November 2013 Wine of the Month Club

[Jericurl]

Ok,
I'm starting a new thread for those participating in the November Wine of the Month Club. The previous thread was not titled as such and could hamper attempts to search for it in the future
Post your recipes, any updates and/or photos, and at the end of the month we will all post a summary of what we could have done better on a particular batch (and how), something that went very well, and something that was learned.
Posting the experience gained is not a requirement, but I think it will help a lot since most of us that are participating are beginners. It is also a way to keep positive and look back and see how much we have learned.


ETA:

Jericurl.....Chocolate Cranberry Habanero (I need to come up with a cool sci/fi-fantasy name for it)

Rayway.....Hot Pepper

LoneStarLori.....Strawberry Chocolate

Stressbaby.....Lime Ginger

Winenoob66.....Sugar Wash (bacardi mixer experiment)

Reefman.....Candy Cane/Peppermint Patty

Buckhorn.....Pumpkin Pie Wine

Elmer.....Chocolate Raspberry Wine

 

[Jericurl]

Chocolate Cranberry Habanero

Chocolate Cranberry Habanero

1 gal craberry juice
4 oz crushed cocoa bits
2 cans grape/cranberry concentrate
1 cup Hershey’s special dark cocoa
1 tsp tannin
1 tsp yeast energizer
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1 tsp pectic enzyme
1/2 habanero pepper
1 campden tablet
2 lbs sugar
SG @ 1.12
pitched Lavlin EC 1118 on 11/12/13

Total amount of extra water added to batch was probably a little less than a quart. I expect a lot of lees to drop out of this one so I wanted to end up with a little over a gallon. From what I understand about adding chocolate, it will continue to drop a significant amount of material for quite awhile. After I siphon off to secondary, I will put any overage amount in a mason jar and in the fridge. At each racking, I will add from this jar so as to keep a full gallon of the wine.
I will need to find out how long I can keep the overage amount in the fridge and/or if freezing will be an option. Does anyone know? I'd really rather not top up with a different type of wine.

I purchased two 3.5 oz Lindt Supreme Dark 90% cocoa bars.
When I transfer to secondary, I'll taste the wine and see how much chocolate comes through and I may add a few pieces of the bars at that time as well.

 

[the_rayway]

Raelene's November Wine - Hot Pepper

Re-posted from our original thread.

I've heard all kinds of wonderful things about hot pepper cooking wine, and just had to give a try to making my own. I'm hoping this will take the place of my hot pepper oil - which is very labour intensive, only lasts for a month in the fridge, and is never quite as hot as I would like it to be. My family likes it spicy, but I played it fairly conservative for my first batch as I wan't sure what the ferment would do to the hotness of the peppers. And they were HOT this year!

Ingredient List
- 4L pure apple juice
- .5 tsp pectic enzyme
- 1 tsp yeast nutrient
- .25 tsp tannin
- 1 campden tab
- .25 tsp bentonite
- sugar to 1.104
- k1-V1116 yeast
- 2 cayenne peppers, split, with seeds
- 4 habanero peppers, split, no seeds

10.28.13
- Chucked everything into the primary except yeast and pectic enzyme.
- Stirred like mad until the sugar was dissolved.
- O.G. 1.104

10.29.13
- Added Pectic enzyme.
- Stir.

10.30.13
- Pitched yeast

10.31.13-11.3.13
- Stirred like a mad thing a few times per day. Decent foaming action during fermentation.
- Had to be very careful, as the gas that came up burned the eyes, nose, and throat because of the hot peppers.

11.4.13
- 'Racked' to a 1 gallon carboy (i.e. dumped through a strainer to get chunks out)
- S.G. .999

FYI, every time I see the words "November Wine" it immediately translates into "November Rain" in my head. I've been singing or humming it for several days now.

 

[LoneStarLori]

Nov 2013 Strawberry-Chocolate (Jack Kellers recipe)

Strawberry-Chocolate Wine

I set out to make onion wine for the wine of the month Club, but started going through my 'I wanna make this' file and decided to start with the Chocolate strawberry from Jack Keller. Because this needs a year to become it's best, I thought I would bump it up so I can give it as gifts next Christmas. This is Jacks recipe from his website.


4 pounds sliced ripe strawberries (frozen sliced have best ripeness)
4 oz Dutched cocoa powder (I ordered some from Amazon to be sure it was Dutch)
11.5-oz can Welch's 100% Red Grape frozen concentrate (couldn't find Welches but our local grocery brand appears to be red grapes since the ones on the can are red and they also have a can with purple grapes)
1 1/2 lb finely granulated sugar (I sprung for pure cane)
2 tsp acid blend
1 1/4 tsp yeast nutrient
1/8 oz powdered grape tannin
1 finely crushed and dissolved Campden tablet
5 pts water
1 pkt Gervin Wine Yeast Varietal B, or Lalvin 71B-1122 ( I used Lavlin 71b-1122)


If using frozen strawberries, thaw. In a primary, pour into a fine-meshed nylon straining bag and tie closed. Do not mash.

Measure the Dutched cocoa powder (see Dutched Cocoa Powder, my February 5th, 2012 WineBlog entry for background on Dutched cocoa powder) in dry ounces and add to one pint of warm water in a blender, pulsing until thoroughly mixed. Add tannin, acid blend and yeast nutrient and pulse again to ensure all are well mixed and then set aside.

Pour the sugar over the strawberries and pour the boiling water over the sugar. Stir very well to dissolve sugar. Add the thawed grape concentrate and stir again to integrate. Finally, add the cocoa water while stirring and continue stirring for a full minute. Cover the primary and set aside to cool to room temperature.

When cooled, add activated yeast in a starter solution and cover primary. Punch down the bag of strawberries several times a day, checking their condition after several days. When they start looking thoroughly ravaged by the yeast (about 4-5 days), remove the bag and hang to drip (do NOT squeeze) to extract readily available liquid (I hang the bag from a kitchen cabinet door handle with a bowl underneath for about 20-30 minutes). Add dripped liquid back to primary and cover primary. Discard the strawberry pulp.

When the vigorous fermentation slows, transfer to secondary and attach an airlock. Do not top up. Allow fermentation to finish and rack, adding the finely crushed and dissolved Campden tablet and then top up. Set aside in dark place for 60 days and rack again; top up with distilled water (this will not noticeably affect the flavor or alcohol level). Return to darkness another 60 days and rack again, topping up as before. Set aside in darkness 4-6 months to bulk age. Rack if required, bottle and age an additional 6 months before tasting. Yes, it is a protracted process, but well worth it. [Jack Keller's own recipe]

The resulting wine is full-bodied and delicious, the marriage of strawberry and chocolate perfect. To retain color, this wine is best bottled in dark glass and cellared in darkness or very low light. It should be consumed within a year -- two years at most.

There is a mention of boiling water in the recipe, but it isn't clear whether it is part of the 5 pts in the recipe. I decided to use 4 1/2 pts in addition to the one used for the chocolate blending.
My starting SG was 1.095 but I measured it after adding the chocolate which was rather thick so I don't know if that affected the reading. My taste buds tell me it was probably a solid 1.09+. I added everything on day one except the campden as the recipe stated.

 

[Stressbaby]

Copied from original thread:

Lime-Ginger
8 limes, rind and juice (this batch had 2 store-bought limes and 6 large Persian limes from my greenhouse)
1 can Welch's concentrate
30g chopped fresh ginger root
30g crystallized ginger
1# 10oz sugar
1t yeast nutrient, divided additions
1/4t tannin
1t pectic
3.75 quarts water
D47 yeast

Zest and juice fruit. Chop ginger, at to 1 pint water, bring to boil. Strain water into primary, add ginger back to pot and add another 1 pint water. Bring back to boil, simmer 1 hr, then strain water into primary. Add zest, juice, tannin, sugar, water, 1/2 nutrient, grape concentrate. When cool, 1t pectic. After 12 hours, yeast starter. Keep fermentation temp down to 20C (I do this by putting the bucket in a larger bucket and putting 2-4 ice packs in between the two buckets, changing out every 12 hours or so). Add second half teaspoon nutrient at around 1/3 sugar depletion. At 1.010 move to secondary, then usual care after that.

 

[LoneStarLori]

Copied from original thread:

Lime-Ginger
8 limes, rind and juice (this batch had 2 store-bought limes and 6 large Persian limes from my greenhouse)
1 can Welch's concentrate
30g chopped fresh ginger root
30g crystallized ginger
1# 10oz sugar
1t yeast nutrient, divided additions
1/4t tannin
1t pectic
3.75 quarts water
D47 yeast

Zest and juice fruit. Chop ginger, at to 1 pint water, bring to boil. Strain water into primary, add ginger back to pot and add another 1 pint water. Bring back to boil, simmer 1 hr, then strain water into primary. Add zest, juice, tannin, sugar, water, 1/2 nutrient, grape concentrate. When cool, 1t pectic. After 12 hours, yeast starter. Keep fermentation temp down to 20C (I do this by putting the bucket in a larger bucket and putting 2-4 ice packs in between the two buckets, changing out every 12 hours or so). Add second half teaspoon nutrient at around 1/3 sugar depletion. At 1.010 move to secondary, then usual care after that.

StressBaby, what kind of concentrate was this? White or purple? I'm guessing white, but I can be dense sometimes

 

[Stressbaby]

Yes, white.

 

[wineforfun]

I won't be starting any new batches(5 - 1 gal. batches aging now) until next month but will definitely be keeping an eye on this thread. Thanks for starting it.

 

[Winenoob66]

5 Gallon Sugar wash

20 cups sugar (dissolved in hot water, then let cool)
5 tsp. Yeast Nutrient
2 1/2 tsp Yeast Energizer
Lalvin EC-1118

Heat 1 gal water to melt sugar, and let cool repeat if needed and then add to primary along with everything else and stir to dissolve nutrient and energizer. When mix cools to around 70 to 75 degrees F toss in Yeast.
Run it till it bottoms out at or below 1.000 and stays at the same reading for a few days. then add
5 Campden tablets and potassium sorbate according to label instructions
wait 24 hrs.
rack off 5 1 gal containers and mix with either all juice concentrates or Barcardi mixers

2 juice concentrates or 3 barcardi mixers per gallon. any flavors you like. Enjoy

Update
11/21/13 Been going for 14 days now. So glad I took a Gravity reading first seems I am stuck at 1.030 but getting a bubble once a min so it is slowly moving will wait and check it again in a few days to see where it is.

 

[reefman]

I'm starting my second Candy Cane/Peppermint Patty batch. Did the first last winter, and it's not yet bottled....I'm bulk aging and tweaking the taste.
Here's Julies recipe, which I'm using as the base:

For a 3gallon batch:
54 candy canes
1/8 peptic enzyme
6 cans Welch's white grape concentrate
1 tsp nutrient
1 tsp energizer
1 banana

I started with an sg of 1.084, acid .60%, after it ferments to dry, stabilize and taste,there really wasn't much in the way of taste so I use about a tablespoon of McCormicks peppermint but I have found Watkins peppermint at Walmart, this is a natural extract so use this if you can find it. Start with a tsp of peppermint, taste and add more to your liking, then backsweeten, I used 24 candy canes (this will also bring out a nice pick color) and one bottle of corn syrup (corn syrup gives it a real nice mouth feel), final gravity was 1.032 BUT I added Ghirardelli 80% chococate, 2 pkgs, should be 7 oz. for 2 months., rack, let it clear and bottle.

Peppermint Patty!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
__________________
Julie

I'll list my tweaks as I get started. I still have about 5 lbs of candy canes in the freezer from last year.

 

[wineforfun]

I am eagerly waiting for the holidays to pass so all the candy canes and chocolate covered cherries will go on sale. I want to make 1 gal. of candy cane and 1 gal. of chocolate covered cherries or blueberries.

 

[Jericurl]

That's my plan as well.
I plan on buying a ridiculous amount of the chocolate covered cherries to make into wine.

 

[Julie]

I think this is an awesome idea! I ask for one favor, after you have made your wine aged it and when you decide this is a keeper, please copy the recipe to our recipe section. We have a lot of members who search the recipes and I think it would be awesome to have these recipes there as well as here.

 

[kryptonitewine]

I'm starting the strawberry chocolate that Lori posted tonight.

Thanks for the recipe, sounds like fun.

That's not your Welch's wine for the contest is it? 6 months seems too short for this one.

 

[Winenoob66]

I'm gonna have to agree with Kryptonitewine that Strawberry Chocolate wine has a strong alluring quality to it. I'm just waiting to see how hers turns out to, maybe I will do this one in the near future myself.

 

[LoneStarLori]

I'm starting the strawberry chocolate that Lori posted tonight.

Thanks for the recipe, sounds like fun.

That's not your Welch's wine for the contest is it? 6 months seems too short for this one.

So far it is looking good. I racked it a couple of days ago and it is starting to separate all the lees and looking more red. The smell is defiantly chocolate. Nummy!

No, this will not be the contest wine. It needs to be 80% juice and you're right, this will take too long.

I am curious to all of those who are making wines out of chocolate bars and precessed candies; Most all commercial chocolate candies are made with a certain amount of wax or paraffin so I'm wondering how that breaks down in the wine. Has anyone seen any floaties?

 

[reefman]

I used a chocolate slab my wife bought at the farmers market, and I have an oil slick on top of my candy cane wine.
I will be racking off the choco. in about two weeks, and hopefully leaving the slick behind.
If it comes along, I will try a filter to absorb some of the oil.

 

[vernsgal]

I am curious to all of those who are making wines out of chocolate bars and precessed candies; Most all commercial chocolate candies are made with a certain amount of wax or paraffin so I'm wondering how that breaks down in the wine. Has anyone seen any floaties?

I used the Lindt chocolate in my cherry wine. It left an oily slick on top while it was in carboy but since racking (2 months ago)it's all clear

 

[LoneStarLori]

I used a chocolate slab my wife bought at the farmers market, and I have an oil slick on top of my candy cane wine.
I will be racking off the choco. in about two weeks, and hopefully leaving the slick behind.
If it comes along, I will try a filter to absorb some of the oil.

I used the Lindt chocolate in my cherry wine. It left an oily slick on top while it was in carboy but since racking (2 months ago)it's all clear

I suspected that might happen but I'm glad it 'racks' away. The Jack Keller recipe I'm using calls for 'dutched' chocolate. After reading about it, the dutch processing removes the acid that naturally comes in chocolate. It must also remove oils because I have no slick. Makes a great hot chocolate too.

 

[wineforfun]

I use Lindt 85% dark chocolate and normally put it in the secondary after it has cleared. I leave it in 4-6 weeks.