OK, so I think I may now have officially lost it. Well at least I'm not making wine out of onions or something crazy like that.
Goji berries, also known as wolf berries have quite the long history and as with just about anything medicinal from the orient there are claims it will make your penis bigger (Maybe not quite but something to do with sperm production). Hey Boner wine, why not :P
I started out with about 4 or 500 grams of dried berries. I added just enough water to re-hydrate them then I crushed them up in the blender. The result was about 2 litres of juice, pulp and seeds. (I think I'm going to save the seeds to see if I can grow the fruit here.
I added 1 litre of blackberry juice, 2 litres of honey and 3 1/2 litres of water. The end result was a specific gravity of 1.130. Pretty bloody high as the Goji berries are naturally full of sugar. unless you want fire water or deathly sweet Mead, you may want to try a little less honey.
As if using Goji berries to make Mead wasn't strange enough, I decided to try something different as far as yeast went. You see, I saved up some active yeast from the bottom of one of my blackberry batches and kept it in the fridge. Ya nuts I know.
src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js">
So here is the recipe
Start time: 4:30 PM November 14th 2007
Specific Gravity: 1.130
2 - litres honey
2 - litres re-constituted Goji berry pulp (AKA Wolf berries)
1 - litre steamed blackberry juice (Unsweetened)
3 1/2 - litres spring water
3/4 - cup Recycled yeast pulp
POST PRODUCTION NOTE:
Although this mead has a very interesting taste, both my wife and I found it to be far to strong. To remedy this situation, I started out another batch with similar juice and water proportions but with quite abit less honey and a lower potential alcohol level. Here is the link GOJI BERRY MEAD #2
So at around 11PM last night I realised my yeast experiment was not really working as well as I would have liked. Either that or I got pre-maturely impatient (The Kraut trait again) So I added 1 package of 1118 yeast and 1 teaspoon of nutrient.
ReplyDeleteI took a look at my Mead this morning and noticed the typical crust had formed on the top. Although there were not any bubbles to be seen, it appears to have started.
ok it is now 8:30 on November 16th. Typically this is the time I stop the fermentation, however, things were done abit differently this time around.
ReplyDeleteAside from the yeast fiasco, this batch of mead also started out quite abit sweeter. In addition, my furnace managed to crap out in the middle of this all so the temperature was slightly lower than normal and definately not constant.
The fermentation is moving along quite nicely now. The specific Gravity is sitting right around 1.096. I figure it should be ready by tomorrow afternoon, I will have to see what it is like in the morning.
As far as taste goes, this mixture of berries has quite the interesting flavour. I guess the best description would be similar to that of a very nice mild raspberry. This should be quite a nice tasting batch of Mead.
So at about 8:30 this evening the Specific Gravity of this batch of Mead was sitting around 1.066. Camparing this to last nights reading at about the same time tells me this batch should hit 1.036 by tomorrow evening at which time I figure I will stop it. At that level, the Mead should end up being around 12 or 13 percent Alc with some residual sugar left.
ReplyDeleteA this point 10:30 PM, I am really starting to notice the aroma and there is a definate warm feeling when drinking it. At 1.063 it is still fairly sweet but that will mellow by the time I stop fermentation. If I try this recipe again I will definately reduce the amount of Honey I add. I really should have measured the specific gravity prior to adding the honey.
At 2:30 PM on Nov 18th the specific gravity had reached 1.050. I know I said I would wait until it hit 1.030 to 1.040, the thing is, I started to notice a bit of a bitter taste so I figured I would stop it early. Since this batch was quite abit more seedy & Pulpy than others, I ran the mead through a stainless steel sieve to filter out the seeds and muck. I then took that muck and tossed it in the garden hoping it would grow into goji bushes.
ReplyDeleteI did my usual heat to 160F thingy. This time I wasn't overly woried about loosing a little bit of alcohol as it was already up around 12 or 13 percent.
The Mead was really starting to clarify nicely. I'm thinking it was running it through the sieve that helped that much more. Today, I decided to put some gelatin in the batch to help in clarification.
ReplyDeleteI came back from the post US Thanksgiving shopping fiasco to find my batch of Goji Berry Mead looking quite clear indeed. It seems this batch cleared up much better and far more quickly than any other of the past. Perhaps it was the choice of berrys or maybe it was the initial screening of the must. Whatever the case, the clarification was quite impressive. Of course it will need a little more aging as well as pre-bottling filtration before I put it away for a few months. Christ, I haven't even racked this puppy once.
ReplyDeleteI did an initial taste test and found this batch of mead to be quite different from anything I have ever tasted in the past. There is a definate underlying sweetness, however there is a nicely pungent aftertaste with a lingering sweetness combined. OK, so that is the best I could come up with, after all I did drink this mead with boxed pasta and Turkey... OK wine fanatics are gagging at the thought. At least it wasn't Kraft Dinner with ketchup.
I am definately looking forward to tasting this mead after some again.
I just racked this puppy last night and noticed the colour was quite light. Almost like a blush. Still tastes quite nice too.
ReplyDelete