I've just had yet another plastic handle break on one of my 5 gall plastic fermenters, but luckily I still have 2 spares. Some of my fermenters are now getting rather old and the plastic D handles are regularly snapping. These replacements aren't advertised as being available anywhere, but there is a way of obtaining them free of charge (my favourite price). If you need any, PM me for details of hoe to get them delivered completely free of charge as I don't want to post details on open forum.
1.5L Cartons of AJ reduced to 49p (32p/L) this weekend 8 & 9th July at Lidl, half the price of Tesco value AJ, max 6 per transaction Vitafit Apple Juice - at Lidl UK
In addition to a further 2 x 1 gall batches for making sparkling wine, I also ut on another 6 galls of cider yesterday taking production up to 83 galls in 25 days. Must stop now as everthing must be fermented out, fined and stored away before daughter returns in under 5 weeks.
I try and get everything fermented down to 0.990 then use 2 part sachet finings to get it finished and cleared in about 2 weeks. Must slow down a bit as I've only got sufficient heavy duty racking to store 90 x 1 gall glass demijohns. P.S. Blackberries are now ripening round this way, another distraction together with the yellow cherry plums that'll be ready in a week or so.
The first Cherry (Mirabelle) Plums on the local hedges are now ripe enough to use for wine making. I wait until they are falling off to ensure they're ripe enough and low in acid. 4 lbs/5L of red plums (you need to extract colour from the skins) for a darkish rosé and slightly less yellow ones for a white wine. Will only make a gallon of each as I don't like the faff of pulp fermentation. NB Weights are before stoning.
Started another batch of strawberry jam wine this week, with the yeast going in on Tuesday night - by yesterday morning it was going absolutely ballistic! I tried putting one of the other style airlocks onto it (the taller S shaped one), and it glugged away for a couple of minutes and then stopped......... then the whole vessel started to lean to one side - it was literally inflating!! In the end, I drained off about half a gallon of fluid just to give some more headroom, which seemed to do the trick in as much that it went back to vigorous bubbling. I don't understand why the last batch was so slow to get going and this batch has gone completely mental?
Put on a 5L batch of red plum wine a couple of days ago in a bucket and another 6 galls of cider this morning which will be my last untill I press more apples later in the year (need the later ripening cookers). Found some 9 year old bottled apple juice at the far end of the understair cupboard but it has oxidised - I always sniff each bottle before pouring into a fermenter and if it doesn't seem right, pour a small amount into a wine glass for examination. Waiting for the local yellow Cherry Plums to ripen before making anything else. More oxygen in this batch, warmer weather, preservative in one lot of jam, old/incorrectly stored yeast? I've noticed that the new round shaped Tesco 5L bottles aren't as sturdy as the old rectangular ones and lean.
I'm wondering if I forgot to put yeast nutrient in the last batch - it would be unlike me not to, but it is possible. Sainsburys still to the square ones if it helps @Scrungee
Thst reminds me, I forgot to mention another possoble cause, adding Potassium Sorbate or Sodium Metabisulphate by mistake in lieu of Yeast Nutrient If you have tubs of these next to your yeast nutrient it's a good idea to mark them distinctively.
I use campden tablets, so no risk of getting them mixed up - the more I think about it, the more I think I forgot to add the nutrient, not least as I bought a 1kg bag a wee while back and remember thinking that I would get it as I only had enough for one more batch of wine - and I used the last of the tub with this current batch. Oh well, you live and learn.
Looks like I'm going to be making some Greengage Wine, 5.5 Kg for £1.10 sounds better than visiting the local Greengage clump, a 10 mile detour and shaking them down from wet trees then scrabbling around in the Stingers underneath for a bag of wasp eaten scabby fruit.
WTF have lions got to do with wine making? Read on ... A pride of 10 lions have moved into the area where our daughter is on a uni field trip in Tanzania, killing one ranger, seriously injuring another, and 2 others escaped when their tent was attacked only 1km from where she is camping. After finding lion tracks around her campsite everybody has been evacuated. So what has that got to do with winemaking? Well, now for the really scary bit, it means she's flying back early, possibly tomorrow and I still have 5 x six gallon batches of wine and cider all over the floor in her bedroom, one of them still bubbling away and I need to organise an emergency massive de-gassing, fining and racking off session today and get the whole lot cleared away before leaving for the airport so she's none the wiser about my using her room as a winery whilst she's been away
Got all that wine away in time, phew. Picked 16lbs 8ozs of yellow Cherry Plums this morning, ripe, fallen ones from off the ground that shouldn't be high in acid, but I find yellow Cherry Plums have less flavour than red ones so I'll be using half a can/gall of that half price Tesco White Grape Concentrate I bought when it was being sold off cheap. Just need another 1lbs 8ozs for a 6 gall batch using 3lbs/gall, thought filling 2 of my buckets that hold 9lbs Blackberries if filled to the brim would do the job, but unfortunately around 8lbs of plums is all they'll hold, size of fruits, air content, etc., etc. With each one only Cherry size, that's a lot of Plums to stone! Every one must get stoned.
