Death be to the Handy Cork

[Wade E]

Settle down over there Pelican, dont get your panties all in a bunch!

 

[uavwmn]

Pelican, I just won the Floor Corker. Got it for $85...that is including the shipping!! Woo Hoo!!

 

[vcasey]

That is great! Now you are going to wonder why you didn't just buy it to begin with, like many of us.
VC

 

[grapeman]

I wish someone had provided this link before you bid that high. Sorry. You can buy brand new from George for under $65 for the Portugese Corker.


http://www.finevinewines.com/ProdDetA.asp?PartNumber=4042


Regardless of the price, you will enjoy it much more than the handheld corkers.

 

[uavwmn]

Appleman, I did look at this one from George and I thought that with the brass plate iris it would last alot longer that the plastic one.


And you are right, regardless, I will probably enjoy this one more!!

 

[Scott]

Enjoy how easy it is to cork now uav, the only way to go

 

[pelican]

Congratulations UAVWMN!

 

[joeswine]

the one I use is ITALIAN of course,all metal/ brass iris and long on comfort...........................when in use.............

 

[rrawhide]

yeah - - -


we got us a wild corker for sure now - he will be corking everything is sight!!!

 

[intoxicating]

If I remember George correctly, the size 9 corks are usually used with 750 bottles, the size 8's with 375 bottles, and the size 7 corks with the 187 bottles.

I have the $16 double lever corker, and have had NO TROUBLE with it. No broken bottles, no creased corks, no spilled wine in three years. I actually managed, with the help of my 20 year old son, to get the FVW agglomerate #9 corks almost all the way into the 187 bottles before George told me that the corks come in sizes. I really don't have the budget or room for a floor corker at this time. I am keeping my obsession, I mean hobby, under control with only four carboys, three gallon each. The seven one gallon jugs I use to test new recipes don't count. That said, I am not bottling the amounts at once that you others are. I don't break a sweat bottling 15 or twenty in a day.

Only drawback to limiting my number of carboys is I can't bulk age for a year, and I have to wait to start the next batch of mead or (previously frozen) fruit wine until I have bottled what is working now. I want to try another batch of prickly pear this fall.

still working on the color. Start with red juice and end with white wine.

I have 2 of my carboys are in use for the Castel de Pape kit, and the other two have port style Mexican Plum. Will have to have at least one of them ready to bottle by October to start the cactus wine. Then the next empty carboys will be an experiemental carmel apple, and another batch of spiced mead. YUM

 

[vcasey]

Please post when you start on the caramel apple, that sounds very interesting. I made a caramel apple cyser that is now bottle aging.
VC

 

[intoxicating]

Tell me more about the cyser, what did you do to make it caramel, and how did the apple turn out? I want mine to be so chewy that it sticks to the roof of your mouth.

 

[vcasey]

I caramelized honey, added it to apple juice, used Vitilevure 58W3 wine yeasthttp://morewinemaking.com/view_product/6639/103218/Dry_Wine_Yeast_-_58W3_8_g, when you read the description you'll understand why! The mead at bottling was way too young to really get a good idea and it will be a few years before I even consider opening a bottle. No it did not stick to my mouth but it did have a nice mouth feel, nice aroma, just needs time. I did end up back sweetening this by caramelizing more honey to add to the mead, which by the way ended up at 18% so it will be a sipping drink! I did use a heavy American Oak with this mead.
VC

 

[intoxicating]

Can you taste the apples? Did you use bottled juice, or juice your own? Why American instead of French oak? I am not sure of the difference in taste, but the stuff I read looks like the French has more of a vanilla note to it. I love vanilla. I haven't oaked any of the mead I made so far.

 

[vcasey]

I used juice - hard to find a good source of cider apples in Florida

. American Oak was used because ......... I had it on hand. With the high alcohol level the only thing I can remember coming through is smoke and alcohol, and lots of both as I had anticipated (remember my choice of yeast) the honey was there as well I just don't remember if the caramel was flavor was up front or not. I did not jot anything down in my notes other then "once this mellows out I think its going to be very good". I am anticipating a wait on this mead and I will not be opening a bottle for at least 4-5 years, so you'll have to wait a while for further evaluations on the taste

. While fermenting it looked like a glass of caramel. You can view the pictures herehttp://www.geocities.com/vc826/index.html?1108653165460 keep in mind a couple of things, its a free geocities account so it will not be there long and it takes nothing to crash the site

.
Also I oak almost all of my meads, especially my cysers, honey and oak (and apples) seem to work well together.
VC