Hedgerow fruit queries (elderberries, sloes)

[modofodo]

I have some elderberries and sloes.

I have not managed to get myself one of they fangled steam juicers yet, however I am considering making a purchase from westfalia.

Can sloes be steam juiced? If they can I'd imagine that will be an easier job than messing about with all the gritty sludge and sediment I had to do last year! I am not a gin drinker so sloes = wine to me.

With regards to the elderberries, I was going to crack on and mash em the old way, but checking my supplies the only suitable yeast I have is Lalvin ICV-K1 (V1116). I assume as this is for fruit based ferments it will be ok? I presume if I had a steam juicer I could look at RC 212 or 71B? I know in theory all 3 and even EC 1118 would work but just interested in most suitable?

TIA

[goldseal]

K1V-1116 is a Swiss Army Knife yeast - it'll ferment anything.

It is good for reds and whites, and will be fine for elderberries (I know, I have tried).

From all the yeasts you have listed, I would pick K1V. RC212 is good for reds too, but can be a bit 'needy' nutrient-wise.

[fatbloke]

As Pete says, there's the obvious ones, but any of the yeasts that have been isolated from "reds" would also be good.

If you look at the Lallemand yeast list you'd see a lot of yeasts, showing various properties.

The problem is that a lot of them aren't normally available (especially in the UK) in home brew sized packs, hence it can often be better, for a better selection to mail order in advance, and I usually link "morewine" and their Lalvin/Lallemand yeast list.

Obviously it takes a bit of research to work out which one is gonna work best, and a bit of "prep" to mail order, but they do have one of the largest ranges available for home brew size packs (it appears that they repackage some of the commercial strains into the smaller packs).

Hence I'd propably go with Petes suggestion of K1V, as his "Swiss army knife" analogy is excellent - but the links show that there are other alternatives as well.

I don't recall which type of acid sloes contain, but if it's malic, then 71B would also be good as it metabolises malic acid.

Oh and a couple of pages back in the morewine link, and you'll also find Redstar yeasts listed but as yet, I haven't found as much data on those as is available for Lalvin/Lallemand ones........

regards

jtfb