rhubarb wine

[tonyhibbett]

My previous attempt at rhubarb wine was plagued by too much initial sugar, 3 pounds per gallon. I found the quickest and most efficient way to extract the juice is by chopping and crushing underfoot, like grapes, then squeezing through a straining bag. However, I am having another attempt with the dry extraction method, adding a kilo of sugar to 3 pounds of chopped rhubarb with a teasponn of pectolase. I will also add 250 g of chopped sultanas and the juice of 1 orange. As the wine will be high in acid (malic), I plan to induce a malolactic fermentation towards the end, which will convert the malic acid to lactic. (less sharp) and produce a sparkling wine.

 

[tonyhibbett]

After 24 hours, colour and flavour extraction is good. The rhubarb is still quite firm. This is a 2 gallon brew. I have added a small amount of tannin, which, incidentally, has added a little more colour.

 

[Dieseljockey]

4 years on and this thread still as legs.... :clap:

I made 23 lts of Rhubarb this time last year and we are just getting around to enjoying it. We tried the odd bottle a while back nothing to write home about, but now :drunk: I'm glad I made it. It does get better with time.

In fact...we went up the big house in the village only yesterday to get a car full of barb....



We have two of these full ready for next weekend....

 

[tonyhibbett]

Having strained, rinsed and topped up with water, I must say the taste is very insipid. There is still 4 pounds of rhubarb solids left. I have therefore split the brew, with 1 gallon as per the original recipe and will leave these solids to pulp ferment for 2 weeks in the other gallon, as per another recipe I have.

 

[tonyhibbett]

As the use of sulphite is optional, I left it out. As this was cold extraction, the wild yeasts were not killed off. As a result, the must was already fermenting when I added the wine yeast and nutrients, so off to a fast start.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Continuing pulp fermentation seems to be the better option in terms of flavour, which is lovely. The pH at this stage is 3.7, which is perfectly acceptable.

 

[Kieran]

Hi I'm new to all this, I got a coopers beer kit bought for me when I house sat for a friend, it went well and I enjoyed drinking and making it. Anyway I picked the rhubarb in my garden for my daughter who insisted I make crumbles ( she's four) turns out she doesn't like crumbles. So I had just over two kilos of the stuff to use before it went bad. And this thread popped up on google. Here's my question do I use a campden tablet when racking? I'm only a week into fermention which is going nicely, thanks. Just got to take my hat off to some of you guys too cos I've been thru a few pics, there's some serious brewers about. I didn't realise how big of a thing this was. Cheers.

 

[Tim_Crowhurst]

Adding a campden tablet when you rack reduces the risk of oxidation, which would damage the flavour of the finished wine. There are other ways to do it, but for the hobbyist a campden is by far the simplest and cheapest option.

 

[tonyhibbett]

2 kg of rhubarb per gallon is rather excessive which could result in too much oxalic acid. If this is the case, add 2 litres of white grape juice at this stage and before adding the campden tablet. This will dilute the acid to an acceptable level.

 

[Kieran]

Ok thanks for th advice, I was just following th recipe at the beginning of this thread. :)

 

[Intelekt]

I'm using just over 2kg of rhubarb in my brew :thumb: in my other rhubarb wine thread, seems to be ok, smells delish :party:

There is next to zero oxalic acid in the rhubarb stalks, it's all in the roots and leaves mostly, so there is nothing to worry about :thumb:

 

[tonyhibbett]

Nonetheless, it is there. OK, a kilo of rhubarb consumed in one go is considered a fatal dose of oxalic acid and using sugar to extract the juice means that only 30% of the rhubarb goes into the brew, so safe limits. However smell and taste are no guide to toxicity. The first 4% run of any distillation smells and tastes great, but is very high in acetone and methanol, a mere teaspoon of the latter is fatal.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Incidentally, spinach is similarly high in oxalic acid. A famous nautical cartoon character was created to encourage American kids to eat the stuff. The sort of quantities he consumed would have the opposite effect of that portrayed!

 

[Intelekt]

I don't think I could eat a kilo of rhubarb in one go :sick: :sick: nor a spinach wine :sick:

I use methanol to run some of my camp stoves :thumb: but never get it on bare skin as its toxic by absorption :electric:

 

[tonyhibbett]

Popeye also smoked a pipe. Tobacco contains oxalic acid too. You don't see much of Popeye these days, nor indeed that cowboy figure advertising Marlboro ****, since he died of lung cancer.
Ever heard of 'ruby red'? Port mixed with meths to disguise the blue dye added to meths to discourage people drinking it. Oddly enough, it was the toxic substances added to absynthe to preserve the green colour which led to it being banned in France, not the absynthe itself!

 

[tonyhibbett]

The pulp fermented batch has a much stronger flavour and colour, but was also significantly more acidic (pH 3.4 compared with the first batch of 3.7). By blending the two, the total acid is 4.8 ppt (t), which is surprisingly low but still within the acceptable range. Now I understand why 1 of the recipes includes the juice of an orange per gallon. I have now added this, bringing the pH to 3.3, with a pleasant twang to the taste.

 

[tonyhibbett]

With hindsight, the dry extraction approach, on its own, seems naff. Not only do you get little flavour, you also lose a lot of sugar. Chopping and freezing, followed by pulp fermentation with pectic enzyme is fine for small quantities but impractical for large quantities, for which crushing underfoot still remains the best option. The addition of sultanas, orange juice and tannin are worthwhile. The wild yeasts present have no detrimental effect. As yet the effect of inducing a malolactic fermentation. A sparkling wine benefits from a relatively high level of acidity, which is currently on the lowish side.

 

[Kieran]

Well I'm only doing one dj full so I won't wash my feet just yet. :)
I might do a strawberry wine next, theres a pick ure own in Leeds which is pretty close to me, I know all the frost we've had has delayed growth but apparently that means fruit this year will be extra tasty. The strawberry in my garden are only just flowering. Anyone know a good thread on here for strawberrys?

 

[tonyhibbett]

As an experiment, I chopped some rhubarb, shredded in the food processor and put it in the freezer. Once thawed, I squeezed out the juice, leaving 25% of solids. So 1 kilo would produce 1.5 litres of juice. The pH was 3.4. I then realised that I could have saved a lot of time by simply running it through an electric juice extractor and squeezing extra juice out of the ejected pulp. There is no point in pulp fermenting either way.

 

[Kieran]

Hi can I add grape juice when racking, I thought I read somewhere you could but thought I would double check. Cheers.