Not being one to walk away from something interesting I did abit more reading and came up with this little combo recipe. Actually, I was going to make Blackberry Almond Mead, but as I was getting it ready, my shipment of Blue Agave Nectar came in.
So here it is
Blackberry Almond Pulque
2 cups ground almonds
1 tsp Jamaican all-spice
Put in double boiler with 4 cups of water
Boiled for 1 hour
I filtered out the almond muck and
Added
4 Cups previously frozen pressed blackberry juice
6 Cups blue Agave Nectar
1 Cup honey
and remainder of water to make up 2 Imperial Gallons (8 Litres)
Specific gravity was at 1.085
The almond wine recipe said to let the must sit for a day prior to adding the yeast, so that is what I am doing.
See you tomorrow (OK, I must be loosing it now)
1 package of 1118 yeast
1/2 teaspoon nutrient (That is all what was left)
at 1:30 PM today I innoculated the Must. I am a little concerned about the yeast in that it really didn't seem all that active when I was soaking it. I did add some nutrient to the must though, so we shall see.
ReplyDeleteAs a side note, the colour of the must was just amazing, with the slight glistening of the ground almost and the purple hue of the blackberry it looed almost metallic.
At 8PM I noticed there was still no activity so I added another package of yeast and activity started within an hour. Beware the bad yeast... it is out there :P
ReplyDeleteFermentation has been abit slower on this batch. I am thinking this is partially as a result of the different yeast I am using. Since I ran out of 1118 yeast, I ended up using 71B-1122 (Also by Lalvin). The fermentation looks quite different in that the 1118 yeast produced large yeast clumps which would rocket up to the top, then drop back down again. Whereas the 1122 seems to do alot more of the fermenting at the bottom with less bonding of yeasty beasties. The yeast particles that do rise up tend to be smaller and less pronounced.
ReplyDeleteat this point, it has been about 60 hours and there is about 6% potential Alc left. In previous batches, it would be sitting at about 2% at this point.
OK, it's been a few days and It finally reached stopping stage last night at around 7:30 PM - 4 days of fermentation. The specific gravity was sitting around 1.030 (About 8.5 % alc)
ReplyDeleteI pastuerized the pulque at 160F for 10 minutes and transfered it back to the primary for cooling.
I decided to do something a little different this time. During the fermentation process, I noticed a layer of almond oil gathering on top of the pulque. This seemed to be hindering fermentation as it was effectively blocking oxygen from getting to the juice. The long and short of it, I saved the oil and poured it back into the pastuerized pulque. I figure this will work similarly to the bung as no oxygen will be allowed in.
No real reason for this except for abit of lazyness.
Oh ya, I forgot about the taste. The jury is still out on that one as I haven't decided on whether I like the taste or not... a slight tequilaish taste, but not as strong.
ReplyDeleteI just racked the Pulque for the second time. Clarification is coming along, it is fairly slow but not as bad as the Cranberry Mead.
ReplyDeleteI measured the Alcohol level and it was sitting at around 12%. By the time this is bottled, it should be a nice light rose colour.
An update on the taste, it is rounding quite nicely now. I'm thinking it will be great once done. The aroma is nice as well.