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Sparkling Wine Bottled

After a few months in the fermenters it was finally time to bottle the Sparkling wine. I bought a fresh case of 12 new bottles from the supply store, while the ole’ lady was drinking a few bottles so I we could get the 15 we needed. Which also means I’m able to follow directions because the instructions said we would get 15 bottles and thats exactly what we got!

The wine looked nice and clear in the secondary fermentor. We were careful not to suck up any of the yeast sediment when racking it to the bottling bucket, where the priming sugar was already waiting. I had boiled some water and added the priming sugar to get it all dissolved so it would mix in with the wine easier. Now the residual yeast in the wine will consume the sugar we just added and give our bubbly the bubbles.

Christmas and New Years is fast approaching, Buying and that is the projected date for this Sparkling wine to be ready to drink. Upon bottling it need about 4-6 weeks to properly carbonate, but with the colder temperatures we have it may take just a bit longer. So to be save I’ll wait 2 months and then pop a cork.

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New batch

With nothing better to do, other than sip a few cold ones, we decided to boil up a batch of beer on saturday night. And it just so happened that they had some good Brewer’s Best kits on sale at the local home brew store. We choose to try our hand at a Bock kit as these are traditionaly brewed in winter and then ready to consume for spring festivities. I’m sure I’ll be able to come up with some reason to party in the spring, provided there is some of this beer left.

In the past I’ve used several different kits from Brewer’s Best, and always had good results. Like most of their kits this one is a mix between extract and grain brewing. It took us just over 2.5 hours from the time we started cleaning the equipment to when the beer was cool enough to put into the primary. My plan is to let it sit in the primary for a week or so, then rack into a secondary for a few weeks.

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Triple beer bottled

Bottled this new batch of Triple beer on 10-10-10. This was a simple extract kit from Brewferm. 1 3.3lb can of the liquid malt extract will make a .5 gallon batch of beer. So naturally I used 2 cans of the extract to make a 5 gallon batch of beer. The recipe from the can is quite simple, add the extract syrup and water to your primary fermentor and then the stated amount of sugar. For a little added zip I used some brown sugar and honey along with the normal corn sugar. This should produce a quite high original gravity which in turn will make a rather high alcohol content. The can from Brewtherm stated an O.G of 1.075 and 8% alcohol although my numbers were just a touch lower.

Upon bottling the beer had real nice carmely color, and tasted a bit sweet. Per the instructions that came with the beer It should be allowed to mature for 6-8 weeks before drinking the freshly bottled beer. This extended maturation period should help it develop some body along with building carbonation. Only time will tell, and I am definitly anxious to crack one!

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Sparkling Wine

This is the Degassing step on our “New Millennium” Sparkling wine. This is a 3 gallon kit from Wine expert, and is very simple. The wine has already been in the Primary fermenter and then racked to a secondary. It has now been sitting in the secondary for about 10 days, after being in the primary for a little over 3 weeks. Now we just have to wait appoximately 2 weeks for the wine to clear before bottling. I hope to bottle at the end of October, which will the give the wine about 2 months to bottle condition before we crack one open on New Years Eve.

Ian