Blackberry Wine...Hedgerow Harvest

[Vossy1]

Are damsons meant to taste as sour as sloe's

I collected some of each like DaaB, they're mixed, but one type is definately larger than the other and both are incredibly sour

[Vossy1]

Cheers DaaB...I think I need a book on the subject

[Vossy1]

Well today came the time to remove my lovely fruit elixir from the must (berry pulp and what not).
So the first thing to do was to clean and sanitise a bucket and muslin bag to collect the fruity liquid.
Then we poured the contents of the bucket containing the berries and liquor into a fine muslin bag leaving the partially crushed berries, seed and anything else behind in the bag.



Then we placed 1.5kg of sugar into the demijon



Then we added the collected fruity juice to the sugar and filled the demijon to the shoulders. We filled our dj's with C02 prior to filling to prevent any possible oxidation of the liquor, even at this early stage. You can get round this without C02 by running the fruity juices down the sides of the dj.
Then shake/roll the demijon to dissolve the sugar, or as much as possible of it

Alternatively you could add the sugar to the bucket prior to filling the dj. I don't do this as the sugar never completely dissolves and you end up with stronger wine from the dj's that were filled from the bottom of the bucket where all the undissolved sugar fell to
You may notice a sieve also. We use this as it traps any fine berry pulp which gets through the muslin and you'd be surprised how much gets through



We did a 2 gallon batch initially but due to the displacement of the sugar and our juicy berries we had enough to fill 3 demijons



We placed the airlocks on the demijohn and after initial vigorous fermentation we'll top up the demijon with the surplace juice we collected in the fourth demijon.

It is recommended to place coloured fruit wines into black demijons, as they can lose there colour if exposed to light. This is'nt a concern to me as the wine will be fermenting in the dark, but when it comes out of the cupboard the dj will be going into binbags JIC

Here's a quick look at the under stairs cupboard with a selection of last years wines....orange, grapefruit and elderflower, hmmm, I wonder if any are ready

[Duffbeer]

Cheers J_P...I'm still uncertain though. I just had a look at these pics and though the fruit shown even has the same orange type fungus appearance on its skin the fruits I saw toda were not grouped together.
There was one every 6 or so inches along the branches alomost directly on the branch as well

http://www.pmstudios.co.uk/environment/ ... 7830w.html

Vossy the're damsons and make a cracking wine...


Happy brewing

Karl.

oops way too late ,lol.

[Vossy1]

Just a suggetstion Vossy, why not put some tube on the tap and push it through the sugar to save on purging with co2 a splashing into a funnel.
Brewers sugar dissolves easily in cold liquid and so does icing sugar to save on rolling the fermenters around. You can turn granulated sugar into icing sugar by blitzing in a liquidiser

All good advice DaaB, but I'm just a collector of photo's and a chipper in on this one
Swimbo asked me what I was doing sanitizing the dj's.....wasting time was her opinion
Honestly Daab, I'm semi paranoid about cleanliness and good practice, but when it comes to wines swimbo has years of not one bad result and I can't argue/discuss it with her

What you doing that for...wasting more time, it'll be alright just give it to me and stop faffing about and she's always right

We....she did a strawberry wine last year, I went to segregate the must from the liquor and there was green and white mould all over the surface.
I looked at it in disgust...swimbo, she stuck her fingers under it and whipped it out...what you worrying about....and the wine.....lovely

It made me more relaxed about my own sanitation methods...as long as everything within reason is dead

[Bigster]

Good work vossy household

I have a more relaxed attitude to sanitising/sterilising when making wine. I tend to pick my elderberries beginning of sept so all berries fully ripe ( slightly off ripe can be very harsh ) and use the old afro comb approach to getting the little blighters off the stalks when I get home

[Vossy1]

I tend to pick my elderberries beginning of sept so all berries fully ripe

It's been a strange year for elderberries. Trees getting direct sunlight have been dropping their berries for the last 2 weeks round here, on some trees they're all on the floor and the tree is bare.
Usually your looking at Sept, not mid August like you said

Yet on others the berries are still green...just need to know where to look I guess...it makes you feel all hunter gatherer

And it's free....yey

[Vossy1]

Would they be white

[Bigster]

why do you think my hat is so big

[Vossy1]

[Vossy1]

Sloes on the other hand are bitter in the extreme and taste as it they will strip the enamel from your teeth

They're definately sloes then

it's a shame they aren't Damsons as spirits aren't my thing but a Damson wine sounds nice.

Damson wine does taste nice. You could always have a go at sloe wine.
I'm going to because I'm intrigued how something so bitter can produce a nice wine

[oblivious]

Hi Vossy1

What type of yeast are you using ale or wine

[Vossy1]

What type of yeast are you using ale or wine

Hey O,

Were using wine yeast and at present that includes Gervin #3 and Gervin varietal D
D is apparently good for beaujolais type wines, hence it's being used in the red type fruit wines.

[oblivious]

I was thinking of using Gervin No5 for my next cider and wanted to see what people opinion of these wine yeasts

[Bigster]

Vossy sloes make superb wine but can be a little tricky to clear so use plenty of pectolase / pectic enzyme.

Also they should be picked in the autumn ( after the first frost apparently) when they are fully ripened

edit - Just seen daabs post - sorry to repeat