well, 3 years ago I made plum wine for the first time because my plum tree had a bumper crop. I had never done it before, but my grandfather used to always make wine and he has given me all of his old stuff since he is 92 and not making wine anymore.
I basically just asked a brew shop, besides the hardware, what do I need?
Believe it or not, it turned out really nice. Oddly, the consistency was a bit strange, but the flavor and strength were great. I never used my hydrometer because frankly, I don't know how.
I am not a complete idiot, I have 4 college degrees and I'm bilingual, but sometimes I get too excited to do my homework and I jump right into things like a 5 year old.
ANYway, my aunt and uncle had a decent amount of apples left on their trees when I paid them a visit in early October so I picked a bushel of apples, juiced them, DID NOT pasteurize the juice, which gave me about 2 gallons of juice, then added a gallon of apple cider from the farmer's market (not exactly market, I live in farm country so basically farmer bob's apple cider - which is pasteurized).
Now, idiot me thinking my carboy was 5 gallons (in actuality it is 3 gallons) proceeded to use EdWort's recipe.. for 5 gallons. My dextrose had not arrived so i scrounged the house for sugar. I used maybe a cup of corn syrup, honey, some molasses, brown sugar, and regular white sugar. I was not trying to be creative and take risks, I just wanted what I felt would be about 2 lbs. of sweetner for my 3 gallons (which I somehow still was thinking could be 5 gallons), and I used the montrachet yeast - and followed the recipe and instructions as laid out.
I had an additional 3 gallons of bought apple cider that is in another carboy.
I did watch some instructional videos on youtube, and I did sanitize as per directed - so there is that... at least...
So, I put in the bungs, the airlocks with the vodka, and put them in the same place in the basement where I did the plum wine.
24 hours later....
The carboy that is 2/3 freshly juiced apples and 1/3 farmer/store bought apple cider ERUPTED overnight. Not a considerable amount but it was like a foam that had somewhat hardened into clay-like apple smelling brown goo.
I cleaned up the mess, re-sanitized the bung and airlock, popped it back in, and left it. Meanwhile, the carboy with 3 gallons of farmer/store bought apple cider was fine.
Juicy-Phresh was "breathing" as I could witness with the airlock, while Phat-Farm was, for lack of a better term, effervescent, but not "breathing" as noticeably at least.
5 weeks later... (aka Present Day)
Juicy-Phresh and Phat-Farm are drastically different colors, yellow and brown respectively, both with about the same amount of sediment at the bottom. Juicy-Phresh is cloudier than Phat-Farm as well. (The names are just to be more fun than saying carboy A & B and I have no intention to call it that when drinking.. well, I mean, depends on how much I drink I guess...)
I still see some little bubbles in Phat-Farm, there is a bit of foam on Juicy-Phresh but no mold or foul odor. They both smell, basically, like apple cider. No vinegar smell, no off smell. I've included some pictures...
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qb40hxn9iqt8450/apfelwein.jpg?dl=0
Comments? Advice? What Say You?