Basic Wine/Mead recipes?

mmm420socal · Mar 14, 2006

Hey guys, Im looking to try my hand at making some ghetto hooch...Aside from Pruno, I don't know much about home made wines.

I got a couple bottles of concord grape juice (100% juice), some sugar and some dry activated yeast...

I'm not trying to make real wine, just wanna see if I can get some kinda drinkable, alcoholic brew. I drink a lot of beer and I thought it would be fun to see if I could do it on the cheap, myself with wine instead.

Any SIMPLE 1-2 week recipes would be appreciated.

MMM

mean mr.mustard · Mar 15, 2006

Pruno!

I would recommend brewing beer as a start... work your way up. Take it from one who has: start simple and small!
If you don't want to make something that tastes good and the bang for your buck is what you want, then I might tell you to still moonshine (if it wasn't illegal, which it is)....

Sleepy · Mar 15, 2006

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmead!

do you want dry or sweet?

fizzy or flat?

start with 15 pounds of clover honey, water and yeast.

boil water and honey 15 minutes...add to more water to make 5 gallons...cool, and pitch yeast.

cleanliness is paramount!

how many carboys do you have?

meads will ferment a loooong time, secondary ferment is usually not enough...sometimes a tertiary fermenting period is needed.

expect it to ferment about a year. :yoinks:

the longer it sits in bottle, the better it gets! :yummy:

there are lots of recipes on line, try google.

p.s. "on the cheap" = brew that tastes like sweatsocks :yoinks:

garbage in...garbage out.

mmm420socal · Mar 15, 2006

Sleepy said:
p.s. "on the cheap" = brew that tastes like sweatsocks

garbage in...garbage out.

Thanks for the tips.... I just wanted to make some baloon wine

I do wanna try some mead however...

As far as distilling goes, its on my planned wish-list of future activities LOL...Distill out about 2gallons of lightning to last the year

LOL

On the cheap = tastes like shit = gets you drunk...All alcohol tastes like ass to me anyway, I just wanted to see if I could make something alcoholic in my own kitchen, cuz I'm bored.

I'm 26, I can just go buy wine, LOL... But I wanted to see if I could make it, for fun.

Thanks for all the help! :kissass:

MMM

mean mr.mustard · Mar 16, 2006

Well, I'd tell ya that the grape juice you have is probably carrying a preservative like potassium sorbate... that won't ferment because it'd kill the yeast.... like I said, the basics are called basic for a reason.... try brewing beer, then move up. The things you will learn, my, oh my, the things you will learn!

Saint Simon · Apr 4, 2006

Well it seems your in luck
this was posted on Overgrow a while ago and I copied it for safe keeping and it takes about a week.

For "better" tasting Ghetto Hooch
for a 1 litre bottle:
use 1/10 (yep .1) Teaspoon of yeast
use 4 Teaspoons (20 grams) of sugar
for every . 70 - .85 litres of juice

For any other size you'll have to find your calculator

Make sure all bottles and utensils are clean and sterile (THIS IS KEY)

Pour your Juice (100% not from Concentrate juice grape is prefered but its all about taste) into the bottle

add the Sugar and the Yeast, the order is not really important but I usually put the Sugar in first.

Once all the ingredients are placed in the bottle airlock it by putting a balloon or plastic bag over the mouth of the bottle held in place with either an elastic band or some sort of strong tape. Make sure no air can get in or out

Now that all the hard work is done take your bottle and put it in a dark area and is around room temperature.

Let this sit for 5 - 7 days depending on the potency you would like (Longer = Stronger) You will know it is working when the bag begins to inflate this is the yeast doing its job.

Once you are finished filter the Hooch through 2 or 3 Coffee filters into another clean bottle.

Place the bottle in the freezer over night to let it settle and you have yourself some cheap, easy, pretty tasty Ghetto hooch.

hope this is what you were looking for
- Simon

btb103 · Apr 5, 2006

In my experience I've found that adding some brown sugar improves the taste and the amount of sugar is entirely up to you to decide what kind of wine you like. I've also decided that grape is terrible and I only use 100% apple cider... very tasty stuff.

hyped4bu · Apr 5, 2006

3 to 5 parts water to each part honey. You can bring it to a boil first for a clearer end product, but I think it tasts better un-cooked. I use a blender to mix the honey and water.

I would suggest using 3 or 5 gallon glass bottles to ferment because you can get cheap airlocks to fit the neck of the bottle (need a way to keep it clean like a bubbler/ airlock

Find a warm place to ferment it. I use the top of the refrigerator.

Lavolin Champaign yeast works well for mead.

Here is a link with a bunch of recipes
http://www.realbeer.com/spencer/cats-meow/chap10.html#menu

HotCha · Apr 18, 2007

Mead is crazy. It's really hard to get consistent results, which is why you don't see much mead on the shelves at your local wine shop.

Start with the best quality, freshest honey you can find. Find a light colored honey like tupelo. 3lbs. per gallon of water is a good mix.

Avoid boiling if you can as this will drive off some of the volatile aroma compounds. The key to keeping your mead free of contamination is a big, active yeast starter and sanitary equipment and practices.

Initial fermentation should finish up pretty quickly. It's good to move the mead to a fresh carboy to get it off of the yeast sediment which can contribute off flavors to the mead.

When we say you're looking for your mead to be clear before you bottle it, we mean CLEAR. Clear like apple juice, crystal clear. All meads will do this eventually, if you don't want to wait there's a product called Sparkolloid that will clarify mead in less than a week if you follow the directions.

Make sure the mead has finished fermenting before you bottle it. Get a hydrometer ($10 at your local homebrew shop) and check the specific gravity to make sure fermentation has ended. If you bottle before fermentation has ended you can wind up with an amazing sticky mixture of booze and glass shards to clean up, not fun.

I recommend using plain brown beer bottles with oxygen barrier caps. The brown glass will protect the mead from the light and the oxygen barrier caps will allow you to age for a long time without worries. Beer bottles allow you to serve smaller amounts as well.

Mead can cause brutal hangovers, consume responsibly and drink plenty of water. I've seen pro drinkers wrecked by mead because they didn't realize the alcohol content was so high. We call it "wobble pop."

jim_w · Apr 19, 2007

On the cheap = tastes like shit = gets you drunk...All alcohol tastes like ass to me anyway, I just wanted to see if I could make something alcoholic in my own kitchen, cuz I'm bored.

If you just want something to get you smashed for cheap, make a sugar wash - all the yeast actually needs is sugar and some nutrients. A couple of tubes of tomato paste, some marmite and a bit of acid (I use tataric) will give the yeast enough nutes, then use roughly a half a pound of sugar per litre - two pounds per gallon. This will make a very strong but horible tasting wash. I distill this crap, but if you haven't got the resources to do that then just mixing it with a bit of fruit concentrate or something should make it drinkable.

Fruit and whatnot is nice, but not needed to make alcohol.

As others have said, cleanliness is paramount. Also important is dealing with gas flow - if you want your hooch to be reasonably strong you've got to let the co2 escape - just sealing the bottle with a balloon won't vent enough co2 to allow a decent amount of alcohol to be made. A fermentation lock is fairly cheap and you can seal one into pretty much any bottle cap with silocone or caulk.

Obviously the bigger the bottle the better - I use five gallon kegs (uk gallons - bigger than yours ;-P).

The Bastard Brewer · Apr 25, 2007

water ,sugar and yeast are all that needed to make alcohol, this is also something you can place in your grow room as it will PUMP out CO2 ,BUT if you want something that tastes nice to drink ,then thats the trick.
100% fruit juices are perfect ,better to get them from Health Food shops and make sure that they do not contain additives or preservatives. Any fruit will do ,but some are better suited than others. (The reason that grapes are the standard fruit for wine making is that the yeast used in brewing grows naturally on the skins of certain grapes and when crushed the yeast would mix with the natural sugars of the grape and ferment naturally,almost magically) . For water NEVER use spa/bottled/filtered water as it is the impurities in the water that will give your brew its unique taste.Heavily fluridated/chlorinated water from the tap is also not a good idea.BUT if you leave the tap water lying for a day at room temperature this should cause most of the Flurides and chlorinates to evaporate.Research your water sourse and experiment if possible.
I would also recommend a water lock rather than the balloon technique.
I also put up a basic Cider recipe earlier in this forum. This is the same recipe I used for the CycoCyder presented at the 420 Cup 2007 and is about as simple and quick as they come.
For first time brewers I would recommend a beer kit at first ,this is to get used to the equipement and techniques involved after this try the CycoCyder recipe and hopefully you should supprise yourself.
REMEMBER
GARBAGE IN = GARBAGE OUT
KEEP THE EQUIPEMENT CLEAN!!!!!
Happy brewing.

D0nC0smic · May 12, 2007

HotCha said:
Mead can cause brutal hangovers, consume responsibly and drink plenty of water. I've seen pro drinkers wrecked by mead because they didn't realize the alcohol content was so high. We call it "wobble pop."

He he he, then they weren't true pro drinkers, on the subject of mead and crazy drinking, anyone here ever been to Pennsic?

BACKCOUNTRY · May 22, 2007

I only made Mead once, with Orange blossom honey, it was awesom! Long wait to get it right(unaged Mead can taste pretty harsh), but that stuff was so pure and clean.

It was too popular with my freinds and I, and we drank most of the 5 gallon batch in a month.

Its great even consumed at warm room temp, but I always thought it would be good to make a even fizzier Mead and use it insted of champangne for Mimosas(mixed with Orange juice).

Guest · May 22, 2007

Master Thai got a recipe for you

Master Thai got a recipe for you

It was 1977 or was 78 so long ago,
but thats when Friends of Thai,
published a sister mag to hightimes called Stoneage,
only one issue was printed with success.
[/ the first issue,
anyhow we had some recipes in it for making mead and wine ,
beer/wine recipes that I see that someone is using and taking credit for these days, lols.
youngins crack Master up lols.
Ahhh who cares ,
just as long as the mission is the same.
Legal weed !!!!

Master will get this out this weekend
and scan it for all to see, posting tues or something like that.
use the recipes if u like,
the mead* is very good but takes a year to cure,
you can even make it using such trash as stems.
works very well even mind blowing when u use budzzzz's
the wine*, 6 mos.
the Beer * 8 weeks (if its Ale)
Also in this mag ,
recipes for Bang* ( a candy)
Bang Lassie* ( a drink)
some very kewl pics too of the Market place ( India)
peace,
Master Thai ;-)I]

yea ill fix the below as soon as these girls/gardens give me some time.

Guest · Jun 18, 2007

Did u forget Master Thai ???

Did u forget Master Thai ???

Highhhh Grasshoppers,
Master hasn't forgotten you,
just real busy,
finish up some late spring things for the summer.
Will return,
Master swears ! with recipes in hand and pics too !
for all to have,
Spreading the love for free.
give master 7-10 days to get back and we will start the brewing party,
Master Thai have lots of shake saved up for these demo's :yoinks:

peace,
Master Thai *-)

Master Thai's own 100 % pure "Sweet Heaven" ( aka: The 1%er ) will be used for these demos as well as some love potion resins and shake.

the orginal L.P. # 1 BX1
***special note of interest ; breed to above, ready for testing,
Master Thai's own "Sweet Heaven" crossed ----
to the Orginal pre-released 2003 "Love Potion #1 tester, by Reeferman
Master BX and cubed this strain,
then crossed twice to the " Sweet Heaven "
should make a very intersting old school BX, like the old days back in the 70's when trying to improve the lumbo using Kush's from Pakiville or Indo's from Afganville.
See u soon ,
peace,
Master Thai *-)

NOTICE still will happen , sorry thou no demo stuff got all burned up in fire, BUT book was in a different safe place of storage. peace, M.T.

Don Cotyle · Oct 26, 2007

There are basically 3 kinds of mead wine.

Regular Mead wine is almost like a pale ale and hops is used in the mix.

Sach mead is a sweet wine without the addition of hops.

My personal favorite is Sach Metheglon in which cake spices are added at the begining of the fermentation process...very spicey and sweet. I use ginger, allspice,cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg etc. I usaly break out a few bottles for the holidays and serve it warmed up.

Do a search for mead recipes on the net...good luck and have fun!!! Don't forget to get other supplies like camden tablets etc.

Once you the hang of it start a batch of Dandylion wine in the spring!!! :headbange

zymos · Oct 26, 2007

Do yourself a favor and save the hops for beer, is my opinion (and "regular" mead doesn't contain hops anyway).

Don Cotyle · Oct 26, 2007

zymos said:
Do yourself a favor and save the hops for beer, is my opinion (and "regular" mead doesn't contain hops anyway).

I beg to differ that point, hops can be added to mead to give it a pale ale flavor, I have several books on wine makeing and one of the recipes calls for hops as an ingreediant in mead, you can basically make wine out of anything...there is even a reciepy for Oak leaf wine... no I never tried it because it didn't seem very apealing.

zymos · Oct 26, 2007

You can add hops to your mead, I personally wont.
That's the beauty of homebrewing!

They sure aren't a traditional ingredient though. Hops have only been used in brewing for a few hundred years, but mead has been around far longer.

The oak leaves are used to add tannins to wines made from fruits and other sugars that don't normally contain tannin, thus making them closer to "real" (grape) wine.
I don't really like extra tannins in my meads either, though I often add some amount of various fruits or juices.

Cheers!

Don Cotyle · Oct 27, 2007

Hi Zymos, I definatly agree that hops isn't a traditional ingreadent, and I only tryed it once and wasn't happy with the results, I lean towards the sweet and spiced mead myself.

I'm aso very fond of Dandylion wine but don't like the finger stains from picking 2 gallon bags of them!

Peace Bro!

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Basic Wine/Mead recipes?

mmm420socal

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mean mr.mustard

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Sleepy

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mmm420socal

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mean mr.mustard

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Saint Simon

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hyped4bu

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HotCha

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The Bastard Brewer

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