Hello - My first post - Made some Wurzels with pics

[fergusont20]

Hi

Ive been a long time lurker on this forum and only registered yesterday.

I hoping to learn lots and end up with some pleasant wine

I have really enjoyed reading all the great posts on here and seeing all the pictures of peoples brews.

Obviously being a total amateur i have learnt quite abit by just reading through others peoples posts, Ive wanted to have a go at trying to create some Wurzels orange wine for some time now, so today armed with a shopping list i compiled by reading Moleys wurzel post (which i think is a great help) i headed into my local wilkos and came out £39 quid lighter.

I ended up with:

2 x Demijohns
A syphon tube
A hydrometer
2 x Old fashioned airlocks and bungs
2 x Newer type airocks and bungs
Bottle brush
Hydrometer tube/jar ???
Wine finings
Beer finings
Pectolase
Wine yeast
nutrient
campden tablets
Wine stabiliser
Cleaner
and something else which i cant make out on my picture

Running short of time i then took a trip to Lidl, one litre of orange juice and 1 litre of mixed grape juice (there was no white grape juice) and a bag of sugar

Back home i gave everything a real good clean and sterilise.

Armed with Moleys how to guide displayed on my laptop, i preceeded to make my first, of hopefully many orange wine

I dissolved 800grams of sugar in one pint of warm water
I added both my fruit juices to my sterilised DJ
Poured in my tea which had been stewing for 10 mins
filled DJ up to shoulder with cold water
gave it all a good shake
i then added 1 heaped tsp of youngs yeast, 1 tsp of nutrient and 1 tsp of pectolase
filled my airlock with water and put the dj on a tray in the utility room

Here comes my questions, apolgies if they are stupid.. i hope someone can help me

1 - I couldnt find any scales so i estimated 800 grams of sugar out of a 1 kg bag, my og was 1.10, does sthat seem ok??

2 - I need to buy a thermometer, so i dont know exactly how hot my solution was when i added my yeast, i let everything cool abit so it wasnt too hot, but after a few hours there did not seem to be much gas activity, probably a bubble every 15 seconds, but no mad whooshing, i presume if the solution is too hot you can kill off the yeast???

3 - Will it have mattered that i used mixed grape juice instead of white??

4 - I havnt got any glycerin, can i buy some and add at a later date??

Im at work now so not sure what is going on with my brew,but tomorrow i will get a thermometer to see how warm the utility room is.

Thanks for taking the time to read this. I will probably need to ask lots more questions as my must goes on

Thanks Mark

 

[Moley]

Hi Mark, and welcome to the forum :

I have to confess that my first thought when reading your post was “Ouch! How much?!”

The 5 litre water bottles are cheap enough and disposable, use them 2 or 3 times and throw them away. Proper glass demijohns, properly looked after, should last you a lifetime, but I find the price new fairly horrific.


Anyway, to your questions:

1. Your OG is fine. it's only that high because your DJ isn't full yet. When you come to top it up with water that has the effect of reducing your net OG.

2. It takes 2-3 days for the yeasties to multipy and get properly up to speed. If the must is too hot it will kill them, but anything below about 30°C should be fine for pitching yeast. Yours sounds like it's already starting up, so don't worry about that one. Room temperature for fermentation should ideally be around 20°C, give or take a couple.

3. Well bu99er me, I've never even noticed that Lidl's ‘red’ grape juice is actually “a blend of red and white grape juices”. That will work just fine and you will get a pink WOW.

4. Glycerine is optional, but you can add it at any stage.

 

[fergusont20]

Thankyou for the quick reply, you have put my mind at rest.

I cant wait to get home after my night shift and see if its bubbling away :)

Yes the DJ's are not cheap, think they were around £7 pounds each, if im successful with my wine making i will probably us the PET bottles in the future, just wanted a nice pair of DJ's to start with :)

I also like to go off foraging with the dog abit, mushrooms, fruit etc

The trees are full of big plump cherries at the minute, my fiance's sister loves cherry brandy and i would like to make some for her. Has anyone got any good ideas to make something nice ???

Thanks again

 

[Moley]

if im successful with my wine making i will probably us the PET bottles in the future, just wanted a nice pair of DJ's to start with :)

Oh no, glass is best, if you've got proper DJs use them.

Ideal scenario is to start your wine off in a 5 litre PET but when you come to rack it off the sediment, rack to glass.

DJs are only approximately gallons, if you calibrate them you will find they can vary quite a bit, typically around 4.5 - 4.7 litres, so if you rack from plastic to glass you will have less volume to top up. PETs also have ridges around the inside which act as sediment traps and can become a pain when you get around to subsequent rackings or bottling. That problem doesn't arise with glass DJs.

Sorry, I can't help with the cherry brandy, but I hope someone else will come along who can.

 

[bluebell]

For cherry brandy easiest way is Kilner jar (or other latge wide necked vessle. For 1lb fruit (you dont need to stone it unless you want to use the cherries later - good dipped in chocolate). depending on taste and sweetness of fruit about 1lb sugar and 1 70cl bottle cheep brandy. shake daily until sugar is disolved and keep in cool ish dark place shaking occaisionally for at least 3 months. Strain off through muslin, without squeezing the last drop out or it will go cloudy, bottle and drink. Works with most soft fruit and most spirits. Worth trying Orange in brandy, ginger in whisky etc

 

[Forkbeard]

Car boot sales are the place to go for Demijohns. Picked up eight for a pound apiece not so long ago. A thorough cleaning, sterilising and scrubbing later and they were as good as new.

 

[hairybiker]

Also try Freecycle for demijohns. Amazing what people have laying around.
i also went GULP at the figure for the initial outlay but you have stuff that will last for years there (properly looked after etc).

I started out winemaking in the 70's when things were cheaper (the kit anyway), and tended to always make fruit wine, just now returning to it with WOW. Going to get a Mango WOW on the go after I rack my Orange one later in the week.

 

[bluebell]

That made me smile - I recently started out and was given some DJs although I have bought some more off e bay since. All the chems, yeasts syphon, 4 x 6 bottle kits and a filter have set me back over £100 all told. BUT most of that stuff will do many gallons of wine/cider.

 

[BrewDan]

Good luck with your brew and welcome, I like you took a while to register but I am glad I did, very friendly helpful bunch here.

You can get LCD stick on thermometers on eBay or in a pet store for around £1 each, saves you having to keep exposing everything to the open air every time you want to check a temp, I've got them on all my dj's and again like you bought everything from new... Have around 7 of those now a Kk and a couple of wine fermenters etc etc, would hate to think what I have spent, but they way I see it is it's fun and if it's looked after probably won't need replacing for a very long time.

Enjoy and keep us posted, I'd like to try this one!!

 

[fergusont20]

Evening

My wurzels wine is 8 days old, i topped it up to the neck on wednesday with cooled boiled water, i have a digital temperature gauge with a probe put next to the DJ's in the utility room. Its been a constant 21-23 degrees all week. There is virtually no bubbles in the airlock. I took a sample out of it earlier and ran it through a alcohol machine. abv - 13.01, pg minus 5.40 and og 92.57. i havent yet sampled it with my hydrometer but does that og sound right??

Am i right in thinking i should give it another weelk before syphoning into another bottle??

Also i started a turbo cider on monday, 2 litres of asda smart price concerntrated apple juice, that appears to be doing ok, but is obviously 3 days behind my wine

Thanks Mark

 

[Moley]

:shock: If that's an OG of 1.09257 it sounds in the right sort of area to me, but way more accurate than any of us would care to go. “About 90” is plenty good enough for me.

FG of 0.9946 is good for a medium-dry wine.

Yes, another week before racking :thumb:

What's your line of work?