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Collection: Klingon Drinks
Recipe By: Hidzcs
Klingon Blood Wine Version Fourteen - Alcoholic
Ingredients
- 2 gallons of apple cider in two matching jugs
- 1 gaslock
- sterilizer, bleach or iodine
- 1 packet of sherry yeast
- 1 rubber stopper with hole, that fits the jug
- candy thermometer
- 3-4 gallon stock pot with lid
- stirring devices
- 2.5 cups of sugar
Directions
- Go to a store and acquire a single gallon jug of apple cider/juice. (You are after the jug itself this trip.)
- Drink said apple cider/juice. Choose your choice of sterilizing fluid. Bleach works but takes a lot of rinsing. Iodine is best.
- Take the clean empty to a homebrew supplier and buy a stopper (with a hole) that fits the bottle, a gaslock, and at least 1 packet of yeast. (Iodine also if chosen.) (I use either sherry or champagne yeast.). Go to the same store and acquire a matching gallon jug of apple cider/juice. Make a batch of sterilizing fluid in your original gallon jug and let it sit for at least two minutes before pouring into another container. (It takes two minutes to sterilize with Iodine.). Cover the top of the jug with a clean, dry oversized plastic cup to avoid airflow and fallout.
- Pour your apple cider/juice into a large pot and heat it to a minimum of 150 but never over 175. While heating place your stopper and disassembled gaslock into the sterilizing fluid to wait there until we need them. Place a little bit of water in the microwave and nuke it till it boils hard. Let it cool in the microwave until we need it.
- Once at 150 stir in your sugar into the apple cider/juice to allow it to be sterilized. (.5 cups for dry to 1.5 cups for sweet cider/juice) Once you stir in the sugar put the stirring device in the sink to prevent casual re-use / contamination. Cool this as quickly as possibly by any means you can contrive that does NOT violate the sterility of the mixture. (I cover my pot and water cool with flowing water in the sink.). Once it is cool enough to return to the jug, then rinse out your jug thoroughly to eliminate any sterilizer left in it. Shake out any excess water too. Pour your now cooled cider/juice into the jug. Remember to sterilize your funnel (if used).
- Quickly rinse off your stopper and gaslock, again shaking any water off of them. Assemble and "cork" the jug. Do NOT water the gaslock. Do put an oversized plastic cup over it to prevent airflow and fallout while there is no water in it. Allow your mix to reach room temperature. Once at room temperature, sterilize your yeast packet with an alcohol swab as well as your fingers. Carefully open the bag and pour into the cider/juice avoiding the sides/throat of the jug. Return dry gaslock to "stopper" the jug. Take your water out of the microwave and pour into the gaslock just enough for it to operate correctly. Mark the jug with the date 6 weeks from now. If today is Feb 27, then it gets marked April 10.
- You can carefully decant the cider/juice but that usually still winds up getting sediment back into the cider/juice. I recommend getting an actual siphon tube from your brewshop and using it. Remember STERILIZE everything that touches the cider/juice. You can place it into another jug or bottle it. Bottling requires having bottles, caps and a capper. I recommend just keeping it in a jug and pouring whenever you want some. Experience has shown me that you MUST keep a gaslock on the jug. If you actually use a screwcap, somehow the cider gets infected.
- Never let your gaslock get to high or too low on water. If it gets too low, bad bacteria can get in. If it gets to high, then it will suck potentially contaminating water into the cider/juice when you pull the gaslock. (Thus is why we start with sterile water.).
- When it pretty much finishes bubbling, it is done. Then there is the question about it being too dry or too sweet. Those are personal preferences. So if it is too dry, add more sugar when you pour a cup. (short term solution) Or add more sugar and let it ferment again. Keep adding each time it quits and is too dry until you finally reach the capacity of the yeast. Then you can add more sugar without it starting again. (longer term solution) By keeping records of the additional sugar, you then have the information you need to put in the correct amount of sugar the first time.
- Where this adjustment matters is personal preference as I mentioned. But it factors in to the "bloodwine" mix. Since I add grenadine syrup to the cider to colour it and give it a bit of a non-apple flavour that adds sweetness. Therefore you want to have a slightly dryer base cider to add the grenadine to. This is a trial and error proposition that you learn over time. For a sweeter cider, I use 3 1/8th quarts of sugar per 5 gallon batch. This is the same as 2.5 cups per gallon. Buying bulk, a 10 pound sack of sugar is fairly close (about a quart over) the target amount.
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