I feel the need the need for MEAD!

OK OK, I stole that line from a t-shirt idea that was batted around today at my mead making class, but really.. I do feel the need to make some MEAD! From what I learned today, mead, being one of the worlds oldest fermented beverages, is also one of the easiest wines to make.

It stands to reason that it would be when you think about it considering that it was made, almost simultaneously by the Norse, the Egyptians and the Celts throughout history. They didn't have modern tools and sanitation ability like we do and were able make mead quite easily. Also honey, whick in case you aren't in the know about mead, is the base fermentable sugar in the mead, was one of the few available sugars throughout history.

After spending nearly an hour talking "Mead Theory" with the instructor, we got down to it. The mead that we were to make was of course honey based, but also had added in bartlett pears that would increase the fermentable sugars available, while also adding a slight flavor to the mead, and a certain bouquet in the final product.

The Honey and water wort (The base of the recipe)

After mixing the FIFTEEN pounds of honey into water to begin disolving it, the pears and more water were boiled to break down the cell walls and release the flavors and also to kill off any potentially competing yeasts or bacterias. We want to control the yeasts that will go into the mix so this is an important step. While we milled and added the pears to the wort (The base of the mead.) we began to heat another pot of water with other additives that will affect the mead formation in different ways. Peppermint tea, gypsum (yes the stone) and black tea amongst them. This was brought to a boil and was then added to the wort as well.

The "additives" like irish moss, gypsum and spearmint tea...

After everything was added to the wort and it had been stirred vigorously to fully dissolve the honey and incorporate all the additives evenly through the mixture as well as to aid in lowering the temperature to verynear to room temperature, we learned how to "pitch the yeast". Pitching the yeast is much like proofing yeast before adding it to a bread recipe. A cup or so of the luke warm wort was placed in a separate bowl and the yeast was added to this. It was gently stirred into the wort and left to sit and bloom. And bloom it did. After 15 minutes the pitched yeast looked like a bowl of porridge.

Adding the pears for sugar and bouquet. (If you're going to learn to make mead, you should of course learn from a man with celtic knots on his arms yes?)

We had to stop there unfortunately because of legal reasons surrounding the manufacturing laws for alchoholic beverage or some odd thing, but the last steps were simply to stir in the yeast to the full bucket of wort, add a fermentation lock and wait...

All in all I would say that it lived up to its reputation for being a very easy brew to make. If you've not had mead, it is typically a golden-hued wine with a honey sweetness and slight dryness, depending on the recipe. It can be very mild on the finish or can have a strong back-end almost like a distilled spirit. Any way you can get it though, it is very tasty. I look forward to making some this year, and with any luck, getting some bees next year to provide me my own honey to make it with!

Best till next time all.
Paul~

Kombucha Making

I spoke some time back about how I was experimenting with making some kombucha and I realized that while I had taken pictures of the progress I hadn't shared it with you, so I thought I'd take a minute to bring the blog up to date with the progress on that front.

To start with I needed to get a SCOBY started. For those not yet initiated in the ways of kombucha, a SCOBY is an acronym for Sybiotic Colony Of Bacteria and Yeast.
This was the "mini"-SCOBY that I started with. It was collected from a store bought bottle of kombucha that a friend of mine gave me. To grow it into something that I could make a sizeable quantity of Kombucha from I placed in this bowl full of sweetened green tea. The Yeasts in the SCOBY consume the sugars in the tea and ferment it producing alchohol. This alchohol is then consumed, through further fermatation, by the various (beneficial) bacteria to produce acetic acid. An additional by product is the Cellulose that makes up the body of the SCOBY.

Now, biology lesson completed, I was successful in culturing my SCOBY into a nicely formed disc of Bacteria and Yeast which I would now send forth to do my komucha bidding!
That white color is from the cellulose that I was talking about.

Although you can't really see the bacteria, being microscopic and all, if you look in the photo below you can see the whispy tendrils hanging from the main body of the SCOBY. Those are mainly yeasts. Many of them being the same types that do our work for us in other goodies like Sourdough and kefir.
In fact, I was successful enough in culturing my SCOBY that I am now able to have two gallon Suntea jars going constantly brewing for me.


Now that only problem I have is that I'm running out of bottles. These bottles were from my Mr Beer experiment last year and have come in handy for bottling the finished product.

Kombucha is a naturally effervescent drink because as the yeast comsume the sugars, they also "breath" out CO2 as a by-product. After bottling the kombucha, I let it sit at room temperature for 3-4 days during which time it continues to brew and breath. The bottling holds in the CO2 and when it's opened. Phzzttt... Carbonated!

It's an acquired taste, I will say that for it, but once you've acquired it, you gotta have it. There's been some issues with the labeling on some of the store bought Kombucha out there lately and some of it has been pulled form the shelves. The nice part about making your own, as with all things, is that you always know what's in it, and more to the point that you can always get it!

You should try it out. You may not even like it after trying, but it's a great science experiment and fun to watch progress. If you do try... good luck!
P~

Fermentation Friendly Home(stead)

Yes, I think I can safely say that we are a fermentation friendly home(stead).
We've made home-made lacto-fermented sauerkraut, traditional sour brine pickles and pickled corn,
We've grown Lactobacillus cultures to ferment milk into yogurt,
We've brewed our own beer,
We've kept our sourdough starter as a member of the family for nearly the last three years.
Now... well now it's time to welcome "Mother" home.

I'm talking about a Mother SCOBY for kombucha of course. If you're not familiar with what Kombucha is, it's a fermented tea that many claim has many healthful properties. I cannot speak to that yet, but it is a good tea from what I've had of it... good enough to try making some on my own! My kids really seem to enjoy what we've had of it; we've tried a few different varieties from our local health food store.

The first thing we needed to do was to start a SCOBY of our own. SCOBY is an acronym for Symbiotic Colony of Bacteria and Yeast. It contains the different bacteria and yeasts that consume the sugars in in the sweetened tea and create the acids and bubbles that are indicative of good kombucha. There are places, I'm told, where one can purchase a Mother SCOBY, but me being me, I had to try to start on on my own.
This is a bowl of tea that I made from Jasmine Flower Green tea and added about a third of a bottle of RAW kombucha that had a small piece of culture starting in it. This little piece was about the size of a quarter and I hoped it would have enough of the live micro-organisms and yeasts to start a new SCOBY.
I left it, covered with a towel, for about ten days on top of my refrigerator and it bloomed very nicely... for lack of a better definition.

Here you can see the new home that I moved it over to this weekend.
It's a two-gallon FOOD GRADE plastic bucket. I brewed a large batch of the same Jasmine Green Tea and sweetened it with about a cup and a half of sugar. To that I added about a cup of the tea from the small batch that I used to grow my new Start and slid the new SCOBY start into it.
And here's the new SCOBY that I have so far. It's darker than most that I've seen, but it's also just started. My hope is that as the new "daughter" SCOBY grows it will form the typical whitish cellulose SCOBY that I've seen before.

So then, I know some of you have made these before, can you tell me if I'm on the right track? How's it looking so far. With any luck, I think that in the next week and a half or so I should be able to drink it!

Are you a fermentation friendly home(stead)? I'm thinking I need to come up with a neat little side bar banner for that? what do you think?
Well, best to you... till next time.
P~