Recent content by pondlife

Never doubted it mate lol!

You should have bought it yesterday, mate - it dropped to £16.73! I've no idea how they work out the pricing of these kits. Prices seem to fluctuate without rhyme or reason!

Well, I finally bottled my first batch of Reserve du Chateau Chilean Merlot last night. It started off on 10 March and finished on 26 March. I must admit, all the racking off into clean FVs was a bit of a pain, but after filtering the wine through a Vinbrite filter I managed 28 bottles, 1 half...

I'n no expert on oaking wines, but I have noticed that the Youngs Chardonnay and Merlot have a taste in common with each other and I think that can only be due to the inclusion of oak chips in the fermentation process. I removed the oak chips from the Reserve de Chateau Chilean Merlot on the...

Just referring back to the oak chips thing...I have 2 Chilean Merlot kits and oak chips are not mentioned in the instructions anywhere, but I had 2 sachets included in the packaging. I've only got one kit going at the moment and I decided to use 1 sachet in the primary fermentation and keep the...

Dammit! I seem to have ordered one too. Can't think how THAT happened (again) lol!

It's always a mistake to sell your favourite bike! I know, because I've done it more than once - the grass is always greener and all that... I've got a classic K100RT sitting in my garage waiting for me to fix its brakes and steering head bearings and I hope to get it back on the road around...

Oops! I just bought another one tonight. Can't think how that happened! :whistle:

Aye! I ordered one yesterday afternoon and it arrived this morning - well done, Amazon! I was surprised at the weight of the package until I opened it and discovered the monster bag of juice concentrate. I can't find any measure mentioned in the packaging, but it must be at least 5 litres of...

I agree. I have completed 5 Young's kits (4 chardonnay and 1 merlot) so far and haven't experienced such serious losses. Apart from the very first kit, which I brewed short, each of the chardonnays yielded 28 bottles and the merlot yielded 29 bottles. I also added an extra 1kg of sugar to the...

Well, I filtered and bottled my Young's Merlot with added frozen blackberries a couple of days ago. With a SG of 1090 (due to the addition of an extra 1kg white sugar) and a FG of 990 giving 13.3% ABV, the wine was ruby red and crystal clear with a lovely, fruity nose. As luck would have it, I...

I can't speak for the Brewmaker Bitter, but I made a batch of Brewmaker 80/- Scottish Heavy and added 500g light spraymalt to the recommended 1kg sugar and it turned out to be a cracking pint. Clear as a bell after 1 month maturation. I also kept 3 bottles aside and only drank them last week -...

Thanks for the advice! :thumb: I chucked the frozen blackberries directly into the FV last Friday. Thankfully, the frozen fruit doesn't seem to have adversely affected the fermentation process as, 6 days later, fermentation is still well under way. This might have something to do with the...

OK. So I re-read the thread and realised that tonyhibbert had already addressed my query at Post #9. So, 7 days into fermentation, I've added 350g ASDA frozen blackberries directly into the FV of Young's Winebuddy Merlot. I usually give my wines at least 14 days before checking the interim...

I like this idea of concentrating flavours, but I need some help. I currently have 23 litres of Young's Winebuddy Merlot on the go - it was started 5 days ago. Today, I spotted a 350g carton of frozen blackberries in ASDA and bought them on impulse. What do I do with the fruit? Do I just punt...