Amateur brewers, beer, wine & cider?

[rapid van cleef]

I make my own spirits. anything you can think of, well, in fact, never mad brandy yet............gotta get some flavourings for that. I drink very little. Its just nice to be able to have a glass or two of southern comfort if i feel like it, and not have to have paid 40-50 bucks for the pleasure. Wifey likes to make cocktails now and again so its cheap for that. For the price of 1 shot and a mixer in a bar I can make a litre of the stuff at home. But then you dont get the whole, going out experienece that i do like.

Weve got a Guava tree and we were wondering about making wine or sumat out of that............well the fruit that is!. Any ideas?

[yachtie10]

you can make guava wine
or distill it for spirits
you can make spirits from pretty much any fruit vegetable or grain plus some others im sure
how it tastes is the main issue

[spajohn]

I've just got back into beer brewing and am about to bottle my third batch tonight. I first tried years ago when I lived in Sydney...living in an apartment that hit 35-40c during the days made for some pretty awful brew. This time around living in an insulated house in Wellington I'm getting much better results...have used Munton's and Brewcraft kits, some with dextrose, another with malt extract. May try an all grain brew once I get the kits turning out OK.

[P38]

How do you prepare the fruit? Do you use a juicer on a food processor, or do you have a press, or something else? Thanks.

Crush the apples whole, collect all the juice and pulp. Put it all into a large bucket with a loose fitting lid and leave it for a long time.... over winter is good.
Empty the contents of the bucket into a press. Squeeze all the juice out and finish the fermentation. filter. bottle then leave for another longtime. open and enjoy.

[Pedrostt500]

Interested in Ginger beer (alcoholic) and that perry sounds good
recipies or links if you have them would be great

would also be interested it the equipment if anyone is getting rid of theirs

Here is the ginger beer recipe that I use,
For the plant,
Glass jar with screw top, ie preserving jar.
1/2 ounce Brewers yeast, though I use a tea spoon of Edmonds Active Yeast.
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 cup of tepid water, about body temprature.
feed plant daily for a week, 1 teaspoon sugar & 1 teaspoon ground ginger.
Mixing the ginger beer.
4 lemons,
3 cups of sugar,
5 cups of boiling water,
12 cups of cold water,
In a large bowl or pot place 3 cups of sugar and juice of 4 lemons, stir together well, add 5 cups of boiling water and stir untill sugar has disolved. Then add 12 cups of cold water and stir once again.
Strain the plant through a muslin cloth,( or a peice of fine curtain netting material non paterned,) into the bowl, the ginger beer is now ready for bottling, enough bottles for approxamatly 4.5 litres.
I use the schweps small glass screw top bottles they hold about 330 ml's, and store them in a plastic stacker crate, just incase any exsplode, though the small plastic coce bottles would be fine as well.
I find the ginger beer is drink able in 4 days, and the best is from the second batch onwards.
To restart the plant just empty the solids from the muslin cloth back into your plant jar, add a cup of tepid water a teaspoon of ground ginger, and a teaspoon of sugar, and feed again for 7 days.
have fun.

[Pedrostt500]

opps miss read that, posted a naon alcoholic ginger beer.

[Pedrostt500]

ok try this link for the Perry
http://www.forum.realbeer.co.nz/prof...s/perry-making
And I am working from a book called Cider written by Anne Proulx & Lew Nichols ISBN 978-1-58017-520-3, this is written for the American market, but alot applies world wide. It is not hard to find information on cider making on the Web as there are more sites than you can shake a stick at.
at present I use a good home juicer for juicing apples and pears, though I do have plans for an apple grinder and press to be built some time in the future.

[Leviticus]

I need to make some cider then, haven't had a decent one since I've been here. My favourite had a Honey flavour added, and was very strong, but was smooth and easy to drink.

Could be fun....