Mutant Parsnip Wine

My good lady Jane has been wanting me to make a Parsnip wine for a while now and we had been growing some parsnips down on the allotment for just that purpose. Unfortunately we have had to harvest them early as we have had some issues on the allotment we have had to deal with. Anyhow we dig them all up and they are small and rather freaky looking things indeed.

I have followed +Andy Hamilton's recipe for Parsnip wine on page 260 of his book Booze for Free. I think it is the most complicated recipe that I have done thus far, only due to the fact of the amount of pans and pots used, and making up a raisin syrup.

Anyhow it's currently cooling in a fermenting bucket, I'm not a big fan of parsnips myself but from what I have heard this wine doesn't taste to much of them, but we shall see in a few months or so.

 

Fermenting : Pumpkin Bitter

Way back last year I made up a pumpkin beer and it's been sitting in it's no-chill cube until I was allowed space in the dining room to ferment it. The wort has been sat in the cube for 29 days on top of 5g of Fuggles and 5g of Target home grown hops. It smelled lovley when I was pouring it into the fermention bucket on top of the required 2.5 liters of boiled water to bring the gravity down to the 3.6% ABV I am after.

The yeast used is Munton's standard Yeast that I had hanging around that needed to be used, so hopefully I'll see signs of fermentation quite soon.

Just as a side note, I ferment with all the trub and cold break, pretty much always have, and the beers come out just great.

Left to Right : Elderberry Wine, Pumpkin Beer, Parsnip wine,

Brewday: Mutant Parsnip Wine

My good lady Jane has been wanting me to make a Parsnip wine for a while now and we had been growing some parsnips down on the allotment for just that purpose. Unfortunately we have had to harvest them early as we have had some issues on the allotment we have had to deal with. Anyhow we dig them all up and they are small and rather freaky looking things indeed.

I have followed +Andy Hamilton's recipe for Parsnip wine on page 260 of his book Booze for Free. I think it is the most complicated recipe that I have done thus far, only due to the fact of the amount of pans and pots used, and making up a raisin syrup.

Anyhow it's currently cooling in a fermenting bucket, I'm not a big fan of parsnips myself but from what I have heard this wine doesn't taste to much of them, but we shall see in a few months or so.

We will rebuild!!!

Well at least the sun was out today, can't say that it was dry because as Jane posted the plot is pretty much been turned into a mud pit. So now the task of rebuilding and sorting the mayhem out has begun.





After five and a half hours I have managed to tidy the plots up quite a bit, still loads and loads to do. Had to shift so much rubbish that the digger had dug up from the banks, old pallets, metal poles, and loads of plastic bags and sheeting.

I'm getting there now slowly, I'll be rebuilding the pallet compost heaps in a new location and are now stacked ready for the new build on plot 120.

Still have to move the shed back into a proper location, but it's still to muddy to do that and I'll need plenty of help to shift it anyway.

We have also had a good news from the Allotment committee, in that we will NOT be charged next season to plot 120 and this was confirmed by the Allotment chairman on site today. 

As well as the good will gesture of not having to pay for plot 120 next year, Our site Plot Secretary has had a phone around and some of the other site holders have given us permission to harvest kale and Brussels from their plots to replace what was plowed into the ground.

So all in all I'm feeling a little better. Once the shed is moved back and the pallet compost bins are rebuilt I think I just might be able to forget about the whole nasty situation.

Very Upset

What a way to start the New Year.  Had a call from the plot secretary yesterday to say could we get down to the plot to take down the polytunnel as they were heading our direction with a mini digger to try and stop flooding.  Allotment is not flooding currently, it has flooded in the past as you may have seen from previous blogs.  This is normally due to us being at the bottom of the hill so lots of water drains our way.  Not normally a problem.  It floods.  It subsides.  No damage really done.  So we head down to the allotment to find that the polytunnel has already been taken down but not much else going on.  Mini digger filling in a big hole in the bank further up the allotment site that a plot tenant in his wisdom had decided to make..... this was allowing water from a drainage calvert to divert onto the allotment site.







So we went down there again today and were met with a scene of destruction.  My kale.  Gone.  Sprouts.  All gone.  Compost bins that Simon spent 2 weeks building.  Gone.   Shed has been moved. And for what?  Apparently very little.  The digger has been on the plot attacking the bank.  The bank to the left of the plot however is still the same height, just nearer to the culvert and not so wide.  The fencing to the top of the plot has been taken down leaving a minor bank with no protection from the culvert at all, guess we won't be taking our grandson down there anymore, far too dangerous.  And the water in the culvert?  Not going anywhere as the exit is blocked (off site so we cant clear it) so the water is still there.  Same place, same height.  The water from the culvert behind the shed had never actually flooded onto the plot anyway.

Same place as picture above..... after digger has been.  Now just plain dangerous.



And the area where Simons compost bins were?



Whole area flattened but no higher than before.

   

   

Managed to harvest some kale and brussels yesterday, as well as the parsnips, despite the weather and the mud everywhere, not knowing that it would all be destroyed today.  It is so upsetting to think of all the rest of the kale, brussels, cabbages and turnips being mashed into the mud by a digger when I grew each plant from seed and have nurtured them since last March.  And the comment has been made that we cant do anything with the bare land at the moment until it has been decided whether that will make up a new plot!  Excuse me!!! That is our plot!  A couple of days ago I had veg and a polytunnel on it!

Now we have been left with a hell of a mess.  Feeling very despondent.

 

Bottled : Quince Wine

The First wine of 2014 has now been bottled. Quince Wine. I made this wine 15/11/2013.

I found the recipe online but I can't remember where, fortunately I jotted down the details, so I'll post it here.

Quince Wine:

Ingredients

20 or more Quinces
3lb of sugar
4.5 liters of water
2 tsp of Citric Acid
2 tsp of Pectolase
1 tsp yeast nutrient
Champagne yeast (youngs)

Method

1. Grate the Quinces as close to the core as possible, I pealed and cut them by hand then grated them with our food processor.
2. Boil the quince pulp in the water for 15 minutes, then strain through muslin into primary fermenter, let the pulp drip drain. (Do not squeeze).
3. Stir in the sugar until dissolved.
4. Add the Citric Acid, Pectolase & Yeast Nutrient.
5. Allow to steep for 24 hours.
6. Rack into a demijohn and leave to ferment.
7. Rack again when the wine clears into a clean demijohn.
8. Once fermentation has stopped bottle the wine.

This is a sweet wine with the SG starting at 1.140 and ending with a SG of 1.050 giving a nice ABV of 11.8% and took just under two months to ferment out and clear.

My notes say to age for 1-2 years but I'm not sure it will last that long but will try and save a bottle until then. It made up 4 full 750ml bottles and just over half a 750ml bottle for us to consume nice and young, most probably tonight. So look out for a post later on the taste test.

1st seeds sown for 2014 (Chillies)

New Years Day is here, so just like last year I have sown my chilli seeds in coir pellets and put them all in the heated propagator.

I'm not doing as many plants this year as I had way to many hot chillies to deal with last year. I fact I stall have chilli fruits still on a few plants in the greenhouse still to be harvested.

This years peppers are:

1. Yummy (Sweet Pepper)


2. Big Banana (F1 hybrid Sweet Pepper)


3. Telimena (Sweet Pepper)


4. Bulgarian Carrot (Hot Pepper)


5. Habenero Orange (hot Pepper)

As last year we had far to many hot peppers this year we are going for more sweet peppers and a few new types of hot pepper. With a total of around 10 plants in the greenhouse instead of last year when I had 24 plants of mostly fiery hot chillies to deal with.

I've also been put in charge of trying to grow Aubergines as Jane had a go last year and they didn't come to anything at all. They are also in the propagator at the moment. The variety of Aubergine we tried last year was Black Beauty so I'm having a go at these again and using last years seed packet. Going to try for 5 plants that will live in the poly-tunnel when the sun comes back.