Skeeter Pee Variety Experiment

[southlake333]

I've read plenty of threads describing various flavor experiments everyone has tried. Some are helpful, some don't have enough info and all of them usually contain just 1 flavor. So this thread is going to be about my experiments in Skeeter Pee flavorings, the results of each and how they compare to one another.

So far I have made 2. The first was Lon's original Skeeter Pee (www.skeeterpee.com). The second was a quad berry skeeter pee using a variation of Dave's Dragon's Blood recipe. My variation is as follows:


6.25 bottles of 15 oz 100% lemon juice (e.g ReaLemon in the green plastic bottles or equivalent)
8 lbs + 4 cups sugar
1 tsp tannin
4 tsp. yeast nutrient (2 now, 2 later)
2 tsp. yeast energizer (1 now, 1 later)
3 tsp. pectic enzyme
up to 6 lbs of fruit - I used the following Great Value frozen fruit:
1 bag raspberry, 1 bag blueberry, 2 bags berry medley, 2 bags blackberries
Water to 6.25 gallons
1 packet Red Star Red Pasteur Red Yeast

1.080 - Starting SG

Sweetened with 5 cups of inverted sugar to SG of 1.007

Between the 2 recipes, the quad berry is by far my favorite. While the standard skeeter pee is a good, light lemon wine, the addition of berries adds body and strong berry flavor which tastes much better and complements the lemon. The result will be my standard from now on (unless other experiments yield better results).

 

[southlake333]

My next experiment will be 2 side by side batches of skeeter pee. One will be close to the original, the other will substitue 30% of the lemon for lime. Both will be 6 gallons and backsweetened using juice concentrates (except for some of the lime, I want to try that by itself). To start, I will list the 2 recipes (just the variations, the rest will follow Lon's recipe)

Skeeter Pee
1 x 48oz bottles of 100% lemon juice initially (e.g ReaLemon in the green plastic bottles or equivalent)
1 x 48oz bottles of 100% lemon juice after SG gets below 1.050
Enough sugar to get an SG of 1.068 - Starting SG - 9% alcohol (around 9 lbs)
Water to 6 gallons
1 packet Red Star Pasteur Champaigne Yeast

Skeeter Lime
1 x 48oz bottle of 100% lemon juice initially (e.g ReaLemon in the green plastic bottles or equivalent)
1 x 15oz bottle of lemon juice plus 2 x 15oz bottles of lime juice after SG gets below 1.050
Enough sugar to get an SG of 1.068 - Starting SG - 9% alcohol (around 9 lbs)
Water to 6 gallons
1 packet Red Star Pasteur Champaigne Yeast

I plan on splitting both of these up into 1-2 gallons batches and backsweetening like this:

• Lemon Lime Skeeter Pee - flavored with inverted sugar
• Bacardi Frozen Margarita Mix - mixed with Skeeter Lime
• Welch's Cranberry Juice Frozen Concentrate - I'll probably mix this one with Skeeter Lime
• Bacardi Frozen Strawberry Daquiri Mix
• Minute Maid Fruit Punch Frozen Concentrate
• Welch's Strawberry Breeze Frozen Concentrate (Orange, Pineapple, Apple, Grape and Strawberry)
• Welch's Passion Fruit Frozen Concentrate (Orange, Pineapple, Apple and Passion Fruit)
• Welch's Orange Pineapple Appe Frozen Concentrate (Orange, Pineapple and Apple)

I'm not yet sure which of the above concentrates will get mixed with which of the batches (except for those labeled) so I would be happy to take suggestions. At the end of this I will have at least 8 new variations under my belt and will hopefully be able to guide others on the best recipes to try. I am also seriously considering trying oldwhiskers' version of berry pee shown in this thread which uses an Ocean Spray juice called Cranberry, Blueberry, Blackberry blend. That one would be a full 6 gallon batch by itself to compare to my quad berry skeeter (which used real fruit). That test might have to wait a few weeks though.

 

[oldwhiskers]

That's a lot of variations, it should really yield a lot of good information. I will go ahead and thief a sample from mine and let you know how it turned out.

 

[tatud4life]

I have a question about the frozen concentrates. When you are adding them, do you dilute them with water? Or do you just pour into the batch with no dilution?

 

[southlake333]

I have a question about the frozen concentrates. When you are adding them, do you dilute them with water? Or do you just pour into the batch with no dilution?

Pour them in with no dilution. The goal is to get the flavor without watering down the wine.

 

[tatud4life]

Thanks buddy! That's what I was thinking. Just wanted to make sure. It is used to backsweeten correct?

 

[southlake333]

Thanks buddy! That's what I was thinking. Just wanted to make sure. It is used to backsweeten correct?

For the recipes I listed above, yes I'm going to use them as backsweeteners. For John's recipe (oldwhiskers), he is using the concentrates during primary fermentation. Backsweetening with the concentrates should result in a flavor more closely tied to the concentrate. Fermenting with the concentrates will result in a different flavor (think simmering in a slow cooker for 8 hours vs topping your creation with a sauce after cooking).

 

[tatud4life]

That makes sense. How does using the concentrate during fermentation alter the amount of sugar you use to start with?

I apologize for all the questions. I'm a little too eager to learn sometimes. Lol

 

[southlake333]

That makes sense. How does using the concentrate during fermentation alter the amount of sugar you use to start with?

I apologize for all the questions. I'm a little too eager to learn sometimes. Lol

Concentrates and juices contain sugar so they will add to the overall sugar content. If you are targeting a specific SG and have a specific amount of sugar you plan to use, just reduce the amount of sugar you add initially, add the concentrate, then test and add sugar in small increments until you hit the SG you want .

 

[tatud4life]

Thanks again buddy!!! I guess if I would have actually gave it a little thought, it would have occurred to me to do that. Lol You have been a huge help!!!

 

[dangerdave]

Awesome, JJ! I'll be watching.

 

[oldwhiskers]

JJ, drew a sample last night and sweetened it and it wasn't bad. You could smell the berries and taste the berries pretty good, more of a mild/mellow berry flavor instead of in your face type flavor. The young alcohol was the stronger flavor since OG was 1.100 and its only been roughly three weeks since yeast pitch.

 

[southlake333]

• Bacardi Frozen Strawberry Daquiri Mix
• Minute Maid Fruit Punch Frozen Concentrate
• Welch's Strawberry Breeze Frozen Concentrate (Orange, Pineapple, Apple, Grape and Strawberry)
• Welch's Passion Fruit Frozen Concentrate (Orange, Pineapple, Apple and Passion Fruit)
• Welch's Orange Pineapple Appe Frozen Concentrate (Orange, Pineapple and Apple)

Yesterday I bottled the normal Skeeter Pee batch (not the lime one) using the concentrates listed in the quote above. I used 1 can of concentrate per gallon of pee as well as another 1/2 cup of inverted sugar.

My initial thoughts are...a single can of concentrate is not enough for backsweetening as it is overwhelmed by the flavor of the pee. While the concentrates did impart a great aroma, I could barely taste them. I'm considering getting some extra concentrate when I bottle the lemon lime batch to ensure a stronger flavor. Since pee does tone down as it ages, I am also hoping to end up with a noticeable flavor difference after a few weeks.

 

[tatud4life]

That's great info!!! Thanks for posting!!! By that information, for a 5 gallon batch, would you need at least 5 cans of concentrate to flavor the batch? I'm going to try some myself (although the quad berry will probably be my fav) and want to make sure I get enough concentrate.

 

[Sammyk]

I did a similar experiment since we suffer from acid reflux. I used one (only) bottle of lime juice and assorted frozen juice concentrates, and simmered down 64 oz of different juices. The favorites were, Black Cherry/Cranberry, White grape/peach, White grape/red raspberry and the Bacardi strawberry daiquiri and the Bacardi Peach daiquiri. The blueberry/pomegranate was well liked too as well as straight Cranberry. I simmered the 64 oz bottles to half the amount, cooled and add it to one gallon batches of SP. I did not add any frozen fruits as was suggested above because I thought once it had fermented out, there would be little fruit flavor left.

Today I just bottled the last of my SP made as above

 

[nate0001]

Looking to try a strawberry rhubarb flavoring. Wondering if anyone has done this yet?

 

[southlake333]

That's great info!!! Thanks for posting!!! By that information, for a 5 gallon batch, would you need at least 5 cans of concentrate to flavor the batch? I'm going to try some myself (although the quad berry will probably be my fav) and want to make sure I get enough concentrate.

Correct, at least 5 cans. I would suggest more and will try more when I bottle the remaining concentrates in my lemon lime pee.

 

[southlake333]

I did a similar experiment since we suffer from acid reflux. I used one (only) bottle of lime juice and assorted frozen juice concentrates, and simmered down 64 oz of different juices. The favorites were, Black Cherry/Cranberry, White grape/peach, White grape/red raspberry and the Bacardi strawberry daiquiri and the Bacardi Peach daiquiri. The blueberry/pomegranate was well liked too as well as straight Cranberry. I simmered the 64 oz bottles to half the amount, cooled and add it to one gallon batches of SP. I did not add any frozen fruits as was suggested above because I thought once it had fermented out, there would be little fruit flavor left.

Today I just bottled the last of my SP made as above

A single can of concentrate makes 46oz of reconstituted juice. So the simmered down 64 oz you used would be approx 1.4 cans of concentrate. You said they were good, but how much of the concentrate flavor was imparted? Just the aroma and a mild flavor difference? Or a very large difference?

I'll try 1.5 (maybe 2 cans) per gallon in my lemon lime batch to see how it turns out.

The single can experiments could just be competing with the new wine flavor (which is always strong) so I don't want to overdo the concentrate addition. Then again, this is a test batch so trying a variety is a good thing! It'll be very interesting to see how they mature.

 

[kzacherl2000]

SammyK, do you know how this affects the abv/alcohol percentage when you are adding 32 oz. of boiled down juice? I love the idea of these flavors!!!

 

[southlake333]

• Lemon Lime Skeeter Pee - flavored with inverted sugar
• Bacardi Frozen Margarita Mix - mixed with Skeeter Lime
• Welch's Cranberry Juice Frozen Concentrate - I'll probably mix this one with Skeeter Lime

Last night I bottled the lemon lime pee split into 2 gallon batches and sweetened in the above listed ways. I do have to say that the extra week I let it sit in the carboy (vs when I bottled the other pee) drastically reduced the new wine taste and made backsweetening to taste much easier. I highly suggest that everyone let their pee sit for 2 weeks after adding sparkolloid just to allow that new wine taste to fade a bit. So here's the specifics:

• 2 gallons straight lemon lime pee sweetened with 2 cups of sugar for an SG of 1.009.
• 2 gallons lemon lime pee sweetened with 2 cans of cranberry juice for an SG of 1.012. Turns out that cranberry juice has a ton of sugar in it so I only needed 2 cans.
• 2 gallons lemon lime pee sweetened with 3 cans Bacardi Margarita Mix concentrate for an SG of 1.009.

All of these tasted great. The Margarita mix provided a much stronger lime flavor than the straight lemon lime pee. The cranberry had a nice flavor and worked well against the lemon lime.

Now that all of the various flavors have been bottled, I'll let them bottle age for a while. In a month or two I'll come back to review them all side by side with the original pee.

In the mean time, I plan to try a batch of Tinkleberry Tea (quad berry pee) without using Bentonite (per Dave's comparitive study) and with a bit less lemon. I will also be trying a batch of tropical quad berry pee (using a frozen tropical fruit mix I found at Walmart). When I start those, I will post the recipes.