Dragon Blood: Triple Berry Skeeter Pee

[ShawnDTurner]

Medium French Toast chips and Untoasted oak powder

 

[dangerdave]

Medium French Toast chips and Untoasted oak powder

Roger that!

 

[Tripplett]

The variation included a pound of raisins in the mesh bag with the fruit, and six medium size bananas in a separate mesh bag. The result was a DB with much more body, and that same lovely red color.

Very interesting. Sounds yummy. Do you cut up or mash the bananas first? Do you mash at them daily with the other fruit? Are the raisins dark or white ones?

 

[dangerdave]

Raisins: dark. Bananas: ripe, sliced, smashed daily like other fruit. Actually, from now on I will just put everything in the bag together for easy mashing.

 

[Craiger]

How many times do you guys reuse your nylon mesh bag?

 

[PrincessVintah]

Thank you for the link. I must give it a go as soon as I have an empty carboy!

 

[Tess]

Im so glad I found this. This is going to be my first wine. Your right, I can make this one and show it off to my family while Im making a longer ageing wine. They prefer a sweeter wine as I like the dry. Thanks you so much for this!! Your instructions were so easy and clear. One question. What do you use for the mess bag that holds the fruit.

 

[dangerdave]

How many times do you guys reuse your nylon mesh bag?

I have washed and reused my nylon bags many times.

 

[dangerdave]

Im so glad I found this. This is going to be my first wine. Your right, I can make this one and show it off to my family while Im making a longer ageing wine. They prefer a sweeter wine as I like the dry. Thanks you so much for this!! Your instructions were so easy and clear. One question. What do you use for the mess bag that holds the fruit.

You are very welcome, Tess. I hope you enjoy it. I use nylon mesh bags I bought from George at finevinewines.com. Go to their Online Catalog/Straining Bags.

 

[Pumpkinman]

Shawn, I've been using medium toast oak in mine since the first batch, i is a great improvement, I couldn't agree more.

 

[Craiger]

I have washed and reused my nylon bags many times.

Thank you!

 

[JetJockey]

Nylon Mesh Bag?

I have a large fine nylon mesh bag. After my first Dragon Blood, it was stained a nice red/pink color. When I 'cleaned' it, I used an industrial 'oxy-clean' called EZ Clean, sold by my Local Wine Store. It is the same cleaner as One Step, i.e. made by the same company - LD Carlson.

The nylon mesh bag wend from the nice pink color to an ugly brown color while soaking. Is this normal? I do notice that when cleaning equipment, the EZ Clean does turn wine from red to clear/golden brown.

Should I be using something else to clean equipment/bags with?

Bob

 

[dangerdave]

I use normal Oxyclean for all of my clensing needs, Bob. Bottles, bags, carboys, canes, tubing. I scrub the nylon bags with the Oxyclean solution, rinse well, and store them in a plastic lidded container with some sulfite solution until next use. Before using them again, I rinse out the sulfite, and then fill them with the desired fruit(s). I have three bags that I have reused dozens of times.

 

[Tess]

I bought some paint straining bag from Lowes. they are so cheap I will probably pitch them

 

[JetJockey]

Dragon Blood SG, ABV, & residual sugar?

I wanted to calculate my DB's ABV and Residual Sugar %.

I've seen a couple formulas using the initial SG and final SG to calculate the ABV. In my case, the Initial SG was 1.077 and the final (before back sweetening) was 0.991. The formulas use anywhere from 131 to 135 times the difference between initial and final SG. If I use 132 x (1.077-0.991) = 11.35% ABV.

I found the Quick Reference Guide to Estimating a Wines ABV and Residual Sugar in 3 Easy Steps. According to the very scientific research and calculations on website: http://www.rochesterwinemakers.org/winemaking-information/winemaking-articles-by-members/guide-est-abv-and-res-sugar/ there is a direct correlation between the final SG and ABV to the residual sugar %.

Using Rochester Winemakers' 3-step method for my DB, the residual sugar/extract (various non-sugar compounds in wine like tannin, acids, glycerol, & pigments) is about 1.8%. Step 3 subtracted the extract component that has contributed to the final RS from the calculated combined extract/RS: 1.8% - 2.2% for white grapes/other fruit = DRY (-.04%). I guess you can't have drier than dry of 0% - maybe we should have a dry, extra dry, etc.!

With my Dragon Blood, I back sweetened my 6+ gallons with 6 cups of sugar to get the SG after back-sweetening to 1.012. How do I account for the additional sugar being added to calculate the true residual sugar?

The Rochester Winemakers Website states "For accurate results, use an SG taken before sweetening as your final SG. Of course you’ll then have to update the residual sugar amount with the new sugar." I'm struggling with how to add my DRY or 0% residual sugar with the 6 cups of added sugar (back-sweetened) to get the final RS%. I don't have the weights of the 6+ gallons of pre-sweetened dry DB to take a % by weight of 6 cups of raw sugar @ 250 g = 1500 g / x grams of 6+ gallons of DB wine.

Any suggestions to calculate the RS?

Thanks!

 

[dangerdave]

Um, 42! The answer is 42! Right?

 

[JetJockey]

WOW! Great minds think alike!, But because I'm so anal I got 41.99999901. The reason I actually asked is that there is a local amateur wine making contest and they want to classify the wines on sweet-dry and ask for the RS, along with ABV, and of course the grape variety or fruit/other category.

I figured I should enter my first bottle ever made! I don't have high expectations - I'm the reason they put "Donation" on the bottom of all those raffle and lottery tickets! But, the popularity of this DB recipe has me optimistic.

 

[DaveL]

just for criousity why do you need to let clear before sweetening then let clear again? Can you sweeten at the stepf adding the finning agent?

 

[Tess]

Dave, My yeast pack arrived today in the mail. I want to start this tomorrow. They are so small, 5 grams. Is that how small they are supposed to be. This is my fist time. Iv only seen yeast pack in the store for baking. lol. I just want to check before I begin

 

[cimbaliw]

Degassing the next batch...

Wow, over the past 24 hours I've probably got an honest three hours into degassing my first batch of DB. I'm using a j'd plastic coat hanger for mechanical degassing and a medical vacuum pump for vacuum degassing (sorry Steve, it was no cost to me with Amazon points). I've still got a half of an inch of CO2 bubbles with the pump a -22mmHg. The must temp is 70f via heating pad. I've added the sorbate and metaB but not the sparkaloid.

The bottom line is that I indulged a small taste and this stuff is going to be great!. Is there anything I can do with the next batch to decrease degassing time. I was wondering if racking to degas may speed things up a bit? The image below shows current state.

Thanks for all your help, this is a fun forum to be a part of.

BC