Hello from Pakistan!

[Winemanic]

Hi there ladies and gents,

I live in Pakistan where drinking (for Muslims) is supposed to be prohibited yet many drink. There are government licensed liquor shops that sell locally manufactured beer, vodka, gin and whiskey. These shops are supposed to sell only to non-muslims but they sell to all. One can easily buy from these shops, however getting caught with it is another matter.

I started on this hobby last year. My first experiment was a sugar hooch followed by Ed Wort's Apfelwein. I now have two wines in the making. A red wine from grape juice and a strawberry wine from fresh fruit.

The dilemma I face over here is I do not have access to any wine-making supplies. I have to go the natural route and find substitutes, like in the strawberry wine, I used papaya peel for pectic enzyme. The biggest challenge I face is that I have to use bakers yeast, as ordering online is not an option available to me.

I hope I'll be able to learn a lot on this forum here.

Cheers!

 

[bkisel]

Welcome to the forum!

I sure hope your wine making won't get you in trouble with the authorities.

 

[sour_grapes]

Welcome to WMT, Winemanic. Best of luck in your efforts!

 

[Winemanic]

Welcome to the forum!

I sure hope your wine making won't get you in trouble with the authorities.

Thanks for the welcome Bill! As long as I keep everything within home I should be alright. They sure do not go around searching for people who might fancy a drink or two!

 

[Winemanic]

Welcome to WMT, Winemanic. Best of luck in your efforts!

Thanks Paul!

 

[JohnT]

Why is ordering online not an option?

I though you can get anything from Amazon, no matter where you live.

 

[BernardSmith]

Why is ordering online not an option?

I though you can get anything from Amazon, no matter where you live.

I think the problem may be customs and excise. I know that my college has had some ... um... interesting problems with students who are taking courses online from certain overseas locations who have had the books they ordered held up or destroyed by government inspectors as subversive and /or undesirable...

 

[BernardSmith]

Hi Winemanic - and welcome. Can you buy craft beer in Pakistan? If you can some of those bottles may contain lees that still have active yeast cells. Those cells can be washed and then cultured and that would give you some alternatives to bread yeast. In addition, fruit itself if unwashed (and pesticide free) will likely have yeast cells (the bloom on fruit) and again, you could - perhaps - try to culture those cells

 

[ibglowin]

Find some fresh grapes that have not been washed to death. Many wineries do not use any special cultured yeast instead relying on the wild yeast that somehow find grapes (and their skins) to settle on in the wild.

 

[dcbrown73]

Welcome Winemanic.

I love engineering and hearing how you go about winemaking with limited resources would definitely be of interest to me!

 

[NorCal]

Where there is a will, there is a way. Congrats to you for not letting others dictate how you are to lead your life. I started with a batch of skeeter pee (search forum) and was surprised on how easy and drinkable it was. Finding an alternative for yeast nutrient will be a task, but very doable. Good luck!

 

[BernardSmith]

Where there is a will, there is a way. Congrats to you for not letting others dictate how you are to lead your life. I started with a batch of skeeter pee (search forum) and was surprised on how easy and drinkable it was. Finding an alternative for yeast nutrient will be a task, but very doable. Good luck!

Hi NorCal, Find an alternative to nutrient would seem to me to be relatively easy - You can take bread yeast and allow it to rehydrate in a little water and then boil the water to kill the yeast. The dead yeast cells provide the minerals and the nitrogen the yeast need. You can also add raisins (if they are available)

 

[NorCal]

Another thought, PM me you address and I will send you a letter and I'm sure some of the 1118 yeast that I'll dump in the envelope will survive.

Reminds me of a story of this home PH.D. Biologist beer maker that wanted to get the special yeast that was used to make his favorite beer. He sent the company a letter requesting they send him some yeast in the included a return envelope. They sent the return envelope back to him, saying "we would never reveal our special yeast and to go pound sand". He was able to get enough yeast, that was present in their brewery, from the return envelope, to get his own colony started, which was his plan all along.

 

[Winemanic]

I think the problem may be customs and excise. I know that my college has had some ... um... interesting problems with students who are taking courses online from certain overseas locations who have had the books they ordered held up or destroyed by government inspectors as subversive and /or undesirable...

I can get mostly everything from Amazon and the likes but no wine making stuff as it is illegal here. They do have a brewery and two distilleries here, but they are licensed and highly regulated. The irony is you can easily buy their products, you only have to make sure the police does not catch you with alcohol!

 

[Winemanic]

Hi Winemanic - and welcome. Can you buy craft beer in Pakistan? If you can some of those bottles may contain lees that still have active yeast cells. Those cells can be washed and then cultured and that would give you some alternatives to bread yeast. In addition, fruit itself if unwashed (and pesticide free) will likely have yeast cells (the bloom on fruit) and again, you could - perhaps - try to culture those cells

Hi Bernard,

Thank you for the warm welcome. Never saw Craft beer... You can buy Heineken from the bootleggers though. Grapes have started coming in... I will try fermenting them naturally soon.

 

[Winemanic]

Welcome Winemanic.

I love engineering and hearing how you go about winemaking with limited resources would definitely be of interest to me!

Thanks! I will try and update how my planned red wine goes!

 

[Winemanic]

Why is ordering online not an option?

I though you can get anything from Amazon, no matter where you live.

The same way you cannot order cocaine from Amazon, I can't get wine/beermaking or distilling stuff - It's illegal here.

 

[Winemanic]

Hi NorCal, Find an alternative to nutrient would seem to me to be relatively easy - You can take bread yeast and allow it to rehydrate in a little water and then boil the water to kill the yeast. The dead yeast cells provide the minerals and the nitrogen the yeast need. You can also add raisins (if they are available)

I do use raisins as yeast energizer and boiled bread yeast as nutrient. The main problem is finding the right yeast such as EC-1118 or Montrachet (- these two are supposed to bear higher temperatures)

 

[Winemanic]

Hi friends,

After a warm welcome, kindly advise on my first thread on wine making here

http://www.winemakingtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=54061