#no.103123

[boissonsaumiel]

Forbidden Rice Wine & Maple Wine Update

I strained the forbidden rice wine (made from Dongbei black glutinous rice aka "forbidden" rice) today with a nut milk bag. Way more labor intensive than I anticipated squeezing all the liquid out, and clean-up was a pain. My fingers were all wrinkled by the time I was done. The jar ended up a little over ¾ full after straining, and then I added a couple glasses of water. It still tastes a bit sweet so I don’t think it’s quite done fermenting.

I tasted the maple wine too. Turns out maple syrup really just tastes like wood once you ferment away all the sugar. All that sugar kinda makes you forget that maple syrup is just concentrated sap, but once the sweetness is gone you're like, "Damn. This tree juice sure does taste like the juice of a tree." Not sure if I like it, but I don't dislike it. It's not unpleasant or bitter or anything. Smoother than I expected.

[boissonsaumiel]

Mead Stampede scores are in!

I'm pleased with how I did.

My hōjicha tea mead scored well overall, but based on the judge's feedback I think it would have worked better as a semi-sweet mead instead of a completely dry mead, to help balance the acid/tannins.

Notes for "Tujku" hōjicha tea wildflower mead:

Judge 1: David S

Bouquet - Honey, very slight Alcohol Tea comes through. 8/10

Appearance - No complaints! 6/6

Flavor - Acidic, slightly hot. Tea comes through, Sour. 18/24

Overall - 7/10

Total - 39/50

Feedback - A bit acidic. Very slightly hot. Smoke comes through as well as the tea. A bit unbalanced. I would pull back on the acid a bit.

Judge 2: Shawn B

Bouquet - Nice nose, honey, curious smoke/grass 8/10

Appearance - amber brown, clear 5/6

Flavor - a bit tannic and tart, but nails the described flavors 20/24

Overall - 7/10

Total - 40/50

Feedback - Interesting mead. Each ingredient choice shines through. A bit tart, dry. Could be better balanced

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The mead I used for my experimental rice wine "braggot" lost a lot a lot of points due to the fact that the mead I used in it had a flawed ferment. I didn't add enough nutrients. Aging helped some, but not enough.

Notes for "The Empress" 60/50 cactus mead/forbidden rice wine blend:

Judge 1: Jake Tweedy

Bouquet - chalky, fruity, heavy mineral presence 10/10

Appearance - 6/6

Flavor - interesting blend of flavors, presenting as acidic fruit mixed with gently floral honey. Faint bitter aftertaste lingers. 10/24

Overall - 7/10

Total - 33/50

Feedback - An interesting blend, there's a heavy mineral presence amongst a bright, zesty, fruity honey character. But a lingering bitterness keeps this mead from landing a world class score. Please keep experimenting! This was fun to try!

Judge 2: Susan Jimenez

Bouquet - prickly pear - mineral notes, clean & interesting med alcohol, inviting 9/10

Appearance - very clear, small bubbles around the rim 6/6

Flavor - low honey, lower acid and soft lingering tannin smooth alcohol for a sack. I get a tuna fishy off-flavor in the taste. maybe sulpher 10/24

Overall - 6/10

Total - 31/50

Feedback - This is well-executed in the aroma. It is very inviting & mineral. There is an off-note that may be from frementation temp, or yeast nutrition. Tweaking this could bring something really delicious.

[boissonsaumiel]

I bottled the pomegranate wine today. The flavor is much milder than I expected. Not nearly as intensely pomegranate-y as the unfermented juice. It reminds me a lot of drinking a rosé. I got four 16oz bottles out of it.

As you can see in the photo, the color of the pomegranate wine (right) is almost exactly the same as the forbidden rice wine (left).

I also racked the blackberry blossom honey mead from a gallon wide mouth fermenter into 2 half gallon bottles. One ended up much fuller than the other, and there were about 16 oz of pomegranate wine+lees left in the pomegranate fermenter after bottling, so I added the pomegranate dregs to the less full half gallon bottle.

Technically that makes that bottle my first attempt at a melomel.

I'm going to let those two half gallons continue aging under airlock.

[boissonsaumiel]

So I tasted the forbidden rice wine.

The reason it looks insanely bright red in the second photo is because I have it backlit by my laptop screen. In the big half gallon bottle it looks indistinguishable from red grape wine, but when you put it in a smaller container you can see that it's much, much more translucent.

I want to say there's a fruityness to it that rice wine made with white rice doesn't have. I don't like it yet, but I think I will like it if it ages longer. I started this batch on Halloween, so it's just about 3.3 months old. Another 3 months, and I think I'll start to like it.

I haven't tried it chilled.

I think I'll wait until later to do that.

[boissonsaumiel]

Added 1lb of molasses to the "beer" batch. As you can see it has all sunk to the bottom. I'll stir it up tomorrow. I also tried adding a couple crushed up digestive enzyme supplement tablets to help along the saccharification of the oat flour. I sense the rice wine starter I used had an easier time processing the starch in the maca powder than the starch in the oat flour.

The rice wine seems like it's finishing up. Hardly any bubbling. I'll wait till I come back from my holiday trip at the end of the month to strain it.

[boissonsaumiel]

I tasted my avocado mead again tonight. I've had some oak chips in it for several weeks. This time I could actually taste the avocado honey flavor as well as a little of the oak this time (the last time I tried tasting it, it kind of just tasted like nothing at all). It's quite nice now. I'm bringing a bottle to my sister for Christmas.

If I did it again, I wouldn't use EC-1118 yeast. K1-V1116 is supposed to do a better job of preserving the flavor of the honey.

I siphoned the forbidden rice wine. I got about 2 liters. It looks a lot like red wine, but darker. It tastes like rice wine. Not exactly the same as the rice wine I made with white rice, but very similar, and I don't really know how to describe the differences. The lees layer was 3 inches thick in the gallon fermenter. I think I can eke some more wine out of it if I let it settle for longer, so instead of just tossing the lees, I poured them into one of my tall glass 65oz milk bottles.

I have one more batch to siphon.

[boissonsaumiel]

Progress Update: 黑米酒

4lb of rice is a lot more rice than I thought it was. I was expecting the volume to double after cooking but I feel like it's significantly more than doubled.

Anyway, I know that once the fermentation really gets going the volume should go down quite a bit, so I have a bunch of temp-jars to put fermenting rice in that I will later add to the main gallon jar once it brews down.