I brought the first full demi-john of birch sap back a couple of days ago, but with volunteers groups and then demonstrating at the Weald & Downland museum over the weekend I haven't had to time to spare for the wine making. By the time I looked at it tonight it had already started to ferment a little with the natural yeasts. There are several recipes for making birch sap wine that I have found, mainly in old country wine books. They are all slightly different. Some boil the sap and some don't. Some add differing amounts of sugar, and some don't add any sugar at all.
Nearly all add the juice of a lemon and a few add grape concentrate or a few ounces of raisins. The lemon adds acid and the grape/raisins the tannin and nutrients which allow the yeast to thrive. I've tried most of these with differing levels of success and in the end I use a very simple recipe. I boil the sap with a sliced lemon and add around 2lbs of sugar. Allow it to cool, pour back into a demi-john then pitch in the yeast (I used general purpose wine yeast) which I start separately using some of the sap, hot water and a tablespoon of sugar. and then fit an air-lock to the demi-john.
Then leave to ferment for a few months depending upon the temperature. The warmer it is the quicker it will ferment. Once it's completed fermenting, place it somewhere cooler and leave until next spring when it should be ready to drink.As I don't add raisins or grape concentrate the fermentation can be a little slow sometimes. It's a good idea to use a wine hydrometer to show you the specific gravity at each stage and to judge when its finished fermenting. If you add more sugar at the start (or as it goes along), the wine won't necessarily be stronger, but the yeast will die once the wine reaches a certain strength, the remaining sugar will result in a medium wine rather than a dry wine. Althernatively you can use a high alcohol yeast to create rocket fuel instead.
Once it's ready the wine should clear (eventually) and it can then be bottled. Here is one from last year that's almost ready to bottle and some already bottled.
Cheers !
3 comments:
Hi Mark I think it's great to see new uses for wood/trees that people write off. I was wondering if you may be taking some of your wine to The bodgers ball I would love to try some so maybe I could preorder a bottle?
Congrats on the tractor too, it looks great.
Craig
Hi Craig,
It's a funny old world when we buy all our wood processed, cooked and even pumped full of chemicals whilst ignoring whats on our doorstep.
I hadn't thought of taking some wine to the BB - but it's a good idea and I will do that if I can.
Thanks for your kind comments!
Mark
Inspired by your blog I finally got round to starting a batch of Birch sap wine. Here's the non- purist recipe I used:
3.4 Litres Birch sap
250g concentrated grape juice (from a homebrew shop)
1 lemon, sliced
Tannin (=some well stewed tea)
1Kg sugar (750g seemed enough for a medium wine in my case)
Otherwise I made it as you described, but fermentation should be faster due to the grape juice.
As I had some sap left over, I also tried concentrating it to syrup - yes it really works. but like you said lots of sap boils down to a tiny amount of syrup.
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