DrankTank : The Beverage Blog

Man do I hate bottling. I started homebrewing about 3 years ago and by my 3rd batch I had already switched to kegging.  It is infinitely quicker and easier. Occasionally, however, circumstances arise that force me to put a bunch of liquid in bottles and cap them. Yesterday, I spent my entire day bottling 3 pretty unique brews, none of which were beer.

1. Shularbrau Cyser - A Cyser Mead brewed in August of 2007.   A Cyser is a subcategory of mead with Apple Cider as the base liquid instead of water.  Basically, lots of honey, lots cider and some yeast.  I brewed the official 2007 National Mead Day recipe here.  It turned out great, but I do think if I let it sit another year or two it will be even better.  It still has a hint of that “rocket fuel” taste that young mead often does.
2. Tennessee Cider - My parents have an apple tree that went nuts this year.  They had a TON of apples from the one tree and it about broke the tree because of the weight.  During one of my trips to see them this fall, I collected as many apples as I could pick before I got tired of it.  Since I don’t have a press, I ran them through my juicer!  I ended up with about 2 gallons of fresh cider that has been fermenting and aging for about 4 months now.  It finally got bottled this weekend.  It is a bit sour, but that’s probably just a characteristic of that particular apple.  A wonderful apple aroma.  There is no infection or off flavors, and it’s not a bad start for a first try at a “real” hard cider (I’ve done the fermented store-bought apple juice thing several times, and it just isn’t the same).
3. Scarlett’s Muscadine Wine - Muscadine grapes are not uncommon in North Carolina. The girl picked enough grapes last year to get about 2.5 gallons of juice.  We crushed them and they have been fermenting/aging for about 4 months.  In my opinion, it turned out a bit too dry for muscadine wine, but I decided to go ahead and bottle it as-is instead of back-sweetening it.  The wine has a beautiful clear red color and I think the key to enjoying it is going to be finding a FOOD that goes well with it.  I’m thinking fruit?  Like a nice juicy pear?

It’s a bit overwhelming to have so many BOTTLES right now.  All said, I probably have 200+ bottles of various fermented bevereges aging in the basement now.  Building a cold-room (for fermenting and storage) is long overdue and I do hope to get that project started in the next month or so.