Posts Tagged ‘maple wine’

I know of a few fly anglers that also make their own wine. Jack Keller is one, and so is Ernie Kalwa, the Captain of the Fly Fishing team (The Osprey’s) that I used to be a member of. Not sure which one of us ties the better flies, but I know it’s not me! Although I do enjoy doing that. Today and yesterday, I had two good days to combine my two hobbies. And one advantage a home winemaker has if they’ve brought a fish back to eat for dinner is that wine selection is not difficult. Whatever is there! For me, the bottle of Liebfraumilch was a good pairing with the baked trout and rice I made. And on top of that, the fly that I caught the trout on yesterday was made with hair from my Maltese dog named Rudy. You can read about the afternoon fly fishing here.

Winemaking activities included racking and degassing. The maple wine I started on May 5 is expelling lots of co2 gas still, even though the fermentation is complete. The specific gravity was at 0.996 yesterday when I racked it – it’s cleared nicely on it’s own since the last racking on May 28th. It has a very interesting taste – I just had very teeny sip of it, and could taste maple candy – but without the sweetness. I’m looking forward to seeing how this will age a few more months.

I started three wine kits two weeks ago – a Chamblaise and two Vieux De Roi. All are four week kits – I generally use 8 week kits for red wines but I wanted some Vieux De Roi and it was only available at the time in the more economical priced version. I noted that these two kits in the instructions called for 14 days in the primary fermenter. Anyhow, these three kit wines were racked and degassing is on going in all of them before I add the fining agents.

Then there is that potato wine! I’ve had a few interesting questions and comments about that. Like, “what does it taste like?” Yesterday, I racked and checked the specific gravity which was 1.002. It does taste a bit sweet – I’ll have to check my records on that one, but otherwise it is pleasant. I am reluctant to describe its taste just yet as it was only a very small amount and not quite what I expected or can really identify. The demerara sugar certainly has left it’s mark though.

The other day, I was snooping around some “stuff” I had and discovered two more wine kits I had forgotten about! They were purchased about September of 2007, just before I headed off to Grande Prairie, Alberta for the Canadian Fly Fishing Championships. I guess I had meant to start them upon my return, but totally forgot I had them. Both are Cru Select RQ’s: a Montepulciano Cab Merlot, the other Unoaked Chardonnay. I’m hoping and believing the juice will be fine but I will use fresh yeast when I start them, probably in about two weeks from now.

So there’s another connection between fly fishing and winemaking. One can get in the way of the other at times! Actually, it wasn’t the fly fishing that distracted me from these two kits back in 2007…

I recently wrote about the homemade maple syrup wine that I started on May 5, 2009. On May 14th, I racked it to a carboy with the specific gravity at 1.016.

Since then, it has begun to clear nicely and the colour is very interesting. It’s a very autumn or fall looking colour – the colour of some maple leaves after they have turned their colours at that time of the year. It’s hard to describe exactly, but perhaps vermillion .. or light cinnamon might be descriptive enough.

Although the SG was 0.997 last week, it is still showing signs of fermentation with lots of CO2 rising through the wine and the airlock continues to bounce every so often.

I’m going to let it continue doing what it is doing for another couple of weeks, then measure the SG, rack and likely add sulfite.

Won’t get into the details – but an interesting, challenging, and tough week. Thanks to my family who where there for me. It meant a lot. More than I can say.

Hey, did I ever mention that I have an awesome 20 year old son named Alex who is a drummer in a Rock ‘n Roll band? Wise, Young & King is their name, and these guys are “GOOD!” That is, if you like the sounds of classic rock – and WY&K write all their own material. I’m listening to one of my favorite songs right now that has a LOT of meaning to me. I think this song was written especially for me sometimes. Or.. especially for “US.” It’s called “Angels Cry.” You can have a listen to it, along with a few other of their songs, here. Tell me what you think. They are all awesome, but of course, I’m especially proud of that drumming sound….

I was going to provide an update on my earlier Maple Wine that I started. My math must have been wrong, when I was checking the SG and adding water – I’ll write more on that when I go over my notes.

This evening, I discovered I had forgotten to add the Isokleer to the Liebfraumilch. I was wondering why it was still cloudy. This was an inexpensive kit wine that I wanted to make and bottle fairly quickly – six weeks to bottle – so I’d have some available for a special event that is/was to occur next weekend. Things are up in the air – we’ll see. Maybe. I don’t know.

I am still undecided as to how I will proceed with the “Special Wine” I’ve been carefully making and taking care of. Trying to decide when I will blend them together to age – or let them age as they are now, and blend later.

I always wished things could be perfect – even though I’m a realist and don’t expect it – but striving for it is good, no? Trying? Hoping? Mediocrity is something I’ve never settled for.

Ok.. back to Wise, Young & King!

I managed to obtain one Imperial gallon of maple syrup at a cost of $45.00. That’s a pretty fair price these days. What I have is dark syrup, which should have more nutrients – and flavour – over light syrup.

I am trying to decide what to do with it as far as some homemade wine. I’ve come across a few different recipes – all using American measurements. The one that seems the most popular – and easiest is John Gorman’s maple wine which calls for 8 to 9 pints of maple syrup, then water added to bring it to 5 gallons. An Imperial Gallon contains about 4.8 US quarts. So going by Gorman’s recipe, that should do 2 1/2 US gallons, or about 9.5 litres. But then, what yeast should I use? I suppose the best thing to do would be to make about 9 litres of maple wine and water solution and test the SG, and make some decisions about what potential alcohol I want while considering whether I’ll want dry or sweeter.

Or maybe I should just try Gorman’s recipe and see what I end up with. Not sure if I will start this homemade maple wine this evening – taking a break from some other things, or wait until tomorrow. Probably a good time to take stock of my yeast strains in the freezer.

Although some consider a maple wine to be a mead, or “mead-like,” some refer to it as an “acerglyn,” but I think this would be more correct if honey is also used in the recipe in addition to the maple syrup.

Decisions, decisions!