#homebrewing
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Recently I've been getting into browsing r/PrisonHooch and seeing the awful brews people are coming up with. So I decided to make one of my own.
The Ranch Style Hooch
Recipe:
2 cans Ranch Style Beans (with Jalapeños!)
2 cups sugar
1 gallon spring water
0.25 tsp amylase enzyme
1 packet Lalvin EC-1118 yeast
Dumped the cans into a pot, filled them with water to get the residue, added to the pot. Then filled the cans again and dumped them down the sink (need to discard some water to make room for the beans), and dumped an additional 2 cups (for the sugar volume). Added most of remaining water to the pot, mixed in amylase enzyme and mashed the beans to get the enzyme nice and incorporated. This converts the starch to maltose (a sugar the yeast can use). Brought to a boil and added sugar, cooled in the fridge until it went under 100°F. Rehydrated a packet of yeast in the last remaining pure water, added the sugary bean soup, mixed well. Drilled a hole in the lid of the jug to add an airlock, so CO2 can escape and air can't get in. I tasted the beans before they went in and it tasted like a fancy bbq sauce... Shockingly good, malty taste.
Now to let this ferment for a few weeks. I'll post updates occasionally.
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Do you have the apple wine recipe? Thank you!
Sure thing! I'll do you one better, I'll give you my recipe for ANY KIND of fruit wine.
Please note, this will make approx 5 gallons of rather strong, dry wine. It will be about 15% ABV, and I encourage you to BE CAREFUL when drinking it, as it can be stronger than you expect.
Full instructions Below;
Supplies; (These are reusable items or materials which you use to make the wine).
(2) 5 gallon brewing buckets (or a 6 gallon food grade bucket. Regular 5 gallon ones are too small; you can use practically any kind of food grade container, as long as it's glass, stainless steel, or HMPE/UHMPE plastic). you can TECHNICALLY use 1 brewing bucket and 1 regular 5 gallon, cause of lees and other loss, but ehhh. Make sure the bucket lid has a hole to accept your airlock, and is waterproof otherwise.
(1) large plastic tub or container. I like big HDX totes for this.
(1) siphon (get the 24" one. just do it.)
(1) brewing airlock
(1) StarSan (sanitizer)
(1) hydroemeter and matchjing graduated cylinder (this is to measure the potential strength).
(1) waterproof baking scale
(1) pair of nitrile gloves
(1) 24" long stainless steel mixing spoon (ALUMINUM IS BAD DO NOT USE)
(1) Turkey Baster (New, Clean, Unused. Label it for brewing only)
(1) Large stainless steel, glass, or ceramic bowl
Theory (I promise to be brief here).
Alcohol is made when yeast eats sugar and oxygen, the byproduct is more yeast, carbon dioxide, alcohol, and what are called esters (complex aromatic chemicals). Not all yeast are made equal, and many thrive in specific environments, or make specific byproducts.
Some universal rules;
No Vitamin C, Citric Acid, or Citrus Juices. (Kills the yeast.)
No Juices w/ Preservatives. (You can use from concentrate, as long as there's nothing else in it).
No Artifical, or Non-Sugar Sweeteners (It doesn't work).
Nothing With a High Protein Content (Milk, nuts, etc. It will rot. Don't.)
Nothing with a lot of salt. (Also kills the yeast.)
Between 100-70F, for most yeasts.
Ingredients
5 gallons of fruit juice (any blend, any brand, any kind, follow the universal rules.)
Sugar/Sweeteners (I like dark brown sugar and unsulphured molasses, expect to use 4-6 pounds)
Spices, mixins, whatnot (see below).
Process.
Sanitize; You will need to make a batch of StarSan (read the instructions!) with warm water in your large plastic container. This is your sanitary solution. This will kill unwanted microorganisms. It is 100% food safe. Do NOT rinse or wipe sanitized items, if a sanitized item touches ANYTHING that isn't sanitized, it is no longer sanitized. You will have to sanitize everything except your ingredients, and that includes your hands, repeatedly, any time they touch anything that is not explicitly sanitized. To sanitize something, immerse it it for approx five seconds, and pour/let drip any remaining star san on or in the object. The residual star san is FINE. Don't worry about it.
Must; Pour your fruit juice into your brewing bucket (AFTER SANITIZING THE BUCKET). This will mix all the fruit juices you may use, this is vital. Meanwhile, put your yeast packet (UNOPENED) into your pocket. Trust me.
Measure; Use your turkey baster to fill your graduated cylinder, and hydrometer. Note (WRITE DOWN) the brix, and specific gravity. Use this calculator: https://www.brewersfriend.com/brix-converter/ to get the current potential ABV. Now, work out what ABV you want, by gradually increasing the brix, until it hits a point you'd like. Take those Brix, and plug them into this calculator: https://www.brewersfriend.com/chaptalization-calculator/ to get how many pounds of sugar to add. Measure that amount of sugar by weight, into your bowl. If you are using liquid sweeteners, you will have to work out how much sugar they have, by weight; that can take some math, but there are ways to find it online. Add that sugar/sweetener to the brewing bucket, and mix until dissolved. Take a second measurement, to confirm that the Brix has gotten to the correct levels.
Mixins; add any spices, or mixins you want. I am very partial to a half or whole cup of coldbrew concentrate, 2 ounces of vanilla extract, and a small bit of cinnamon (very small). You can add black tea, cloves, nutmeg, even citrus zest; just follow the universal rules, and if feasible, sanitize the material. If you can't sanitize it, it should be ok, generally, as long as it's visibly clean and free of gunk.
Mix! Add your yeast. You do NOT need to prep your yeast, save for to get it up to body temperature SLOWLY (put it in your pocket while you work). Put your sanitized lid on your brewing bucket/vessel, and shake vigorously. If this is not feasible, or you are not very physically strong, instead vigorously mix the mixture. Your goal is to aerate the mixture, to add oxygen, which the yeast needs for it's initial growth spurt.
Airlock; Add the airlock, write the Brix, and starting date on the bucket or on a small bit of painter's tape, and store in a room with a stable temperature, away from sunlight. 70-90F is ideal for most yeast.
Wait; Check on the airlock, it it's making bloop noises, it's fermenting. When it stops making bloop noises, or they seriously slow down, the fermentation is done. this will take approx 1-2 months, in my experience.
Check; Make your star san again, sanitize your gear. Open your brewing bucket. If you see mold, when you open the brewing bucket, you failed. Try again. If you see brown/crusty stuff on the sides, thats OK; that's Kroysen, it's normal. Use your baster as before, to check the Brix/SPG. It should now read near zero. If so, it's done, if not, maybe add a bit more yeast, close it up and wait a little longer. If there are any off flavors, make a note of them. that's not unusual, and it's NOT impossible to fix. Google the specific flavor smell or whatever, and you'll find suggestions. If it's rotten eggs/feet smell, see next step.
Rack; When it's ready as above step, use your siphon to siphon the wine from it's current bucket, to a second one. Do your best to not disturb the bucket before or during this step, as a lot of dead yeast has settled to the bottom, and we want it to stay there. This second bucket can be a regular, food-grade 5-gallon bucket; since you will be leaving some stuff behind, and fermentation is done. If the wine smells like rotten eggs, you need to "air rack" it, that means, when you siphon it, let the wine pass through a strainer or collander on the way out, or let it fall from a height, so knock out the sulphur dioxide. APPLE WINE WILL ALWAYS NEED TO BE AIR RACKED.
Enjoy! You can bottle it at this point, or do what I do, which is have a bucket with a spigot that I can grab a glass from whenever I feel like it, in a cool dark place in my basement.
For my apple wine,
5 gal apple wine
4 lbs of brown sugar
12oz mollasses
K1V-1116 yeast
And if you do choose to make your own wine, I implore you to share it with others, and also let me know how it goes!
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I also started a spiced cider, a mint mead and a lavender mead.
My brother-in-law got me fancy honey for Christmas, so of course I'm going to hooch it up!
#ketchup laser#kl brews#mead#lavender mead#cider#spiced cider#mint mead#home brewing#homebrew#homebrewing
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Reddit, why are you like this?
I suppose I should have specified that my homebrewing budget does not cover the cost of an 8400km round-trip excursion.
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Because the Nintendo eShop is being discontinued soon, here's a guide on how to homebrew your ds with detailed instructions.
When your ds is homebrewed you can access hShop, a site that contributes .cia files and kind of functions like an archive for games (tho you should keep in mind that this is not entirely legal).
I would recommend getting an SD card with a big amount of storage so you can enjoy your homebrewed ds! (You might need to convert your SD card)
Benefits of homebrewing are being able to customize your ds fully, having access to more functions then usual, having apps that serve as an AppStore (hShop or Universal updater) and just basically using the fullest potential of your ds.
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Redneck Brewing #34 (I think): Banana Tropical Smoothie Wine
Just got another batch of "sounds interesting and pretty cheap to make" grocery store wine going. This time taking advantage of the remaining yeast layer from that batch of Cran-Lingonberry Pineapple stuff. (Which turned out looking and tasting more like pineapple, mixing them half and half.) Didn't seem like the little remnants of that batch should actually have much effect on the taste of this one.
Those labels should be easy enough for English speakers to decipher: a fairly thick smoothie-like juice concoction that's pretty heavy on the banana, mango, and passionfruit pulp in a mostly apple juice base. Plus some generic "no pulp" (because that's what they had) tropical juice blend which has less banana, but also some pineapple and orange in the mix.
The results were better than I expected with that other similar tropical blend juice, and I know a lot of people really like to use banana in wines and meads though I have yet to try it. So, I saw that smoothie thing with the smaller bottles on sale (this 1L was actually full price but still less per volume unit than the sale bottles), and thought I may as well give this mix a try. Worst case, it's a waste of under $4 worth of juice and a little sugar. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I let the juice come up at least to room temperature before mixing this up. But, it can have a little extra warmth from that old trusty kitchen radiator tonight to hopefully help it kick off. (Again, it doesn't get over 25C/77F up there.)
With all that fruit pulp in there, I fully expect it to foam up like crazy, and lose a lot to sediment in the end. But, it should hopefully make for better flavor.
#redneck brewing#redneck wine#homebrewing#country wine#grocery store style#fermentation#alcohol#wine
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Hey Writeblr today’s Writing Question
Do you have any hobbies you gave your characters? What about hobbies you picked up from your characters?
I got into homebrewing after alot of book research for one half a dead witch. I currently have a batch of mint apple mead aging in my closet. This year I want to start brewing some basi, filipino rice wines.
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I forgot about making kombucha for a while.... 😳
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Bottled my traditional mead. It slowly fermented to a semisweet 13%. It should have fermented to dry 14%. As much as I want to use raisins as a yeast nutrient to keep it simple, it just doesn't seem to be cutting it.
It has a slight bready aftertaste, probably because the yeast refuses to fully clear and I don't like to use filters. But letting the mead air for a few seconds after pouring seems to help. Though not exactly what I was going for, I think it's tasty. But I can never tell if my preferences are average.
I normally wouldn't bottle this since the yeast could potentially continue fermenting in the bottle, but:
1. It has very little sugar left that could ferment
2. It's been sitting for months with almost no movement on the air lock
3. Most importantly, I'm planning on sharing this at an SCA event so it should all be opened and drank by the end of the week.
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got too silly and now im doing calculations on how to make a blood based alcohol
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monachopsis posting; i got a book based on the theme im going for and ive been taking notes and im having a great time
enjoy my blurry photo to avoid spoilers
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unattractive photo but… wound up getting 2 gallons of cider and 1 gallon of perry out of the apples and pears I processed today.
I did only a rough filter so a lot of particulate will settle over the course of fermentation & the final product will be much clearer than this. I tend to like a “dirty” primary fermentation, I think it gives the end result more body.
Using Lalvin 71B yeast for all three pots. I did not add any sugar as I thought they were already pretty sweet. Haven’t decided yet if I will add botanicals during secondary ferm… on the one hand, yum, but on the other hand, I kind of want the pure taste of my own trees for this first batch. I’m sure I’ll mull (no pun intended) over it for the next couple weeks and then make a split second decision right as I’m racking. Trust in the spirit of the spirits, I always say.
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@recoiloperated I upped the initial honey this time from 100 packs to 120.
2.4 lbs! *insert mad scientist laugh here*
All it took was an hour of clipping and squeezing.
The Lord's Mead v2 is coming along nicely!
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Started 2 x 2 gallon batches of peach tea wine using ec-1118 champagne yeast.
Ignore "water" markings, as they were used when initially preparing the sugar wash and are not indicative of the actual water content.
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Got another brew and bottle day finished, with the second batch of wheat ale bottled and my first shot at a New England IPA brewed! My buddy that helped me accidentally kicked over and broke my hydrometer, so we simply won’t know what the percentage is on either of these
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Latest Redneck Brewing experiment: Strawberry Hodgepodge Hooch, now underway!
Just bottled up another batch of easy mixed berry flavored cider out of that jug this evening, so I wanted to just go ahead and reuse the yeast dregs. The little bit of cider remnants shouldn't clash with this.
I had that carton of wild strawberry juice drink to try, so thought I might as well throw in what was left in that open bottle of squeezy strawberry jam--which is actually more of a smooth strawberry sauce with a decent fruit content. Better flavor than I expected. The rest of that jar of cheapo honey can go in there too.
I also ended up adding enough plain white sugar to bring the final ABV up to just over 10%, plus some pectic enzyme to take care of whatever was in the squeezy stuff. Another batch where I figured, "how bad could it be?". Now I guess we'll find out. 😅
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