that point I will add chemicals to preserve the wine and after 2-3 days I will bottle and leave all but one bottle on the shelf for a minimum of sex months. I will take one bottle and chill it, open it, and enjoy it.

That brings up something. When it the wine ready? It is ready when it tastes good for you. I will have one bottle to celebrate the batch being done and shelved. It will be good and I will be happy with it. Letting the other bottles sit for 6+ months will just add to flavor. After a year, I think, if you have not drank the wine you should have some people over and open what is left and share it all until it is gone. That or, ONLY IF IT IS REALLY GOOD, give it to friends and family that will appreciate the flavor and time you put into the bottle.

Wine is meant to be drank alone and with a pack of people. I can only imagine what it is like when you drink it in a group of people and they like it. That must be a great feeling. I will have to put in an entry when this happens.

Until next time keep it bubbling!!!

Chuck

Call Of The Wild

3/30/2011

After my last post you may think that I am stuck on wild berries. Well, I really am. Over the centuries, and even more so in our time, we have been changing what our produce is. We pick the best seeds from the best plants. We water everything more than it would ever get in nature. We use chemicals to not only grow but to keep the bad things away. What you get in your produce department resembles very little what the actual fruit was originally.

Strawberries are the biggest change that I can think of right off the top of my head. I have seen wild strawberries. They are small and you have to pick all day to get enough to do anything with. However, if you taste one of these wild berries and taste a strawberry you get from a grocery store you will taste a difference. You can't purchase the flavor of a wild strawberry from a store. You can get close but is close always best?

Blackberries have changed also. I have had wild black berries almost exclusively. We have always gone into the woods and picked blackberries. They are always sweet and have that distinct taste. They do not grind in your mouth with seeds. Now the ones you get in the store have that black berry flavor but they also have a watery taste and have the grit of seeds. I think I will brave the thorny limbs of the blackberry bush to make sure that any wine I make has the flavor that my ancestors would be proud of.

Now there are some berries that you can't even find in a store. The elderberry is one of the. The gooseberry is another one. For no good reason that I can think of we never domesticated these berries and a few more. We did not make them bigger at the expense of their flavor. We did not farm them into different species. These berries you can only get from the forests and wild areas of the world. Or you can pay out the nose for them on the internet.

The elderberry has become my favorite berry at the moment. This berry comes from a bush and is small and hard to deal with. However, it is worth dealing with it. For a long time I have thought that you needed to use your fingers to pull every berry off one at a time. I have been proven wrong by a video on youtube. In fact all you need to do is use a fork to pull these berries from the group. This can change a few hours of work into about 30 min. Makes getting these berries worth while.

I guess you can get whatever you want to ferment. If you want fruit from a grocery you can get fruit from a grocery. I personally think it is a waste of money when there are such bounties in the wild. I have priced what a couple of gallons of blackberries would cost at the grocery and other berries. It is worth my time to go pick these berries in the wild. It also keeps me from paying federal taxes to the government that I think needs less money than it does. I would rather walk through briars than pay for something that is free in the wild and I have and always will. However if you live in a large city or in a country where these berries do not grow you can only go to a grocery. If you are in another country I would suggest finding a berry that is in that country to keep your wine regional.

I will not judge but I will not use berries form the store unless it is dehydrated elderberries. They cost $5 an ounce and in $15 you have a great wine. I do think after this year I will not need to do this again.

Keep it bubbling!!!
Chuck

Elderberry Blues

3/29/2011

It has been a while since I have had a blog entry. I not only have been busy with family but I have been busy throwing out gallons of really crappy wine. Yes, that's right. I have been tossing out wine.

It seems that every batch that I have listed here has turned out tasting like, what I would call, prison hooch. I did bottle some of the Hard Cider just so I could have a bottle of the first batch that I ever made. It is terrible. Too sweet to even think about drinking. Sure it makes a great mixer with cranberry juice but I am not in this to make a mixing wine. I really spent days looking into where I went wrong. While I was doing this I had a batch of elderberry wine going from dehydrated elderberries. Each week I threw out one to two gallons of prison hooch. Each week I still cared for this elderberry concoction. So where did I go wrong?

Well, when I threw out the last of everything I had been brewing, I racked the elderberry wine. I was a little worried about putting this into my mouth since it looked like blood. If you have never actually made any elderberry wine then you don't know what I am talking about. It is a VERY thick deep red liquid. I can tell you if it isn't then you made it too weak and need to think about dumping it. What did I taste? Young wine! A very young wine that needs a lot of time and care to become something that someone would sell their first born for. Now where did I go wrong on all the other batches? I didn't use actual fruit. Well, I did on the watermelon wine but that is harder than hell to make anyway. I didn't use real apples, I used apple juice. I didn't use real cranberries I used cranberry juice. The mead? I just used too much honey and I could not tell the difference between it and the crap apple wine I bottled. I did not actually use the fruit. I did with the elderberry!!!

Why did I decide to even do the elderberry wine? When I was 13 I would steal wine from my grandfathers wine rack. Every bottle of it was elderberry. I picked the berries himself and brewed up a very nice buzz for a teenager. I wanted to relive my childhood. Now, I was able to purchase 8 ounces of dehydrated elderberries from the brew shop that I get ALL my supplies from. I used that to make about 1.5 gallons of must. Elderberries smell like crap when they are being hydrated and are very unappealing. In fact I walked around all day with the nasty smell in my nose. That made me worry about my choice to tell you the truth. When I did my first racking I thought it was too thick so I added more water and sugar to the leftover must and started a second batch using the same berries. That might have been a mistake. The jury is still out on the second batch but it is not working out like the first batch. When I racked the first bit I added a little sugar since it was so dry already. Then I added more later at a second racking. Then when I racked it a third time I tasted it. When I was 13 I did not have any respect for what I was drinking. Even with all the CO2 in the liquid it was wonderful. I gave a measure to my wife and she even agreed that I was going to have a hard time keeping any of this gallon. I let my little brother have a taste of it last night and he was impressed. What did I learn here? ONLY USE ACTUAL FRUIT TO MAKE ANY WINE!!!

Now from this, I am going to get more dehydrated elderberries to make another gallon. Later this year I am going to the creeks in the middle of nowhere to get actual wild elderberries to make a five gallon batch of this angelic beverage. I have found my berry of choice for now. Yes, I plan on doing black berries and maybe a wild cherry if I can get enough of them. But I am going to do a 5 gallon shot of elderberry wine. There is a reason people write songs about this elixir. I can't for the life of me understand why every winery doesn't make it. I would gladly pay $50 a bottle for what is in a carboy behind me when it is ready for drinking. It is simply amazing what elderberry wine tastes like.

The short of all this? Do not make wine from juices you buy in a Wal-Mart! Only use actual fruit and make sure you use enough of it. Do not cut yourself short thinking you will just make up for it with sugar. You reap what you sow. If you do that you will have a watery tasting wine with alcohol. The alcohol is not worth this. It is a waste of time, sugar, and yeast. You want as much fruit as you can get to make the wine you want to drink. You want more fruit for the wine you will be giving away. You can't make up for the actual taste of fruit with sugar. You can't ever make up for the quality if you do not use as much fruit as you can. Don't brew crap. Brew something that you are proud of!!!

How did I make the elderberry wine? That is simple. I used 8 ounces of dehydrated elderberries and about 4 and a half cups of sugar. I didn't even use the greatest yeast I could use. I used yeast that was in my wine starter kit. Next time I will use some higher grade yeast meant for a fruity wine. That is all I did. I did NOT use my hydrometer. I will probably never use a hydrometer now that I know what I am doing with this berry. There is no reason to. I know the sugar that I want I know the berries that I want. Now I will use the hydrometer for wind berries. You never know what you are putting in your must when you are using anything wild. I will also enjoy every sip of the elderberry wine that I make. If you have never had elderberry wine I highly suggest that you go find a bottle and slowly enjoy a very cold glass of it. In fact I suggest you enjoy several very cold glasses of it. It will make you feel better about brewing it yourself.

Keep it Bubbling!!!
Chuck

Back From Indiana!!!

2/20/2011

Its been a few days since my last post. I had to travel half way across the US and back.

What did I find when I got back? Well, the watermelon wine sucks. It is probably exactly what it is supposed to taste like. I just don't like the taste. It is so going to be poured out into the back 40. The mead is fighting any signs of completing fermentation and is still going with a bubble ever 20-30 seconds. The hard lemonade finally kicked off and is not having a hard fermentation but it is going on a steady bubble flipping.

The Apple Cider however has completed all fermentation. I racked it and it is now clearing up faster than I had expected. The top 1/3rd of the liquid is a beautiful clearing amber color. I tried the liquid and was quite shocked. It was a very dry cider with one hell of an alcohol kick to it. I will look into sweetening it before bottling it up. I am ready to try the cider thing again only this next time I will be adding some raisins and we will be working with a LOT more sugar. I plan on using a yeast that will die quicker in alcohol so I can get a much sweeter cider. I really didn't taste the cinnamon in the cider so next time I will be adding a few sticks for the primary and remove them when they go to the secondary. I have to say that I am not all that pleased with the flavor of the cider it is living up to the name of "Atomic Rock Hard Apple Cider".

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

Hard Lemonade!!!

2/15/2011

I went to the brew shop and picked up a couple of 2 Gal. primary fermentation buckets and a few more airlocks. Yes, when I went in I didn't know what I was going to try next but I knew I was going to try something. My one year old, Katie, and I went to the grocery store after that. We had a few items that we needed to get so we strolled around looking for what we could turn into a brewed adult beverage. Walking through the frozen concentrates we saw some Country Time pink lemonade. My son, Jon, who is 10, had said he would like to see some lemonade wine. When I looked into it I found hard lemonade. I grabbed two containers and the rest of the list and came home. I ma not sure if two was over kill but this is the Great Experiment isn't it.

Here is what I added to the mix:

• One gallon of water
• Two tea spoons of Yeast Nutrient
• One tea spoon of Yeast Energizer
• LALVIN K1-V1116 Yeast
• OG=1.106

This is pretty much from a recipe off YouTube. Yes I do a LOT of research on YouTube. What is interesting is that the man that was giving the tutorial actually said he liked the K1-V1116 and when I looked in my little yeast bowl in the fridge there it was. I though if he had good luck with it I would try it. Anyway I don't believe in coincidences. I was really supposed to use this stuff. I looked up the yeast and it seems to be a good one for this. I highly suggest that you look into what yeasts there are and make a educated decision before you use the yeast. Simply put in the yeast maker and the numbers in Google. It is so east to get this info that a gecko could do it. hehehe.

Now unlike some of the juices that I have been doing I left this mixture in my 2 gal. bucket so I can stir it regularly. I am really concentrating on oxygen in the wines that I will be making unless the recipe calls for it to go straight into a jug.

Things that I plan on doing in the near future. Well, today while at the brew supply I placed an order for dried elderberry. I found a recipe for it and thought I would take a try at it. This will be a long and laborious wine taking a great deal of time in the bucket and months in being racked and re-racked. The recipe I found has taken 1st, 2dn, and 3rd place at different wine challenges. We will see if it tastes that great in about 6-8 months. Other than this I have noting planned but you never know with me. I wasn't planning on making hard lemonade either.

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

My Damn Reasons!

2/13/2011

I hope you can tell by the image I used today that I am in a playful mood. Some how that just sounds dirty so we will go with good mood, a very good mood. If you have been keeping up with my blog you will also see that I am trying to not only raise home brewers up to be something that they are and lowering the people who went to school to be chemists and scientists to what they should be. I have never liked over educated pricks.

My niece Lauren's reaction to my deciding to brew was to say that it seemed like a red neck thing to do. I assure you being a red neck is the last thing I am. I don't have a gun rack in my truck and I don't chew tobacco. There are a lot of other things that being a red neck I am not but I don't see the need to get into those things here and now. Maybe in a later blog post. What I realized when she said this is that the world has a bad view on home brewers. They think we do this only because we are poor. I can afford to go buy a bottle of wine from the store. Hell, we got a six pack of Corona from the store just a few days ago. I am doing this for several reasons. Let's take a look at that for a moment.

I am sick of being taxed on everything from groceries to my cigarettes. From my car to literally my pool. It is in ground so it is not a red neck pool, just so you know. They tax me for beer, wine and spirits. This year I took my tax refund from the federal government and put it into my supplies and equipment to home brew so I can stop paying the government, that can't curb its spending, money that could go to better use in my house. Again I can afford to go get wine from the store if I wanted to. I choose not to.

I know what is in my wine. I know exactly what has been in it. How long it was in it. And what is going to be in it. I know I have no preservatives. I have no carcinogens. I have nothing in my wine that I would not drink. I think that makes it a lot more healthy.

My family used to home brew. My grandfather homebrewed a great elderberry wine. My father brewed an ok rose petal wine. Even my step father has brewed a really good wine. So, I have been exposed to the brewing processes on and off through our my childhood.

My wife, Leslie, and I are trying to become more self sufficient in any way that we can. We are finding that by gardening we appreciate the meal more when it came from our own hands and sweat.

Lastly, this is all a great science experiment. I have been pretty open about that. I see every batch of wine that I make as a science experiment. Every home brewer should see it as that. Unlike the brewers for brewing companies we put our money where our carboy is. We lay our dollars on the line for what we THINK could turn out to be the one batch that is better than anything we could ever buy at any store or get at any restaurant. That about sums up the reasons that I am doing this.

I can't tell you the excitement I got when I taste tested my mead and it seems to be turning out to be, what I would consider, a great wine. I was literally glowing with a smile that is rare among people today. I beat the odds and am looking at a great wine. I BEAT THE ODDS. I can't express the word I in this more. I did it. Not someone from Yale. Me! The person who dropped out of High School and was a bum for a years. I did it. I consider it a work of art and plan on signing every bottle that I make like any artist, my nice Lauren is an artist, would do. I even have my fictitious company that I will place on the labels also. "Micro-Biological Chemistry" Seems appropriate since I have been pushing that idea from the beginning. Even before I started by first batch of wine. I am proud of being able to do things my grand father did. Things our forefathers did regularly. Things our ancestors took for granted. I, by making good wine, have elevated my personal status up to the ancient Egyptians who were very avid brewers. That is what it feels like to taste a wine you made with your own blood, sweat and tears.

Quick update on the watermelon wine I am making. I tried straining out all the pulp in the must today and realized that I really do only have about a gallon of liquid under all that melon and grapes. I put all the fruit back in my pale and went to my small yeast library, yes I have several strains of yeast at my fingertips. I chose Lalvin EC-1118. It has a higher tolerance to change in temperature and causes less foam. The less foam is what won it over for me. After the Cran-Apple incident I am a little shock shy on foam. I only have a couple inches of space between the must and the top of my pale so I don't want to deal with foam blowing out the top if at all possible. My O.G. was 1.086. According to my hydrometer that will get me about 10% alcohol content. Probably a perfect for it being a fruit wine that should be refreshing and not something to get you three sheets to the wind.

Well, that's all for now.
Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

What is a Chemist?

2/13/2011

We are all chemists if you really take a look at just about everything you put into your body that is not shrink wrapped or canned drinks. I am about to go make a glass of iced tea and I am not just going to pour my tea into a glass. I will add some lemon to it and ice to cool it off. There you have it. Chemicals added and a catalyst to change it from room temperature to a nice cool drink. No I do not add sugar to my tea but many do. Yet more chemical reactions when you do that. When I make coffee I add sugar and cream. Not only do I sweeten the drink but I change the density and texture with both the sugar and the cream.

Cooking dinner is the greatest act of chemistry. This is where you take base components and add them together to make something that is amazing. Taking that fish you caught or purchased from the store and adding breading then cooking it in a light olive oil and you have something that was never meant to be in nature. Thanks Giving you take a turkey and add stuffing put it in the oven and ONLY IF YOU ARE GOOD you get a very juicy and amazingly tasty dinner that will help you sleep. I think we as Americans don't eat enough turkey. Even making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich is an act of chemistry.

Everyone that prepares their own drinks and food are chemists. I think the colleges have diluted what is real chemistry. They want you to think you have to spend years in school learning what this chemical and that chemical can do and what happens when you add them together in certain circumstances. I totally disagree with these people! Chemistry is when you add two things together to make something different. WE DO THIS EVERY DAY!!! We are all, at worst, armature chemists! Maybe it is time we tell Yale and Harvard they have it wrong! They are raising people up to a standard that we all have the capability to do and we do it every day. I will bet you money that most of those chemists can't do what my wife does in the kitchen. I will bet you they can't make a pork chop that is as juicy and tasty as she can. In my opinion that makes her they better chemist.

Brewing is chemistry at a pretty high level. We really do take basic ingredients and put them through a complex process to make something that is so different than what we stayed with. We use single celled organisms and harness their abilities to do something really remarkable. We coddle our experiments and talk to them and hope that everything works out like we hope it will. Most of the time we are surprised to find out that we are better chemists than we actually thought we were. We as home brewers are able to do what brewing companies can't do. We can put anything into our chemical experiment and change processes and the environment to break out of the box to make things that are beyond what you can get off the shelf. What is surprising is that many of these people don't think they are master brewers when if fact they are. Am I a master brewer? No, I have not bottled anything so I have no claim to fame. Can I become a mater brewer? Yes I think I could over time. Anyone can if they think out of the box and work beyond what others do and make things that nobody ever though could be made. Making the same thing over and over is not the trade mark of a master brewer. Making things nobody ever thought could be made is that mark. Master brewers ARE some of the best chemists in the world.

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

Tired!!!

2/12/2011

Well, I just got through busting my ass. I have been dealing with just juices and honey on the batches of wine I have started. While great as starter wines I decided to step it up a notch. I think the only mistake is I didn't really weigh my watermelon. I think I ended up with about 10 pounds. I added everything else by directions and am now looking forward to the 12 hour mark when I can add my yeast. The recipe is below if you would like to try this.

• 6 lb watermelon
• 1-1/2 lb fresh table red or green grapes
• water to 1 gallon
• juice and zest of 2 lemons
• 4-1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 tsp pectic enzyme
• 1 crushed Campden tablet
• 1 tsp yeast nutrient
• wine yeast

For the watermelon I used 3 round melons I found on the rack at Wal-Mart. They were cheap, only being $3.00 each. I think the grapes were about the same price as one melon. I already had the lemons in my fridge. Leftovers from my son's science fair project. All the ingredients are extremely easy to get year round. That was not the work here.

Have you ever decided to take 3 watermelons and make them pulp? Not the easiest thing to do in the world. I brought in my wife's cake blender and that just got me sticky. I really need a shower. I used a potato masher I found in a drawer and that made things easier. I crushed the grapes by hand and that was an act of God if I have ever seen one. I have about two gallons of the stuff in my plastic food grade pale behind me. Top secure and an air lock in place. Waiting for the tablets to do their work and then allow me to add yeast and see if I am going to get liquid through my airlock again. Goddess! I hope not. I hated it when I started the Cran Apple wine.

One last thought, on the last entry I have a picture of the mead that I am making. I never let you all know that the image at the top was the actual mead. I was rather impressed with how well it turned out so I will be doing more images in the future. Also, the image at the top of this entry is the label I will be using on my wine bottles. I liked it and grabbed a packet of them. When I run out I will order directly from the company.

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

...And The Gods Smile On Me!

2/10/2011

Well, first fermentation has completed on my mead. I have racked it and tasted it for the first time. The aroma was disgusting. It smelled like honey beer. I can't tell you how bad that smell is. I know it is just the yeast that is still working but it was nasty. The flavor however is amazing! I was so surprised. The smell had me expecting that it was going to have a nasty skunk beer flavor. I was happy to taste a every sweet honey flavor with a nice alcohol kick. I think the whole experience will be almost spiritual once I wait for the last of the yeast to die from alcohol poisoning and clear the liquid to a clear nice amber color. I will also be adding some blackberry flavoring to this right before I bottle. Probably leave it in the bottle for a few months before serving this to anyone outside the family.

This is what really gets me going on things. When I just guess and it pans out. The whole mead experiment was guessing. I added more honey than everyone else was telling me to. I didn't use a hydrometer. I did not add any sugar, nuts, grapes, or anything. Just some water and a lot of honey. THIS IS WHAT IT IS ABOUT! Trial and error. This is what our scientists have been doing for centuries and still do now. They have a good idea what they need to do and they just jump in with a very educated trial. Sometimes this does not work. Sometimes they end up with something that amazes even them. :)

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck



As an after thought.

I watched the fermentation on the mead and I was getting less than on bubble ever min. So, I added the Potassium Sorbate and degasses the liquid. I will add something to clear up the liquid in two days, if I don't show any more fermentation. So, at this point I am four to five days from bottling the mead. I have to say that I am excited to get to the final point of this experiment. I can't wait to have an actual bottle of mead in my hand with a label on it. The finished product. An experiment seen to the end.

What would I do differently? I think I would add a fruit to the must for extra flavoring and I may have added some yeast energizer along with some yeast nutrient. Other than that? I may have only used four pounds of honey not the full five pounds. It is a bit sweet. :)

Microbiological Chemistry

2/07/2011

Earlier on in all this I called brewing Microbiological Chemistry. I would like to take a moment to quantify this.

Microbiology: the study of microorganisms, which are unicellular or cell-cluster microscopic organisms. This includes eukaryotes such as fungi and protists, and prokaryotes.

Now to make this work let's look at brewer's yeast.

Brewer's Yeast: Single-celled pure cultures essential to the fermentation process. Although wild yeasts are still used in some traditional beers, cultured brewers yeasts provide consistency and go a long way toward providing unique character to modern beers. ...

Now we have the study of unicellular organisms and you have yeast that is a single, or unicellular, organism. There is the microbiology aspect put into perspective. I love it at times when I over think something like this.

Now in chemistry we would add chemicals together to make something entirely different. Bored the hell out of me! Sorry Miss. Reed. You put me to sleep every day and that is why I failed. Now that I look back on those days too bored, I can look at brewing and see that I am taking fruit, sugar, and yeast to make something entirely different. The fruit is basically used for flavor. Oh sure, I use the sugar naturally in the fruit but I also have to add sugar. So much sugar that the fruit sugar is really less that 50% of the sugar content. Now, I take the yeast and add it. There is a reaction with the sugar and yeast. What is that reaction? Yeast eat sugar like a fat kid eats cake. They might as well be born with straws to suck it down like Fat Albert sucked down cheese burgers. They take that sugar and convert it into two things CO² and alcohol. I use the CO² to add to the bull shit global warming. Yes it just floats off into the air to add to the green house gasses. No, I don't freaking care either. The alcohol is what we are after. That and the flavor form the fruit. You get the mix right and you have a spiritual experience. Now in chemistry we would go for a reaction when adding the chemicals. The yeast eating the sugar and pooping CO² and peeing the alcohol is that reaction. Chemisrty!

There you have it! Microbiological Chemistry in my office. Little one gallon test tubes making three separate things and turning them into what will hopefully be a very good wine. :)

Keep it bubbling!
Chuck

Berry Blow Through

21/06/2011

Well, today I started another gallon of wine. No, I haven't actually made any wine past the first fermentation. Even the mead is still bubbling away. I started with 50% apple juice and 50% cranberry juice. I used Lalvin K1-V1116 yeast trying to keep as much of the fruit flavor as possible. Usually used to make white wine I decided to try it. After all everything that I am brewing right now is an experiment. Probably everything I will ever brew will be an experiment. I added enough sugar to bring my Original Gravity to 1.090 exactly. I did add a tea spoon of acid mix and a tea spoon of yeast nutrient. There, that is all the boring stuff. hehehe

I did finally see what some people experience. I had the foam blow up through the air lock and made a nice mess. I was working with my sanitizing agent and air locks. Every time I think I have it under control it foams up and attacks my air lock. I have replaced the air lock three times and every time the foam lowers down and I think it is safe to put on the next air lock and within 30 min to an hour it just does it again. I am kind of screwed at this point since I do not have a hose that I can attach to the bung and run into a bottle of water to deal with any over flow through the night. I don't usually go to bed early but my luck would have it that the night this is happening is the night I would like to sleep really badly. Well, you know what they say. No rest for the wicked.

I do like the smell of this must. I loved the smell of my cider but I was surprised how much I do like the smell of the cranberries. I will probably have to do a full 100% cranberry wine if this works out. I am not a real cranberry person. I don't eat them on holidays and really can't stand the idea of eating them even then. Yeah, when I was a kid I loved them but I probably ate too many one day and now I just don't want to eat them. I really only made this wine for my wife for when the baby is born. She loves cran-apple so I made her some cran apple wine. I am praying that the fruit flavors come through and it still has sweetness.

Ok, some updates on the other experiments I have going on. I have moved everything over to bubbler locks. I like these over the cylinder locks since I can count bubbles instead of burps. I am keeping the one cylinder lock I have for times like this when I have must foam coming up. More volume to them so they can take some of the foam without spilling. The bubbler locks are perfect for just watching the CO2 easier. The mead is starting to slow down quite a bit each day and by the end of this week I should be ready to rack it into another bottle and then we will look into clearing it up and bottling it. The Nuclear Hard Apple Cider a very nice and beautiful yellow and just a fizzing along. I just want this one to fizzle as long as it wants to. The piece of cinnamon has stopped flipping from the bottom to the top and I am fine with that. I am very concerned that there will be too much cinnamon flavor to it. Out of the three that I have going I can't wait for the NHAC. I will probably call it that on the label. Nuclear Hard Apple Cider. But I have a sense of humor also.
If the cider comes out as well as I think it will I am going to go buy two 5 gallon glass carboys and produce 25 bottles of the stuff. If I do this I will let it all age until Christmas and then pull out the whole bunch and go visit family. I will give away bottles of it and make sure everyone has some to during through the holiday. With everything my mother and her husband have been going through  since he had a bad motorcycle wreck they could probably use a few bottles to help heal the soul. My brother just needs to have a few drinks with me. We can use the holiday as an excuse. Guess I will need Leslie to be my drive home. ;)

Keep it bubbling!'
Chuck

Appuclear

2/05/2011

After trying the mead experiment I was not ready for what the Hard Cider would do. Now I really am calling it Rock Hard Cider. It started as a small leak of bubbles and then more fast than slow I could see white fluffy things floating around in the must. There was already a current to the liquid. Yes, even with one CO2 bubble making it out every few seconds the must had a current moving this stuff around. Everything doubled every hour. Kind of like half life backwards. Within four hours after pitching the yeast the CO2 gas coming off applgedon to start moving the cinnamon stick in the bottom of the jug.

This morning the fluffy things are gone and the only thing moving is the CO2 from all over the must to the top. The fermentation lock is begging for reinforcements since it is a constant bubble. Now what really gets me about this is that I have heard that full fermentation does not really start until about the 24 hour mark. I am 4 hours from that mark.

I will probably have to get a nuclear hazard sticker and put on the outside of this. Call it Nuclear Hard Apple Cider. Well with a projected 15% alcohol content that may be accurate. :) Wish my family luck since it seems I have nuclear wastes brewing in my office. We just don't have the nasty green glow.... yet.

Chuck

Brewing Full Blast

2/02/2011

Well, today I got all the supplies I will need to do up to 5 one gallon batches with 1 one gallon jug free. If I feel I need to do more I will go back to the brew supply store and get more. I blew a lot of money. To get totally set up with all the chemicals, jugs, plastic hoses, hydrometer and everything else came to a little over $200.00. Yeah, OUCH! I will have to make a lot of wine to make this worth while. Now that is not a problem. I toughly intend to do just that. Make a LOT of wine. Otherwise why would I even get started in this? I think if you are going to do it you need purchase everything you will eventually use. Why only go at it half assed? You don't.

I have already stated a new batch of wine. Well, a hard cider. I added a little cinnamon and right now it smells like apple pie. I know it will probably not taste that way but I am praying. I used Red Star Premier Cuvee yeast again. This is all is about making some rock hard apple cider. This is something I want to break out for the guys that think wine is for girls. That would be my brother David. Ok, I know he was joking but now he has it coming. I think a 30 proof beverage that has good flavor will be more than enough to get him off my back about making some beer. At this point I have no interest in making beer. I tried that about 16 years ago and I really didn't like it. Probably why I didn't do it again. I used some yeast nutrient and some acid blend to give it a little kick in taste. Well, since I have no reference I hope it will add a little kick. Who knows. The yeast has been pitched and the fermentation lock is in place. Now I wait for the bubbles to start. Wish me luck. :)

It was nice to use a hydrometer on this batch. Unlike the last batch where I just guessed and now I pray. That batch, the mead, is still bubbling away and shows no sign of slowing. Let's hope I hit the maximum alcohol levels. Yes on the first two batches I am going for broke.

Tomorrow I am going to start an apple cranberry mix. 2 parts apple to one part cranberry. I will not be going all out hoe to get as much alcohol out of that. I will be using a different yeast entirely and probably less sugar. This one is for my wife. I would like a nice smooth wine with a better flavor for when she gives birth to our fifth and last child. Something for us to quietly celebrate our new arrival later this year. :)

Until next post, keep the bubbles bubbling.
Chuck

Brewer's Prayer



2/02/2011

Our beer, which art fermenting,
Hallowed be thy yeast,
Thy time will come
Thy will be done,
In hydrometer as it is in conditioning
Give us this day our daily bubbles
And forgive us our test sips
As we forgive those who sip against us
And lead us not into unsanitation
But deliver us from skunkiness
For thine is the Ale
Thy Mead
And thy Wine
Cheers!

Found on http://www.homebrewtalk.com/

I thought this was great and needed to be passed on. Say it as you brew your... well... brew.

Chuck

Child's Play

1/31/2011

I don't know about most brewer's children and how the children view brewing but mine are not interested. I don't blame them at all. Science can bore even the scientists. I know being a Network Engineer there are things dealing with computers that can put me to sleep. Now, how do you make yeast interesting? You make it funny. And that is actually very easy when you put your mind to it.

I told my children that yeast eat sugar. At this point they pee alcohol and poop CO2. Yes this was probably over simplified and may not even be accurate but who doesn't like a good poop joke. Biological needs have always been the butt of a LOT of jokes. You get a few boys together and have one pass gas and see who doesn't laugh. Everyone will. Educational? Probably not. Getting their attention? Totally worked. I even broke out my fake Irish accent and would say. "lil yeasties are a peein in me mead." Even my brother that is about 38 or 39 thought this was a gut breaker. Yes he laughed his butt off on this one. Now my sister didn't think it was all that funny. She is a teacher in Alaska. And this is what she had to say about my comment.

"Only you could make something so natural seem.... unseemly"

Now did I really? Yes on the surface I sure as hell did and it was not the first time and will NOT be the last time. I have a very colorful sense of humor. But when you see that I actually got my children interested in what was going on and now they come in and watch the little yeast farts bubble up in the glass jug I think what I did was very educational. Funny but educational. Maybe that is the missing denominator. We have stopped making learning fun. It is a chore that most children do not look forward to. Now you take the making of alcohol from yeasty and make the CO2 farts and you will have the attention of every child, and a few adults, right then and there. You will also get giggles. You will get questions that some will really make you think even if you know exactly what is going on. THAT IS GOOD! Most of the time we learn from the people who we are teaching. If you don't you are teaching wrong. In my opinion. And on this blog my opinion is everything. :)

So, in closing do you have to make brewing dull and dusty like old ancient texts left in the tombs of Egypt? No! You should not. It is up to us to grab the imagination of the generation destine to take our place and make it think and make it wonder. When you think and wonder about something long enough you experiment and when you experiment you learn. When you learn you truly live. So by following this I breathed life into my children and in turn they gave me the only medicine that can heal everything. Humor. Go and joke with your kids about thing so complex that they could not possible understand in a way that makes them interested. This will sow the seeds that will reap the next generation of brewers.

Chuck

Mead It In!

1/28/2011

Ok, I could not wait for the Tax money to come in to start making yeast pee alcohol and poop carbon dioxide. Yeah, it sounds nasty but we have been drinking it for thousands of years. Anyway, I went to the local brew supply shop and picked up a gallon jug, fermentation lock, rubber bung, cap to shake the contents without spilling it and some Red Star Premier Cuvee yeast. That was a whopping $8.68 total. Yeah, it broke the bank.

I came home and sanitized everything completely. I used bleach mixed with water. I rinsed everything over and over again to make sure no bleach was left. I had 5 pounds of honey and I just added it all to the carboy and topped it off with water. The must is about 3 inches from the rubber bung right now. After adding the water I shook the gallon jug for 10 min. If you have never shaken a gallon of liquid for 10 min I suggest you do this. It will work your arms and hands. Mine are wore out. While I was shaking the must I had the yeast getting started. After the shaking was over I pitched the yeast into the must and shook it for another min. Added the fermentation lock and called it good. It is setting on my desk behind me.

I picked the Premier Cuvee because it has a high alcohol tolerance. That may sound really crazy but when you understand that alcohol kills yeast you can see why we need it to live as long as possible so we get as much alcohol as possible. Yeah, I am shooting for jet fuel on the first batch. Within the next 24 hours the little yeasties will start doing their stuff and we will see bubbles really humming through the fermentation lock.

Why did I decide to do a gallon of mead for the first roll through? That is easy, I had the honey to do it. I am concerned about how much honey I used since it usually calls for about 4lbs. of honey for one gallon, but I keep seeing people add more and more at the end to get their specific gravity up. I really didn't have the money for the hydrometer so I am working blind on the first try. I really don't have issue with too much honey. It will just mean that at the end of the fermentation I will have a little bit sweeter mead. That is if this yeast doesn't do its job and eat all that sugar and pee me some alcohol! :)

More updates later!
Chuck

AFTER NOTE: I was really concerned that I didn't get all the cleaning agent out of the jug before I added the must. I am glad to say that I have bubbles coming out. If I had not gotten it all out all of the yeast would have died and I would not be seeing bubbles now.

When Can I Have A Drink?

1/28/2011

I was sitting here thinking about what does alcohol go with. I think what I should have been asking myself is what does it not go with. Quite frankly I can't find anything in my mind that it does not go with. Let's take a small look at a few things or times that it goes with almost like biscuits and gravy. Yes, you can tell I am from the southern states in the US with that statement. :)

Lunch: You know we have been trained not to have that beer at lunch sine so many people decided they would just get drunk and go back to work. HOWEVER, when I was younger I worked for Mayflower moving company. For lunch we would go to a place called Soap N Suds. It was a place so close to the main office we could just walk there. You could do your laundry in the front, thus the soap. You could get beer and something to eat in the back, thus the suds. We would go there and get lunch and have a beer. I was not a big beer person back then and to this day prefer wine over beer. However, after working my ass off all morning moving things around in the warehouse that one beer was like the nectar if the gods. Yes, I was tempted every day to have more than one but I knew if I got drunk it would ruin this little trip that let me unwind from the hard labor of the morning. That ice cold beer was not just beer but something the actually refreshed me and made the first half of the day worth the pain and sweat I put into it. To this day when I am working hard and have a beer around mid day it makes me think of back then and the stress, sweat and pain just flow away. Amazing how one beer could do that when we have been trained to think it is a horrible thing to do to have a drink early like that.

Dinner: Please! We all love a excellent cut steak and a nice glass of wine or a cold beer. They go together like breathing and life. So I will not waste your time going further on this.

Social Events: I don't know about you but my favorite birthday was a couple years ago when we had quite a few people over and I had several bottles of wine and of course beer. That night I spent on the back porch with a hand full of the people who were there and my wife made sure my glass was never empty. It was cool enough that we needed jackets so my wine stayed cool and so did I. The conversation was great and the people even better. Yes, I drank in excess but it was not a frat party. You don't have frat parties when you are 41. You have a social event. And that is what it was. No I didn't drink so much that I regretted it the next day. I had just enough that everything will stay in my memory as the best birthday I have ever had.

New Births: Every child that has been born to me, and I have four with a fifth on the way, has been celebrated by myself with either a cold beer or a great glass of wine. Every one deserved that short time where I was able to enjoy something that took from months to years to create to appreciate what I had and what I had helped bring into this world. No it is not a great time to get hammered but it is a great time to have a few moments to enjoy what I have and think about what I will have. As a note on this one all my children are from the same woman, my life long companion and wife Leslie. Don't want you thinking that I am a total jerk. :)

I think a lot of reasons that we don't enjoy alcohol like our ancestors did is because of social dynamics. We have been taught that if you drink too early, too late, at this event or that event and even if we drink alone we are alcoholics. Or at least border line alcoholics. I think this is pure crap! You are an alcoholic when all you think about is where or when you are going to get your next drink. We have been taught that it is wrong to drink in front of your children and I really think this is total crap. When you drink responsibly in front of your children you let them learn what is responsible drinking. A beer after work does not mess up your children. Beating them does. Not being in their life does.

I think if you are working a garden you deserve a drink. I think if you have put up with the total crap that society brings and leaves on your door you deserve a drink to wash it off your door step. I think that society may have it wrong and that is a very sad thing. People are losing their past and sometimes it really can be found in the bottom of a bottle. As long as you are responsible about getting to the bottom of that bottle and you don't become one of the people who ruins it for the rest of us that actually see this as a sacred thing that should not be abused. Much. :)

Just my honest opinion.
Chuck

No Preservatives Needed?

1/27/2011

The more I look in my basement the more items I find with no preservatives. Last night I found some Clove Honey. Just pure clove honey, nothing added and all the crap taken out. We got this at Sam's Club. That's right! You could walk into Wal-Mart and walk away with the prime ingredient to make a very height grade and high quality mead. Wal-Mart of all places!

Tonight while we were making dinner our two year old, I call her Oogie, went into the basement and came up with a can of peaches. Just wanting to know what she was about to eat I looked at the ingredients. What did I find? Peaches, water, corn syrup and sugar. NO PRESERVATIVES. Nothing that could possible stop fermentation. Nothing that would inhibit the creation of a peach wine. I also found that the myth of being able to eat healthy is expensive is just a myth. We purchased these peaches at a store called Save A Lot. It is a discount grocery store.

I know what is going to happen now. When Leslie and I go shopping I will be looking at cans of anything that I could turn to wine to see what has preservatives and what does not. I think when the dust settles on this I will see that for years I have been eating healthy and I really didn't have to buy "Organic" crap for three times the price of what is on the general shelf. You know, maybe the whole Organic movement is just bull shit so people can grow 1/2 the crops and actually charge three times the amount. hummm.... I wonder who else has looked at food in this light before.

I guess the full and the short of this is take a good look into your local grocery and you just may find things that you never thought of turning into an adult beverage on the shelf begging for you to take it and make the Bio-Chemical processes take shape and make something that was never meant to be anything more, oh so much more.

Chuck

And So It Starts

01/26/2011

Well, I am waiting for my tax return to purchase all the equipment I will need to get started with my Home Brewing Project. Funny how I will be using tax money to keep from paying consumption taxes. Kind of means that I will be paying around $2.00/bottle of wine instead of $20.00. Makes me wonder exactly how much I pay in taxes on a given bottle of wine. I will also have complete control of everything that is in what I drink along with how strong it is. I am sure that many of you who do not brew will have no idea what is really in what you are drinking. Is your blackberry wine made from real blackberries or is it made from flavoring?

Over the years I have researched brewing wine. I have read things from people who are die hard naturalists to people who think chemicals make everything. I think they are both wrong. I think there is a happy medium of diehard naturalist and chemist. That is where I will be trying to tread. I guess you could call me a natural chemist. When I can use something from nature I will. When I can't get my hands on it I will turn to chemicals. However the bulk of what I brew will be natural.

Here lately I have really been sinking into my research of brewing wine and mead. I think the people who do this are mis-catagorized. Many people see them as rednecks, country bumpkins, or just plain cheap bastards. Yes, some of them might fit the descriptions above but I don't think the vast majority fit into this mold. I know I don't. Looking into this I have found that the people who keep track of what they do and how they do it are borderline Micro-Biological Chemists. They deal with yeast and basic chemicals to get a chemical reaction for not only alcohol but also taste, texture, smell and color. Just a little yeast, sugar and anything they can dream of. That really doesn't sound like a country bumpkin to me. They have to know how to calculate specific gravity of liquid to not only know how much alcohol to expect but to also know when it is time to move from one stage to another. They have to keep specific records so they can reproduce what they have found works and what doesn't. They do think just like a scientist. Almost identical to what a modern chemist does. And here is the kicker. They end up using more chemicals then a modern chemist does. Not the redneck listed above. As I follow this hobby I hope I can iron out misconceptions, myths and outright lies. I guess this is in a small way a quest for what the truth is.

My father brewed a little. So did my grandfather. They are both gone and I never paid any attention to what they were doing to pull information from that. All this is entirely my research and my hard work. Sure I will meet people along the way that will explain this or that but in the end it will be research and hard work that will make what will be my brew project. Oh poor me. All the work and so much wine to have to drink. Now that I think of it you may even get a few drunk blogs on this subject. hehehehe

Chuck