Aniseed Wine

[caitlintilt]

Hello everyone :) I had a brainwave today... I want to make aniseed wine! Or liquor (wouldn't be distilling, just using super wine yeast to get it up to about 20% abv) The only problem is I'm not really sure how to do this and there are not many recipies out there for this sort of thing, so any advice / suggested recipies? I was thinking I could flavour with either fennel, anise seeds or star anise, I have come across one recipie for a white grape based wine with two star anise 'stars' in with it, but that didn't seem like very much to me to flavour a whole gallon. Also, if I was going to make a grape concentrate based wine, how much grape concentrate would be needed for a gallon? Thanks whoever replies

 

[oldbloke]

I have no idea what might be a good way to do it, but if you find one, I want to know what it is!

 

[wezil]

Hi, I use pure grape juice rather than concentrate at 1 litre a gallon (it's cheaper)! Plus the aniseed is likely to cover any grape flavour I take it your trying to make a absinthe, pernod type drink (shudder) try searching online for the amounts of ingredients that are used in home made versions, that should give you the flavour you want!

 

[tonyhibbett]

Pernod is based on star anise. Ouzo is based on anise, with star anise, cloves, cinnamon and coriander seed. Basically, flavoured alcohol at 40% abv., typically mixed with water and ice before drinking. For this reason, there is no need to make it high strength. My approach would be to make a light flavoured white wine based say, on apple juice, because apples readily give up their flavour to stronger flavours while providing background body. Ferment this as high as possible without ending up sweet. Put the finished wine in screwcap bottles and add, say a teaspoon of aniseeds and smaller amounts of the above listed ingredients. The alcohol will start to draw out the flavours. Agitate daily for a week then taste a sample. If you like it, strain out the spices (coffee filter paper) and drink. If you feel it needs more flavour, add more spices accordingly.
I have used a similar approach to emulate calvados (apple brandy) and gin. In the latter case, I added dried juniper berries and I have to admit that it didn't taste like gin as we know it and was brown. Nonetheless, it was good stuff.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Absynthe is an interesting topic. It was banned in France for health reasons, but is now legally produced and sold there. In order to preserve the distinctive green colour, dreadful chemicals were added, which made it toxic. It was never banned in the UK. It was banned in the US while, at the time, Coca Cola contained cocaine!

 

[wezil]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absinthe. All sorts of now illegal substances have been used in tonics and pick me ups over the years, to say nothing of religious use! opiates for coughs and diarrhoea, cocaine as a nerve tonic, cannabis as a relaxant, lsd to treat mental disorders, Ecstasy for marriage problems. It's a fascinating area of research, especially when you discover why most of them were banned!

 

[caitlintilt]

Thankyou for the replies everyone :-) I've bought some star anise and some fennel seeds and what I think I'm going to do is make a white grape or apple wine and flavour it with these, once it's underway I'll let you all know how it goes and the end flavour with a verdict on whether it's worth recreating! My next batch however will be banana and prune wine

 

[caitlintilt]

Any advice or amendments to this recipe or does it look good? (other than to the actual method, thanks for all the advice about screw top bottles, muslin bags e.t.c. it's been eye opening, but this seems the simplest so I'm going with it)

WOW - type aniseed wine

1 L white grape juice
2 L apple juice
650g sugar
2 crushed star anise
2 tsp fennel seeds
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 tsp pectolase
1 tsp citric acid

method: follow basic WOW method, but putting seeds and star anise in the demijohn at the start

what I really want is advice about acid amounts and whether I need tannin in there, or yeast nutrient

 

[Brewtrog]

Sounds good to me, I'd throw the tannin and nutrient in just in case personally, better to have it sorted now than find out later that it would have been a good idea. Best of luck with it :

 

[tonyhibbett]

Yes sounds good. I would use tartaric acid rather than citric, hold on the tannin because it's easy to add at the end, but difficult to remove. Coriander seeds are very light in flavour. I have a good herb oil recipe which uses 30 seeds per litre. Fennel seed on the other hand, is powerful stuff. Sugar amount seems a bit light if you are aiming for high alcohol level, but you can always add more towards the end. I guess you can class this as a flower wine, so vitamin b1 tablets might help things along, although some nutrient compounds (eg Wilco) contain some anyway.
Good luck!

 

[caitlintilt]

Thanks :-) I'll look into tartaric acid, as there seems to be quite a lot of talk about it on here it may well be worth buying some, and check my yeast nutrient for that vitamin. I guess I'll taste it near the end and decide on tannin, I understand how without it wines might seem a bit light or whatever but I wasn't sure it was a desirable thing to have in an aniseed wine, but we'll see, thanks for the help! I've only been brewing about six months but already I'm inventing recipes and I don't strictly have all the know how advisable for doing these things :L but I guess that's half the fun! :hat:

 

[tonyhibbett]

It's all fun!

 

[P_H_I_L_L]

I have come across one recipie for a white grape based wine with two star anise 'stars' in with it, but that didn't seem like very much to me to flavour a whole gallon

Are you kidding? Star anise is exceedingly potent. I use it in asian cooking, just one 'arm' of the star and its seed crushed a bit would be overpowering (I'm guessing).

 

[caitlintilt]

Hmmm it seems the only way to resolve this for sure is to make the wine

 

[tonyhibbett]

A gallon of wine is not quite the same as a meal. A simple test would be to infuse a single star anise in half a gallon of hot water and make a judgement.

 

[Tim_Crowhurst]

I have come across one recipie for a white grape based wine with two star anise 'stars' in with it, but that didn't seem like very much to me to flavour a whole gallon

Are you kidding? Star anise is exceedingly potent. I use it in asian cooking, just one 'arm' of the star and its seed crushed a bit would be overpowering (I'm guessing).

I use star anise in my plum chutney, one whole star goes for every kilo of fruit & veg, and any of the other ingredients are quite strongly flavoured ones, including ginger, garlic, cinnamon, cloves, chillis, plums, crabapples, onions, cranberries and cider vinegar. Despite all the competition, the anise flavour is surprisingly strong.

 

[caitlintilt]

that is a great idea to test, I shall start infusing immediately, or soon anyway :L

 

[tonyhibbett]

While you are at it, you may as well add the other spices, to judge the balance.

 

[Badger]

I was just about to start a similar topic today! Atm I've a gingery clove wine bubbling away which makes me want to make one with fennel seeds and star anise ...