The Brewery - LTT Homebrewing Community

[GOTSpectrum]

2 minutes ago, Wi RoZ said:

I finally decided to try to make wine from the grapes that grow in our backyard. Takes some more weeks before they're ripe enough and it's really not that much but I've always wanted to give it a shot . If it works out I'll post some pictures. Any advice in advance? Completely new to this so I hope I won't make my family mad by spoiling a few pounds of their beloved grapes  

Read up on how to do it, buy some campden tablets and use your own yeast! 

 

Many sure you get the right equipment, you'll need a bucket if your planning to ferment them with skins on(only for red grapes) or a fruit press and a demijohn/carboy.

[GOTSpectrum]

4 minutes ago, Wi RoZ said:

I finally decided to try to make wine from the grapes that grow in our backyard. Takes some more weeks before they're ripe enough and it's really not that much but I've always wanted to give it a shot . If it works out I'll post some pictures. Any advice in advance? Completely new to this so I hope I won't make my family mad by spoiling a few pounds of their beloved grapes  

Oh and CLEAN, CLEAN, CLEAN!!! then... CLEAN some more! 

[GOTSpectrum]

9 minutes ago, Wi RoZ said:

I finally decided to try to make wine from the grapes that grow in our backyard. Takes some more weeks before they're ripe enough and it's really not that much but I've always wanted to give it a shot . If it works out I'll post some pictures. Any advice in advance? Completely new to this so I hope I won't make my family mad by spoiling a few pounds of their beloved grapes  

If you have any specific questions feel free to pop them here and I'll try to give them an answer.

[Wi RoZ]

13 minutes ago, Ben Quigley said:

Read up on how to do it, buy some campden tablets and use your own yeast! 

 

Many sure you get the right equipment, you'll need a bucket if your planning to ferment them with skins on(only for red grapes) or a fruit press and a demijohn/carboy.

 

12 minutes ago, Ben Quigley said:

Oh and CLEAN, CLEAN, CLEAN!!! then... CLEAN some more! 

Thx for the advice. Cleaning will definitely happen, sterile worker here . They are red grapes but I have no idea what kind exactly. They're not that big (about 1/3 -1/2 of an inch in diameter) and round-shaped (not the oval ones). They taste pretty sweet.

 

EDIT

 

I think they might be labrusca's/concords. They have a pretty dark purple color and the skin easily comes of when they're ripe.

[GOTSpectrum]

3 minutes ago, Wi RoZ said:

 

Thx for the advice. Cleaning will definitely happen, sterile worker here . They are red grapes but I have no idea what kind exactly. They're not that big (about 1/3 -1/2 of an inch in diameter) and round-shaped (not the oval ones). They taste pretty sweet.

Get yourself a refractometer and you'll know exactly horrible much sugar is in them. You want to get 202-242g per litre. To get 9.9-11.6ABV respectively

[Wi RoZ]

1 minute ago, Ben Quigley said:

Get yourself a refractometer and you'll know exactly horrible much sugar is in them. You want to get 202-242g per litre. To get 9.9-11.6ABV respectively

Maybe I'll do that. Might be a little to professional for me though. The plan is to do it in an oldschool kind of way, without using to much modern equipment. The risk of screwing up will be a lot bigger though  

[GOTSpectrum]

Just now, Wi RoZ said:

Maybe I'll do that. Might be a little to professional for me though. The plan is to do it in an oldschool kind of way, without using to much modern equipment. The risk of screwing up will be a lot bigger though  

Refractometers aren't really modern or professional. They are really cheap. But if you really want to go old school get yourself a hydrometer. Harder to use, you need a bigger sample, and harder to read, but it's old school. 

 

Also here's a picture of my boil and first hop addition.

[Wi RoZ]

1 minute ago, Ben Quigley said:

Refractometers aren't really modern or professional. They are really cheap. But if you really want to go old school get yourself a hydrometer. Harder to use, you need a bigger sample, and harder to read, but it's old school. 

I actually didn't mean using oldschool equipment, wasn't clear about that sorry. I ment using simple equipment like they did back in Roman times for example. Craftsmanship and all that . But forget about that. 

 

I still have to study the concepts of crafting beer/wine but now that I've got the time I want to give it a go. Thx for your enthousiasmic replies  

[GOTSpectrum]

11 minutes ago, Wi RoZ said:

I actually didn't mean using oldschool equipment, wasn't clear about that sorry. I ment using simple equipment like they did back in Roman times for example. Craftsmanship and all that . But forget about that. 

 

I still have to study the concepts of crafting beer/wine but now that I've got the time I want to give it a go. Thx for your enthousiasmic replies  

No problem bud, glad I can help peak your interest! Cider is a good way to start as it's easy and cheap if you use super market juice.

[Wi RoZ]

1 minute ago, Ben Quigley said:

No problem bud, glad I can help peak your interest! Cider is a good way to start as it's easy and cheap if you use super market juice.

I'll first give that a try then

[GOTSpectrum]

1 minute ago, Wi RoZ said:

I'll first give that a try then

I'll drop you a link tomorrow to a good video to help you get started, it's late here and I still have 20mins left of this brew!

[Nup]

12 hours ago, Ben Quigley said:

What do you mean by "are you keeping the brew heated?" If you been throughout fermentation then I have a fermentation chamber that is temperature controlled.

 

My boiler is homemade from a HDPE bucket a kettle element and a temp controller I built.

 

Here's a few more pics for you, I'm just heating up to the boil now.

-snip- 

Yes. For the fermentation, if it was hot or cold. 

That is a nice bucket though! Would love to know more of the controller. 

 

Hope yhe brew went well then. 

[GOTSpectrum]

41 minutes ago, Nup said:

Yes. For the fermentation, if it was hot or cold. 

That is a nice bucket though! Would love to know more of the controller. 

 

Hope yhe brew went well then. 

Yes all went well, but took ages with it being my first in ages! Smells amazing now done and got 7% more efficiency than planned. Meaning instead of 1.058 I got 1.067. (7.5-8%ABV.)

 

I got damn close to my target volume though, maybe 1-2 litres over, so I'm happy with that!

[R00t]

My dad and I have been making wine for two years now.  

Last year we bought 5 different grapes from some guy that was growing close to us. Turned it into wine and its not that bad. We did some mix and some pure but the wine is only a year old so it has plenty of time to gain for flavor.

This summer we just planted a vineyard on our half acre so hopefully next year we'll have plenty of wine to make.

[GOTSpectrum]

1 minute ago, R00t said:

My dad and I have been making wine for two years now.  

Last year we bought 5 different grapes from some guy that was growing close to us. Turned it into wine and its not that bad. We did some mix and some pure but the wine is only a year old so it has plenty of time to gain for flavor.

This summer we just planted a vineyard on our half acre so hopefully next year we'll have plenty of wine to make.

Nice! I've yet to make wine from grapes directly, done from grape juice, and blueberries, Blackberries and even rhubarb. Grapes are rather expensive here so think I'll stick with juice. Do you own a fruit press or do you do it with your feet haha.

[R00t]

1 minute ago, Ben Quigley said:

Nice! I've yet to make wine from grapes directly, done from grape juice, and blueberries, Blackberries and even rhubarb. Grapes are rather expensive here so think I'll stick with juice. Do you own a fruit press or do you do it with your feet haha.

Haha, we haven't tried with our feet yet.

We do have a really old fruit press that we bought (100+ years) but its just to old to use. We just use our hands. Its tedious work so we were thinking about getting a hydro press but they are really expensive.  

 

[GOTSpectrum]

57 minutes ago, R00t said:

Haha, we haven't tried with our feet yet.

We do have a really old fruit press that we bought (100+ years) but its just to old to use. We just use our hands. Its tedious work so we were thinking about getting a hydro press but they are really expensive.  

 

Try building your own press, an A frame with a car Jack can work really well!

[GOTSpectrum]

Just a quick update, the beer is off like a rocket! Also check out the vintage hand blown glass airlock I have recently acquired!

[Nup]

On 2/9/2017 at 0:00 PM, Ben Quigley said:

Yes all went well, but took ages with it being my first in ages! Smells amazing now done and got 7% more efficiency than planned. Meaning instead of 1.058 I got 1.067. (7.5-8%ABV.)

 

I got damn close to my target volume though, maybe 1-2 litres over, so I'm happy with that!

A nice brew! What recipe did you use? Also the first time I missed up my gravimetric readings. So the alcohol came out at 11%, but I would guess it’s more like ~7-ish also. Live and you learn  

nice air lock! Very elaborate. 

[GOTSpectrum]

2 hours ago, Nup said:

A nice brew! What recipe did you use? Also the first time I missed up my gravimetric readings. So the alcohol came out at 11%, but I would guess it’s more like ~7-ish also. Live and you learn  

nice air lock! Very elaborate. 

I'll post the recipe tomorrow, but it's a Nottingham yeast so it will eat every last bit of sugar, I'll be surprised if it stops at 7%. I've got a 16% wine in the go atm, along with two lots of mead and my pear cider. Think I need to clean my press this week.

[GOTSpectrum]

13 hours ago, Nup said:

A nice brew! What recipe did you use? Also the first time I missed up my gravimetric readings. So the alcohol came out at 11%, but I would guess it’s more like ~7-ish also. Live and you learn  

nice air lock! Very elaborate. 

Heres the recipe, I made it up to use the bits and pieces i had laying around.

 

Grain

UK Marris Otter 5.5KG

175g crystal 60

90g flake wheat

300g black malt

 

Hops

50g Fuggles - 60min

27g Magnum - 30min

10g fuggles - 10min

5g Challenger - flameout

 

Mash at 67-65C

 

Sparge at 76,5C

 

yeast pitched at 23C

 

yeast - Nottingham ale yeast

[GOTSpectrum]

Over the weekend me and my partner went about pressing out own apples too make cider, theres a link attached too my google album with some photos. the process consisted of washing the apples first, then quartering them and using a grating attachment on a food processor to shred them. After that it was loaded into the fruit press and away we go. After four hours of work we had 20 litres of juice at 1.045 gravity, a very sticky kitchen and a happy composting bin. Then we sterilised the juice with a campdem tablet and the next day we pitched out champagne yeast. 

 

also I have two gallons of mead almost ready to bottle, a gallon of pear cider, a gallon of red wine and 5 gallons of stout. I have to say I am not looking forward to bottling day this month. How's all your brews going on?

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/cj3pPuxkFhEtRaei1