nilotic's brief hello

[nilotic]

Hi

New to brewing, inherited a few DJs and bits & bobs a few months ago, including an old book
CJJ Berry "First steps in Winemaking"
Love it.
Love the process and the results.

Made some elderflower wine which is quite drinkable even before aging. A few bottles should make it to a year old so time will tell.
One batch went horribly wrong because I failed to read the small print on the sugar - so I put a lot of unexpected artificial sweetener in by accident

lol

Currently got a gallon of rosehip wine just beginning to clear, high hopes for that...

But my main mission at the moment is to get GINGER BEER dialled in, and then DANDELION & BURDOCK.
I've started on the ginger beer.
Made 3 batches,

1) Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's recipe using grated root ginger in a plastic bottle.
2) CJJ Berry's Ginger Beer recipe - basically a permanent ginger powder ferment, batches diluted and bottle conditioned.
3) second batch of 2)

1) This is a soft drink - lovely and I will make more. It's very refreshing but not a beer.
2) Turned out flat, syrupy yet watery. Disappointing.
3) Lovely. Much improved fizz and flavour, some beery body to it as well. :thumb: :

I think the difference between 2 & 3 was getting the ginger 'plant' established.
I'm going to continue making this with slight mistakes/tweaks here & there.

Found a good thread here called Fiery Ginger Beer, started by rickthebrew, and I'll try that recipe too soon as a comparison.
Will post results as they come.

cheers all

N

 

[Wendy1971]

Hi and welcome :thumb:

 

[BrotherMalice]

Hello & welcome to the forum

 

[LeedsBrewer]

hello and welcome

 

[nilotic]

Thanks folks for making me welcome.

I like this brewing lark, it's extremely satisfying.
Having said that, I don't think I'll do elderflower again.
Rosehip was initially quite a hassle but if the end result tastes excellent then I'm happy .

I've tasted decent local brew grape wine in France, BYO container style, so I have a good idea what a decent benchmark is.

 

[dennisking]

Hi and welcome.

 

[Mr Majik]

Hi nilotic welcometo the forum. Im new here too, these chaps have taught me lots! thats an interesting name are you from Nile area?

Its a shame you didnt enjoy elder wine, my grandad used to make some wonderful elder wind. A friend of mine is currently trying out an alcoholic dandilion and burdock recipy, if it works out i'd like to try it myself.

Enjoy!

 

[nilotic]

Hi mr majik

I'm from Croydon actually, :mrgreen: just nicked the name from a Clive Barker book.
He describes a creature from the Nile basin
which constructs a large structure out of pure maths.
Some shimmering glowing tangle of glyphs and trigonometry.
Bonkers but I love it. I'm not a mathematician though either, should point out .....

Yeh it is a pity about the elderflower wine..
It's quite pleasant, but it's not a flavour which I prioritise over others....never tried it before so now I know :)

D&Burdock though I know that can be lovely....

 

[Mr Majik]

I quite enjoy Barker, I've just read the Abarat books, I hear there are more on the way. I've got a great book of his short stories too, can't remember what it's called off the top of my head though.

Do what book is this mathematical creature in, I picture mix of the Loch Ness monster and a tesseract. Think I'd like to read it :)

 

[nilotic]

The book's called "sacrament".

Not the easiest one to read,.....

 

[nilotic]

Just thought I'd update to say :

I WILL be doing elderflower again.

The last couple of samples have been truly excellent. :
Despite being known as an early wine, it really improves between months 4-6.

Oh, also I recommend decanting it - get it aerated before drinking.

 

[oldbloke]

CJJB's recipes can be a bit heavy on the sugar, always worth doing some back-of-envelope sanity checks of the expected ABV