Problem with an old time recipe for Bread Champagne

[splangemac]

Hi I’m new to the site and this is my first posting. I’m very much hoping that one of you knowledgeable people will be able to help me? I have not made wine for a very long time, but when I did, I achieved quite good results. I stopped making it through lack of time etc but now I want to start again. What really prompted me as well was finding an old book (1950’s I think) by Peggy Hutchinson called “Home made Wine Secrets”. Whenever I have made wine or beer before one of the main things that keeps getting repeated is that everything must be spotlessly clean and sterilised. However this was not mentioned, the sterilising that is, at any point in the book. This intrigued me so I thought I would have an experiment with a cheap recipe called “Bread Champagne”. It was very simple, cut the bread into slices, toast it, cover with water, add sugar, leave to ferment for 21 days then strain and bottle. I always keep things very clean but I did not sterilise anything as that was what the experiment was about. The author said she had tremendous success with all her recipes so I thought I might to. Needless to say after about 2 weeks mould started to form all around the edge of the plastic bucket it was in. I had something at the back of my mind that this was not a problem (possibly very stupid of me I know) and I scraped it off. After another week it looked terrible so it ended up being chucked. What are your thoughts and how do you think Peggy Hutchinson did so well without sterilising? Looking forward to any helpful answers and taking part in the site.

Thank you for looking at my post,

Splangemac.

 

[graysalchemy]

One thing I would say is that back in the fifties bread was not the mass produced sh*te we endure today, so it is unlikely to have had any yeast on it to start fermenting. So after 2 weeks even with scrupulous cleaning and sterlization it is not supprising it went mouldy.

Personally I would use yeast and not try to rely on wild yeast. :thumb:

 

[splangemac]

Thank you I think that sounds a better bet.

 

[Brewtrog]

If you want to retry this experiment, try making your own bread first and using that. You're more likely to have yeast in the bread that way. So saying, as gray's says, I'd always use yeast in a brew rather than relying on wild yeasts.

 

[graysalchemy]

I can't see how bread would have any live yeast left in it after being baked in an oven at 200+c even the core reaches 90c for it to be cooked. I suspect the yeast would have been either from sitting around in a bakery or from wild yeast which inevitably attaches itself to the bread.

The reason why they would have done it that way is that they didn't have brewers yeast and certainly not wine yeast readily available in the 1950's.

I would use proper wine yeast and be done. :thumb:

 

[hypnoticmonkey]

I read a recipe/blog post about prison booze which involved using a slice of bread in lieu of actual yeast.

Can't help but agree with you, though, GA. I think it's more a case of hoping it picks up some wild yeasties from the air, or some such, from the bread.

 

[splangemac]

Well thank you everyone. I make my own bread so I'll take a bit of everyone's advice by using that and including wine yeast as well. I may start it this weekend so I'll let you know how I get on. This time I'll sterilise everything as well. Thanks again.

 

[hypnoticmonkey]

Incidentally, if you're into weird brewing experiments, just search for Moley's posts c.2009-2010.

 

[splangemac]

Oh thanks I will.