Kitchen Alchemy
Sep. 11th, 2004 02:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
treeskinForgot to mention that I'd bottled all of last fall's batch of pear wine on Wednesday, and started two batches of oak leaf mead.
The pear's not bad, a bit green flavor-wise, although I thought it was better than a pear mead that was being passed proudly around Laid-Back. It has potential now, it ought to be quite good 6-12 months from now. I'm in no hurry. It's not quite as dark as I was expecting (running the pears through Robyn's juicer caramellized some of the sugar in the juice), but still a rich amber color, and I think there will be a hint of caralem in the flavor once the "new wine" taste ages out.
I am in a hurry about the oak leaf mead (aka the Ent Juice). I'm just that curious to see how it turns out. One batch with red oak leaves, one batch with bur oak. In each case, I infused the leaves in water for 5 hours, then added the 12 cups of infusion to about 2 gallons of honey-water (the usual ratio, 1:4). The red oak infusion just smelled tannic and earthy, and was basic brown; nice, but I can get that from tea. The bur oak infusion...oooo....it had the most wonderful earthy smoke smell (not sure if that's the leaves, or the fact that I picked the leaves off the tree near our campfire), and a rich red-brown color. That's the one I have high hopes for. I'm using this set of recipes for proportions (leaves to water, etc), but I don't think I want a product as strong and acid as the original recipes looks to provide. Hence, mead.
Next batch of mead (probably when these two are out of the primary fermenter, 1-3 months depending on yeast activity) will be those black currants in the fridge.
The pear's not bad, a bit green flavor-wise, although I thought it was better than a pear mead that was being passed proudly around Laid-Back. It has potential now, it ought to be quite good 6-12 months from now. I'm in no hurry. It's not quite as dark as I was expecting (running the pears through Robyn's juicer caramellized some of the sugar in the juice), but still a rich amber color, and I think there will be a hint of caralem in the flavor once the "new wine" taste ages out.
I am in a hurry about the oak leaf mead (aka the Ent Juice). I'm just that curious to see how it turns out. One batch with red oak leaves, one batch with bur oak. In each case, I infused the leaves in water for 5 hours, then added the 12 cups of infusion to about 2 gallons of honey-water (the usual ratio, 1:4). The red oak infusion just smelled tannic and earthy, and was basic brown; nice, but I can get that from tea. The bur oak infusion...oooo....it had the most wonderful earthy smoke smell (not sure if that's the leaves, or the fact that I picked the leaves off the tree near our campfire), and a rich red-brown color. That's the one I have high hopes for. I'm using this set of recipes for proportions (leaves to water, etc), but I don't think I want a product as strong and acid as the original recipes looks to provide. Hence, mead.
Next batch of mead (probably when these two are out of the primary fermenter, 1-3 months depending on yeast activity) will be those black currants in the fridge.
