Advice Urgently Sought...

[kmoorman]

I've been given something of a deadline to meet... my wife has kindly ordered half a pig for the freezer, but currently the freezer is pretty full of fruit.

I've taken quite a lot of it out to defrost in the kitchen, and I currently have:

Sloes - 21lb 14oz
Plums - 10lb 6oz
Blackberries - 10lb 3 oz
Elderberries - 1lb 1oz

Defrosting in the kitchen.

I also have 15 litres of lidl red grape juice and 4 or 6 small tins of red grape concentrate available.

Furthermore, I know there are at least:

10lb of bullaces
more sloes
and bags of elderberries still on the stalk

in the freezer.

I have 2 '6 gallon' and 1 '7 gallon' fermentation buckets available.

I also have about 5 of the '2 gallon' fermenters to hand.

what should i do?

I could get some blackcurrant juice and try a strong english port... is this possible?

I think I may have too many sloes... thoughts?

I'm open to all suggestions.

[Her Lushness]

Do you have a steam juicer? If you do, I'd suggest steam juicing a load of this fruit and then putting the juice into kilner jars to store...

One port recipe that I've done/am doing is this one: English Port You'd need blackberries, but you could use tinned ones instead of fresh, and a few gallons of that would take care of most of your fruit.

Not sure what you'd do with the plums except plum wine... plum and parsnip maybe


(what about fermenting the pig and leaving the fruit where it is?)

[kmoorman]

Update

I've had to make the children's dinner, so I've had to deal with the fruit to a certain extent.

I've split it into 2 separate fermenters as below:

6lb 2oz bullace (they weren't sloes!)
5lb 3oz plums
5lb blackberries
7oz elderberries
2lb sloes

per tub

so, that's 19lb of fruit per tub, which comes up to the 3 gallon marker.

Some are still frozen. I'm not going to do anything else until after the kids have had their dinner, now.

Kieron.

[kmoorman]

Do you have a steam juicer? If you do, I'd suggest steam juicing a load of this fruit and then putting the juice into kilner jars to store...

One port recipe that I've done/am doing is this one: English Port You'd need blackberries, but you could use tinned ones instead of fresh, and a few gallons of that would take care of most of your fruit.

Not sure what you'd do with the plums except plum wine... plum and parsnip maybe


(what about fermenting the pig and leaving the fruit where it is?)

I've got 10lb of Blackberries 'in the mix'... As I've said above, the plums are the fermenters, but they could still be removed, as they are easy to spot.

Kieron.

[Her Lushness]

DOH! I meant BLACKCURRANTS to buy, sorry, I've been shopping all day with the Mother In Law and I'm a bit delerious!

Check the recipe link for the ingredients.

[kmoorman]

DOH! I meant BLACKCURRANTS to buy, sorry, I've been shopping all day with the Mother In Law and I'm a bit delerious!

Check the recipe link for the ingredients.

I might pop out tomorrow and get a bottle of ribena to add to the wine after the on pulp fermentation.

[kmoorman]

As the fruit is in the fermentation bins, what should I do now? Pour over a little boiling water and mash? Grape juice and Pectolase for 24 hours and then start fermentation?

[fatbloke]

As the fruit is in the fermentation bins, what should I do now? Pour over a little boiling water and mash? Grape juice and Pectolase for 24 hours and then start fermentation?

Well I'd be just using cold water and the pectolase Kieron as you'd not want to have any more pectin to deal with than is necessary.

In any case, my memory says that you put the pectolase into cold water anyway as otherwise it's killed off by the heat.......

someone may confirm (or deny ) that.

regards

JtFB

[kmoorman]

I put the pectolase in at about 30c last night... is that too hot?

Anyway - today I added 1 small tin of concentrate, plus 3 litres of lidl grape juice and 1lb of sugar per bucket.

My problem is, what is the SG of it?

It's quite 'thick', so finding out the SG is tricky. It could be anything from 1060 to 1070 depending upon the consistency of the bit I put the hydrometer into...

Any advice?

I added 1 more tspn of pectolase earlier, just in case, and I won't have time to pitch the yeast until tomorrow morning ayway.

What I do need though is at least a rough idea of the sg, so i can add the right amount of sugar etc later.

Kieron

[Mamgiowl]

2 ways to do this.

First let everything settle then get a turkey baster, put it into the must where it's clearest and take some out that way. Method two is to strain a small amount out through a seive into a jug, strain again through muslin, clean tights (double layer) or similar, then strain again through a part of an old shirt. This last will be better if you can let drip overnight.

Mind if you've got a jelly bag you can cut out all the above makeshift ideas, and as long as you keep it covered it should be fine overnight.

[kmoorman]

2 ways to do this.

First let everything settle then get a turkey baster, put it into the must where it's clearest and take some out that way. Method two is to strain a small amount out through a seive into a jug, strain again through muslin, clean tights (double layer) or similar, then strain again through a part of an old shirt. This last will be better if you can let drip overnight.

Mind if you've got a jelly bag you can cut out all the above makeshift ideas, and as long as you keep it covered it should be fine overnight.

I have no choice but to leave over-night. You don't think it might need a campden tablet to make sure nothing 'starts' before tomorrow?

I'll go for the straining technique tomorrow.

Thanks for the advice.

Kieron.

[kmoorman]

i've measured the sg after straining and it's 1058 for each. Ideally i would normally bring it up to my final figure now (1100) in this case, but i am running short of space in the fermenters, so i've pitched the yeast now.

I've gone for a Gervin in one and a Burgundy in the other to compare.

I will need to add about 2kg of sugar or equivalent later to bring the sg up, but i'll do this once i've taken it off the pulp.

That won't be a problem will it?

[Mamgiowl]

I shouldn't think so, just add the sugar in small amounts over a period of time so you don't over-do it as 1100 seems a bit high to me.

[kmoorman]

possibly a bit high... I might have a rethink... I will use the total drop method for the alcohol content, as i'm going to add some ribena later.

[Zebedee]

1100 seems a bit high to me.

a bit ???

it seems alot high to me