All citrus trees are grafted. So it is possible to get 2 or more fruits on a tree. Down here in Texas you can get trees with four different fruits grafted onto them. We called them fruit salad trees
I feel your pain on the ferment doing what it wants. I started a wild fermented ginger wine in June of 2019. I just finally decided to rack it last month. It was still fermenting! I was only losing about .004 Sp Gr every month. Tastes great though and hit about 14% ABV.
Just racked my batch of this. I used bread yeast and it stopped after 3 or 4 weeks. Can't wait to try it. As I was racking had a thought of trying this with lemons and making a lemonade kilju. Will have to wait though gonna start a spiced Metheglin so I can have it bottled by fall and aged a little for the winter.
I know the heartbreak of a stuck fermentation. That's why I racked, leaving most of the yeast behind, and added more. Nearly 2 months of super-slow fermentation, even with yeast hulls, carefully monitored temperatures, and swirling... but now things are looking up. It's taking off and bubbling like mad, constantly. I GOT UNSTUCK LUCK!
Just a thought for you... when it's stuck, don't rack. That takes away half your yeast colony and now they have to build back up again, which can create off flavors. If, in fact the colony is dead, they would serve as nutrients for the new yeast you added. Just a heads up for next time!
The reason why I did rack this time is because I tried a number of ways to unstick the fermentation, including adding new yeast directly, and it only worked for a couple days. It was like adding good to bad, by the way it seemed, and the results were pretty disappointing. Now that I've racked and added new yeast, the new yeast is snacking on the remaining old dead yeast, fermentation is going like a rocket, and there's a 3/4 inch foamy head on top.
inspiring! thanks for showing that it got stuck! it happened to me a couple of times too (i usually add water and it goes back to fermenting) your ideas about honey and hibiscus and this mojito sugar wash sound really fun ill try it at some point
When you add water, you're diluting the alcohol content and sugar content, making it easier for yeast to start up again sure, but you're also lowering the potential ABV. Decisions decisions!
Forgive me if its been mentioned before but perhaps the reason why its so slow fermenting is because mint and lime have antibiotic properties? So may take longer?
I’ve been nervously waiting for this video to see whether Derica approves as she is the Mojito aficionado. Seeing your reactions to this had me doing a happy dance. I’m going to hazard a guess The Franklin gets a thumbs up so far 😄
Mints a pretty potent antibacterial, antifungal, anti, well most things lol. It slows things down loads. I had a similer with Wild Water Mint and Lemonbalm wine. Oddly, one the slowest brews I've had were Nightshades (Henbane beer and Datura Flower wine) as they're Alks literally inhibit fermentation. Which got me wondering about the mint problemo. Although this does give visible evidence to the Medicinal benefits of Mints if ever its questioned.
Iv made water wine ( just water and sugar) that was ready and stout in 2 3 weeks. It must be the mint holding it back sorta like a natural antiseptic/antibiotic
Hi guys I started my mojito 5 days ago made 2x your recipe very very slow bubbling and today no bubbles it will for a very short time if I give it a shake
Thanks for the reply just finished woching the 2nd video you put out on mojito (for the 3rd time lol) . I forget that inpatients isn't part of this hobby. Just started brewing 12 weeks ago so ive my 1st apple cider bottle. Stuffed that up to much yeast and to little sugar was done in a week got about 2%abv think didn't take a reading at the start. We tryed a bottle last week pretty good
i love making five gallon batches of this with bakers yeast, fine it with bentonite clay for around two weeks and let some fireball candys dissolve in it. usually turns out in the early 8%.
i know after watching your videos you don't add yeast nutrient, however i was wondering in a case like this, because of the factors of low nutrient as well as possible antimicrobial effects of the leaf, would you consider it? Just curious the thoughts on something like that? i absolutely love mojitos and grow my own mint and really want to start making this for the summer ahead.
😂 you're hair has grown demonstrably. I found my way to Kilju after a few forays into country wine making and trying to unpick what the actual process was .. coming to the realisation that fermented alcohol is sugar water and yeast. I figured 'somebody would have done this' and sure enough, Kilju. I wasn't going to break the news to you as to the fact that those weren't kefir limes. 😂
Added Raisins to my Kilju as an experiment why do the Raisin Dance one goes up and one goes down. Kind of confused but it's really entertaining. Let me know thanks :)
Now I am curious to know if you could ferment coconut milk or water? I have excess of both. Also let me just say I am so glad to be part of your channel from the early stages of your stardom, because one day you guys are gonna be big and i would proudly say, i have been following them before they were a thing. Racked my first Cyser today, made the natural way using bread yeast and City Steading science and its just so so wonderful at only 6 weeks old. Thank you for this.
I've made water Kefier with coconut water and it fermented VERY well. It made a really delicious ginger-lime soda, but the coconut flavor didn't really come through for me. I imagine if it worked well for water kefier it would work as a liquid base for beer or mead too. For the coconut milk, I think it would depend on the fat% as to weather or not it would work, since i think higher fat% can inhibit the yeast. It's probably worth trying a small batch to see how it turns out.
Unrelated to this video but I was wondering if you were going to do a video on making larger batches? Maybe 3 gallon or 5? I’m sure it’s the same process but was curious if that video exists or will ever be made? Thank you for all you guys do!
We do one gallon for ease of making a video. It's exactly the same process, just scale by how many gallons. For us, with making as many brews as we do, we'd just have a LOT more brews lying around.
@@CitySteadingBrews makes sense, thanks for the reply. Would love to see beneath the desk of fermentation and see the scale of which you guys brew. You guys kill it, thank you again for your channel!
Hey dudes, Joe here! Yeah Kaffir limes are wrinkly and I think smell like tar. That being said I think y’all have Rangpur limes which aren’t wrinkly and are bigger than Key Limes.
Hello from the UK! After watching most of your videos, I finally had the confidence, after a few months of deliberating, to buy all the kit and start home-brewing! Now I have a question... In your (I think) second episode of the peanut butter banana mead, you thought that the fermentation went really well because of the nitrogen in the peanuts meaning it is good nutrition for the yeast. I believe you could be right but as some people are allergic to peanuts I wanted to look for an alternative and found that lentils are really high in nitrogen and wondered if you would do a brew where you use lentils as your yeast nutrient? FOR SCIENCE! 😂 Anyway, love your videos!
I have never had a Killju above about 8% abv finish sooner than about 6 or so weeks, I have HEARD that it is supposed to be very fast but I have never had it works so. If you have a brew where you think you might not have enough nutrient for the yeast to work with disolve some Fleishcmann's active dry (or really any bread yeast) into about a cup of your must for an hour or two then throw it in the microwave and nuke it till you are sure the yeast is dead, then pour that into the starting must, as you have pointed out before yeast is pretty cannibalistic, I have used that method for years to keep young apple brews from having a farty smell.
I am really surprised that you didn’t have yeast colonies all over your mint. When I make mojito mead, you can barely see the mint for the yeast. When I swirl it during fermentation, the yeast falls off but is back within 24 hours. To use Derica’s metaphor, the moon dust isn’t just on the moon, it’s also on the palm trees. (?)
Dear Brian and Derica, a while back (before august) i started a homemade wine. at the time i was unable to get a sugar reading because my reader shattered. anyways, eventually it stalled out and i added some water and more yeast because on taste test it was way to sweet. its reading after the added water was around 1.105. but the fermenter was full so i couldn't water it down. as time went on i took a reading recently and it is around 1.075. i'm thinking at this point that it has probably about reached the alcohol tolerance (bread yeast) taste test still puts this as pretty sweet and very carbonated. im worried about what to do with this. either find a way to water it down some more and worry about the flavors thinning out, or purchase more powerful yeast. im not sure where to go with this one.
Several directions you can go. Diluting as you said, more yeast as you said. Fortifying with distilled spirits can help. Oaking can take down a sweet brew somewhat. Without knowing what 'homemade wine' you made, it's hard to offer more suggestions.
@@CitySteadingBrews the recipe i used was very similar to the wine for beginners recipe you posted a video on. i used a juice containing white grape, cranberry, and apple juice. all without preservatives. some sugar and some honey. since it was a different juice than what you used and i mixed honey and sugar it's not surprising i went to heavy on the sugars. i wish i had that initial reading but alas i do not.
Hey, just a thought, as someone who has grown a couple of citrus trees, those look really big to be key limes, but they look exactly like my meyer lemons, and you said they wind up looking like small oranges but not tasting like them, are you certain you don't have a meyer lemon? Just curious, gardening is a long-time hobby of mine, love your channel, I need to get more fermenting going, we are actually getting ready to rack our two gallons of hard cider which we made from foraged apples.
I have had trouble with my kilju. Once I almost accidentally started at 1.340. Went to 6 gallon and it dropped to 1.110 or so. But Ive also had problems with stalling out way too high. The cure, and its now part of the recipe is simply chalk. Best guess is CO2 acidity stall. Using DADY yeast, it dropped to .990. Whopping high ABV.
I think the etymology for the word Kilju is Kiljua. A Finnish word to Yell. Witch you probably will do after drinking... That! Never had that fancy way of brewed kilju. But I once tried the original Finnish kilju with just water, sugar, and yeast. That was terrible!😜
If your 'lime tree' is more of a bush, it might actually be calamondin/calamansi. It tastes like a cross between a mandarin and a lime, tho they're usually smaller. Calamondin's are cold hardy to 20F and can bear fruit all year round.
I watched your kilju fermenting video and started a batch a two days ago. I was wondering if there would be any problem with the fermentation with no real nutrients for the yeast, and this video answers that question. I did make a few changes to my recipe, I inverted the sugar, my sg was 1.09 and I used distillers yeast (what I had on hand) I'll let you know how it turns out. It seems to be happily fermenting away.
When you are making kilju you should use thing called "turbohiiva" that makes it really good in 4 days it will be around 17% alcohol. That is the way to make kilju.
I didn't watch the first video yet so just gonna shout in the middle without reading the comments. If you push it to 2 weeks you will need turbo yeast... Can't remember if fresh yeast did the same thing
Two my most watched channels City Steading and Barley and hops, George made a fast fermenter with a spout to taste when your getting close as he said you can stop it early if it satisfies your particular taste thanks for your video guys
@@CitySteadingBrews your right but it does give the brewer the chance to stop fermentation early or let it finish and back sweeten thanks for the reply
Mines still in primary. Started at 1.124 on August 24th, had the mint removed on 28 sep with a spgr of 1.050. Haven’t had time to deal with it, it’s still bubbling, and I’m out of starsan and money. So payday I can get starsan and test it to see if it’s moved at all....
You have inspired me to attempt my first ever brew! Going to try for a hydromel, as I can only find mead in store around 13%abv. Using lalvin EC-1118, which I think will make back-sweetening a little difficult.
I'm confused... if you're making your own mead, make it however you like. Also, 13% is not a hydromel, that's approaching sack mead territory. :) EC-1118 is one of the worst yeasts for mead imo, especially if you want to keep the ABV low. It doesn't produce bad tasting mead, it just makes making a sweeter mead nearly impossible, like you said. I'd honestly use bread yeast before using EC-118.
@@CitySteadingBrews I'm planning on starting with 1.5lbs - 2lbs of honey. Problem is that its a lower expected abv than the tolerance of bread yeast or ec-1118. Is restarting the primary fermentation by back sweetening a realistic issue in the end? After racking and letting it sit for a couple weeks or is pasteurization the only option?
Ok I am a whiskey guy that loves to watch all of your channels. I want to start brewing. Wine is ok to me do you think I will like Mead more and if so what should I try first?
Brian, my Franklin is 14 days old and still fermenting. Bubbles coming up the sides nicely. My OG was 1.130. My concern is some of the mint leaves are turning white. Is that normal? The aroma coming from the air lock ( yes I smell mine too) is a fresh mint and lime.
@@CitySteadingBrews Well my Franklin is another week old (3weeks). I took a reading today and it is 0.990. Completely dry. It tastes like a dry mint wine. So I'm going to rack it today and add the lime and zest. I want to back sweeten it. Should I just mix in some more sugar or make a sugar wash with some warm water and pour it in? Not really sure just adding sugar and agitating it is the right thing to do.
ive been brewing mead very successfully and want to try this in a 3 gallon batch. could i use 2 pounds of sugar per gallon with yeast nutrient... would this work? im planning on proofing my yeast before pitching also
This is really great, as usual. My question is this...if you add lemon zest/skins like I am going to do with my tea wine (5 gallons) in a week or two, do I need to "sanitize" the skins first? In other words, do I wash the lemons (I always wash fruit and vegetables) in sanitizer before extracting the skins? Or, is the alcohol level high enough at this point to not worry about wild yeasts colonies or contamination?
kilju is well kilju, you might want to try sugar wine. almost identical apart from added nutrient ( you already used wine yeast.) you can brew it in a month. :)
It depends on the glue used for the labels. Sometimes they simply need a good soak in hot water. Sometimes soaking in Sanitizer liquid helps. Sometimes a little Goo-be-gone does the trick though it can leave a greasy residue. Often I do the soak then scrape with a blade method, but be careful!
So hear me out. I keep fish and want to do a planted tank. I wanted to make diy a co2 diffuser to help with plant growth. All the how tos in making one tell you to mix yeast, sugar, and water in a sealed bottle with a tube running from its cap into the tank. And the pressure will push the newly created co2 through the tube. Now, will the resulting mixture be safe to drink? How do i check? Since it will eventually stop producing co2 and I will have to dump it, if its technically homemade booze i want to atleast drink it.
I have no idea what could come of this and I'm reluctant to give opinions since it could be hazardous to your health. Also, I don't think fermentations will give enough consistent CO2 production to make this worthwhile at all.
Is there a chart or formula that y’all trust to find out the gravity contribution of fruits? I’m asking because I’m wanting to make blueberry wine and want to try and not use ANY added sugar. Y’all talk about the points of white sugar and honey per pound I’m wanting to be able to calculate the same for different fruits and berries. I know y’all kinda touch on this subject in a couple episodes, but I’ve binge watched so many the past couple days I can’t remember which one it was! Also I do realize this will end up being multiple multiple of berries but I’m wanting to do a side by side comparison of a common berry +sugar combo vs a straight up berry. Like always y’all are awesome don’t stop putting out videos!!
Been dealing with a gallon of mint tea wine that's stuck. last addition was a full packet of ec-1118 four days ago and barely any burps happening. starting to wonder if mint is inhibiting the yeast's ability to thrive. started at 1.120 and before the ec addition it wouldn't budge below 1.080. it's at most at 5.3% alcohol and still very sweet; at most it should reach 15%. done some searching on the google, but other than a few articles on general antimicrobial properties, i'm not finding anything specific concerning mint and yeast or brewing. still, interested to see where both yours and mine goes!
Can we make wine from holy basil? It may be a good immunity booster if taken in small quantities daily. I am growing the black one which fights cough and cold.
@@CitySteadingBrews oh! Basil with honey makes a great cough syrup. This is a wonderful herbal medicine in India. We just need to see if mead can be made out of it.👍
I used this method for my most recent cider and it worked great.. Was wondering if you had some advice for me. A little off subject, I started making wines over shutdown in March. My second wine was from a batch of older blackberries from my in-law's patch. I've been making wine using by taking the potential abv method. I always felt that it came out strong. I recently picked up a refractometer to get actual readings on finished products and realized my abv was much higher than expected. In reality I didn't know I could obtain these numbers. My blackberry wine is reading at around 31%abv how do I keep my wine from producing such a high abv, potential was suppose to be 15%. What can I do without using chemicals? Any ideas?
Okay, I saw on another video that y’all see questions from older videos all as one big comment section so I’m requesting knowledge if I may. I’m going the tea bag mint way, they’re in the mail. Should be the herbal route, but how many bags would you suggest. I know you probably wouldn’t know with out using the same product yourselves but can I get a ball park, please? I mean brew 1, 5 or 10 bags? I understand how it may be a loaded question if y’all used real mint. I think I’d start with five bags, but how much water with the teA to put into the jug at the same time? Hmm
As far as lime leaves go, kaffir lime leaves are totally distinctive because they come as pairs a small leaf, with another behind it in an hourglass like shape. The fragrance is intense lime.... Not lemon, but lime. Kaffir lime fruits are wrinkled like small green brains and are small and not generally juicy, which is why the juice of kaffir limes is NOT generally used but the zest and the leaves. I'd go to a citrus nursery and get a smell of real kaffir lime leaves cos it's a great fragrance.
Not really. To carbonate properly, you degas it first, then create a small controlled fermentation in the bottle. The 'old' gasses will not taste so good, but the young gas is just enough to fizz.
there is a phone ap called NatureID, which allows you to take a picture of a leaf from a plant or a flower and it will give you all the info about that plant, and care of that plant.
Easy is relative! Before bottling, add some priming sugar and a bit of champagne yeast. Then bottle and it will carb. An ounce of sugar per gallon should do.
Pretty sure those fruits are like twice the size of a key lime. They might be Persian lime, or your tree might've been taken over by rootstock (e.g., citrange).
@@CitySteadingBrewsThe makrut or Thai lime* is among the most distinctive citruses I've ever grown or known. The leaf is unmistakable: it looks like someone took a standard three- to four-inch citrus leaf, folded it along the stem like a taco, made a decoratively curved V-shaped cut about an inch up from the base of the leaf, then unfurled it. The scent of a makrut leaf is likewise unmistakable: comparing it to a cross between lime zest and lime flower understates the perfume. When I owned a makrut tree, I used to make a lowish-alcohol potation that I called "margarita mead" with dark agave syrup plus piloncillo (Mexican very dark brown sugar in cone shape), fermented with lemongrass (I think) and extract of dried orange and bitter orange peel plus saison yeast, and at bottling I'd tuck a lightly torn whole makrut leaf in each bottle. It wasn't very margarita-like, but it was pretty yummy. Makrut fruits are zestable, but the surface of the fruit - my makrut's fruit had the squat yurt-shaped profile of an especially wide-for-length satsuma tangerine - is knobbled in a pattern unsettlingly like the gyres of a human brain. The pith is easily the bitterest of any citrus in my experience; producing palatable zest and juice was generally too daunting to bother. I miss my little makrut tree! But it pleased me greatly, just last week, to discover that the "That's Tasty" brand of refrigerated fresh herbs has added "lime leaves" - makrut leaves - to the lineup! *The scientific name of makrut or Thai lime is Citrus hystrix. The common name "kaffir lime" is increasingly disfavored; the least objectionable translation of the Arabic word "kaffir" is 'infidel', and as with most words that refer to Them Who Are Not Us, the connotations only get ruder from there.
Ive started this one 3 days ago. This is my first ever alcoholic ferment. All the mint is kinda floating on top and i’m afraid it’s gonna get moldy if i just let it float. Is my fear correct? And if so what can i do to prevent it?
I also don’t have an airlock because i really wanted to try before going out to buy a bunch of stuff. So now i’ve just rubberbanded a thin cloth over the top
I wouldnt worry about stuff floating at the top. As long as everything was cleaned prior and you have a sealed airlock on it, you should be ok. Its been 5 months, how did it turn out?
@@Senorzilchnzero i used the recipe as a pretty loose guide because this was my first time making booze and didn’t want to spend a lot of money. I only bought ingredients but no special equipment. I’d say if you use regular bakers yeast to be really carful moving the brew to rack it or maybe even put it in the racking location, let it sit for a few hours and carefully rack it. I got a lot of yeast in my final bottle and it tasted kind like licorice when it mixed in with the brew
Kilju should not be that slow fermenting. Maybe mint causes that or bad yeast. Normally real finnish kilju ferments in about week and another week for cold crash and racking. Original ingredients are table sugar(beet) bread yeast water and maybe very little fruit example one orange or so for relatively large amount of kilju
Well.... you say that but many others who have made Kilju are saying higher gravity ones NEVER ferment in less than a month. Sure, this isn't 'traditional' kilju. Then again... kilju is just sugar water and bread yeast.... the other things are added to make it palatable.
why you don't do an experiment where brewing three container one with wine yeast and other with champagne yeast, the third one mixing half of wine yeast and half of champagne yeast >>> sorry for my poor English
@@CitySteadingBrews what I mean wine yeast and champagne yeast tend to different in final product. my question is what if have a gallon of water and honey(batch) and we put 2.5 g of wine yeast and 2.5 champagne yeast (total of 5 g for a gallon) hope that makes sense
Generally when you mix yeast one colony will kill off the other by starving them out. You won't get a mix of properties. Whichever colony gets a head start in building itself up will starve the other. Wine yeast and champagne yeast are the same thing, in reality. There are a huge number of types of wine yeast and champagne yeast, so a comparison would be VERY complicated to do properly. Most wine yeasts are 12-15%, most champagne yeasts top out around 18% for alcohol tolerance, if that's what you mean by the differences, well... using the same recipe one will be sweeter so long as you surpass it's tolerance.
Safe is such a relative term. All the methanol, ethanol, and everything stays in freeze distillation, whereas with regular distillation, you only keep the alcohol.
@@CitySteadingBrews from what you've said in your past videos, as long as i dont drink more than 1 gallon worth (you said 2 gallons+) the methanol level shouldnt be dangerous. Im not drinking a gallons worth, 😂 then id have another problem (like you said)
Well... yes and no. Technically speaking, ethanol is the cure for methanol poisoning so you really can't have a problem, but... alcohol is complex, and there are a lot of things in there already. Concentrating them seems like a bad idea, though it was done for centuries, and there's almost no records of harm. I don't promote it due to legalilty.
probably should've started with a lower gravity and done step additions with the sugar. that was a really high gravity must. plus fermenting first then adding the mint and lime peel for secondary.
All citrus trees are grafted. So it is possible to get 2 or more fruits on a tree. Down here in Texas you can get trees with four different fruits grafted onto them. We called them fruit salad trees
Commercial trees may be grafted, not All citrus trees are grafted
I use grolsch bottles. Has free beer in them lol.
I feel your pain on the ferment doing what it wants. I started a wild fermented ginger wine in June of 2019. I just finally decided to rack it last month. It was still fermenting! I was only losing about .004 Sp Gr every month. Tastes great though and hit about 14% ABV.
Sounds great!
Just racked my batch of this. I used bread yeast and it stopped after 3 or 4 weeks. Can't wait to try it. As I was racking had a thought of trying this with lemons and making a lemonade kilju. Will have to wait though gonna start a spiced Metheglin so I can have it bottled by fall and aged a little for the winter.
I know the heartbreak of a stuck fermentation. That's why I racked, leaving most of the yeast behind, and added more. Nearly 2 months of super-slow fermentation, even with yeast hulls, carefully monitored temperatures, and swirling... but now things are looking up. It's taking off and bubbling like mad, constantly.
I GOT UNSTUCK LUCK!
Just a thought for you... when it's stuck, don't rack. That takes away half your yeast colony and now they have to build back up again, which can create off flavors. If, in fact the colony is dead, they would serve as nutrients for the new yeast you added. Just a heads up for next time!
The reason why I did rack this time is because I tried a number of ways to unstick the fermentation, including adding new yeast directly, and it only worked for a couple days. It was like adding good to bad, by the way it seemed, and the results were pretty disappointing. Now that I've racked and added new yeast, the new yeast is snacking on the remaining old dead yeast, fermentation is going like a rocket, and there's a 3/4 inch foamy head on top.
I LOVE the Red Bucket Of Sanitization!!✋🤚!!!
inspiring!
thanks for showing that it got stuck! it happened to me a couple of times too (i usually add water and it goes back to fermenting)
your ideas about honey and hibiscus and this mojito sugar wash sound really fun ill try it at some point
When you add water, you're diluting the alcohol content and sugar content, making it easier for yeast to start up again sure, but you're also lowering the potential ABV. Decisions decisions!
Colonel Brian Smith of the Brew Team, Loves it when a plan comes together!
Forgive me if its been mentioned before but perhaps the reason why its so slow fermenting is because mint and lime have antibiotic properties? So may take longer?
Yup, mint totally does. Lime wasn't added until after fermentation though.
I’ve been nervously waiting for this video to see whether Derica approves as she is the Mojito aficionado. Seeing your reactions to this had me doing a happy dance. I’m going to hazard a guess The Franklin gets a thumbs up so far 😄
Mints a pretty potent antibacterial, antifungal, anti, well most things lol. It slows things down loads. I had a similer with Wild Water Mint and Lemonbalm wine. Oddly, one the slowest brews I've had were Nightshades (Henbane beer and Datura Flower wine) as they're Alks literally inhibit fermentation. Which got me wondering about the mint problemo. Although this does give visible evidence to the Medicinal benefits of Mints if ever its questioned.
Key limes are about half that size. You probably have a Persian lime.
It could also be a sour orange.
No idea.
Iv made water wine ( just water and sugar) that was ready and stout in 2 3 weeks. It must be the mint holding it back sorta like a natural antiseptic/antibiotic
Just got my kit today.i cant wait to start brewing.
Hi guys I started my mojito 5 days ago made 2x your recipe very very slow bubbling and today no bubbles it will for a very short time if I give it a shake
Ours took a while to ferment too.
Thanks for the reply just finished woching the 2nd video you put out on mojito (for the 3rd time lol) . I forget that inpatients isn't part of this hobby. Just started brewing 12 weeks ago so ive my 1st apple cider bottle. Stuffed that up to much yeast and to little sugar was done in a week got about 2%abv think didn't take a reading at the start. We tryed a bottle last week pretty good
who put the fun juice in Danica's coffee today? ;p
i love making five gallon batches of this with bakers yeast, fine it with bentonite clay for around two weeks and let some fireball candys dissolve in it. usually turns out in the early 8%.
Wow you can hear the carbonation. The mics picked it up when he started swirling the wine thief in the mint leaves
Yeah, the mic is just out of frame above us so it picks up any little noise in that whole area, lol.
What would you have done to to start your yeast back up to raise your alcohol content
i know after watching your videos you don't add yeast nutrient, however i was wondering in a case like this, because of the factors of low nutrient as well as possible antimicrobial effects of the leaf, would you consider it? Just curious the thoughts on something like that? i absolutely love mojitos and grow my own mint and really want to start making this for the summer ahead.
😂 you're hair has grown demonstrably. I found my way to Kilju after a few forays into country wine making and trying to unpick what the actual process was .. coming to the realisation that fermented alcohol is sugar water and yeast. I figured 'somebody would have done this' and sure enough, Kilju. I wasn't going to break the news to you as to the fact that those weren't kefir limes. 😂
Added Raisins to my Kilju as an experiment why do the Raisin Dance one goes up and one goes down. Kind of confused but it's really entertaining. Let me know thanks :)
The fermentation process creates gasses which will cause solids, like raisins, to "dance." :)
Now I am curious to know if you could ferment coconut milk or water? I have excess of both. Also let me just say I am so glad to be part of your channel from the early stages of your stardom, because one day you guys are gonna be big and i would proudly say, i have been following them before they were a thing. Racked my first Cyser today, made the natural way using bread yeast and City Steading science and its just so so wonderful at only 6 weeks old. Thank you for this.
I've made water Kefier with coconut water and it fermented VERY well. It made a really delicious ginger-lime soda, but the coconut flavor didn't really come through for me. I imagine if it worked well for water kefier it would work as a liquid base for beer or mead too. For the coconut milk, I think it would depend on the fat% as to weather or not it would work, since i think higher fat% can inhibit the yeast. It's probably worth trying a small batch to see how it turns out.
I'm sure you could. Not a LOT of sugars, but you can use it in place of water in a brew. I'm not sure it will give a lot of flavor though.
Lol, noticed Brian's shirt when rewatching :) Thank you for educating Yutes like me.
Our pleasure!
Unrelated to this video but I was wondering if you were going to do a video on making larger batches? Maybe 3 gallon or 5? I’m sure it’s the same process but was curious if that video exists or will ever be made? Thank you for all you guys do!
We do one gallon for ease of making a video. It's exactly the same process, just scale by how many gallons. For us, with making as many brews as we do, we'd just have a LOT more brews lying around.
@@CitySteadingBrews makes sense, thanks for the reply. Would love to see beneath the desk of fermentation and see the scale of which you guys brew. You guys kill it, thank you again for your channel!
Just showed the 'shelf of fermentation' in a YT story the other day! We upgraded from the desk, lol.
Hey dudes, Joe here! Yeah Kaffir limes are wrinkly and I think smell like tar. That being said I think y’all have Rangpur limes which aren’t wrinkly and are bigger than Key Limes.
Hello from the UK! After watching most of your videos, I finally had the confidence, after a few months of deliberating, to buy all the kit and start home-brewing!
Now I have a question... In your (I think) second episode of the peanut butter banana mead, you thought that the fermentation went really well because of the nitrogen in the peanuts meaning it is good nutrition for the yeast. I believe you could be right but as some people are allergic to peanuts I wanted to look for an alternative and found that lentils are really high in nitrogen and wondered if you would do a brew where you use lentils as your yeast nutrient? FOR SCIENCE! 😂
Anyway, love your videos!
That's relly good idea I love experimenting
I have never had a Killju above about 8% abv finish sooner than about 6 or so weeks, I have HEARD that it is supposed to be very fast but I have never had it works so. If you have a brew where you think you might not have enough nutrient for the yeast to work with disolve some Fleishcmann's active dry (or really any bread yeast) into about a cup of your must for an hour or two then throw it in the microwave and nuke it till you are sure the yeast is dead, then pour that into the starting must, as you have pointed out before yeast is pretty cannibalistic, I have used that method for years to keep young apple brews from having a farty smell.
Yes, we use yeast hulls for that... same thing.
I am really surprised that you didn’t have yeast colonies all over your mint. When I make mojito mead, you can barely see the mint for the yeast. When I swirl it during fermentation, the yeast falls off but is back within 24 hours.
To use Derica’s metaphor, the moon dust isn’t just on the moon, it’s also on the palm trees. (?)
Dear Brian and Derica,
a while back (before august) i started a homemade wine. at the time i was unable to get a sugar reading because my reader shattered. anyways, eventually it stalled out and i added some water and more yeast because on taste test it was way to sweet. its reading after the added water was around 1.105. but the fermenter was full so i couldn't water it down. as time went on i took a reading recently and it is around 1.075. i'm thinking at this point that it has probably about reached the alcohol tolerance (bread yeast) taste test still puts this as pretty sweet and very carbonated. im worried about what to do with this. either find a way to water it down some more and worry about the flavors thinning out, or purchase more powerful yeast. im not sure where to go with this one.
Several directions you can go. Diluting as you said, more yeast as you said. Fortifying with distilled spirits can help. Oaking can take down a sweet brew somewhat. Without knowing what 'homemade wine' you made, it's hard to offer more suggestions.
@@CitySteadingBrews the recipe i used was very similar to the wine for beginners recipe you posted a video on. i used a juice containing white grape, cranberry, and apple juice. all without preservatives. some sugar and some honey. since it was a different juice than what you used and i mixed honey and sugar it's not surprising i went to heavy on the sugars. i wish i had that initial reading but alas i do not.
Hey, just a thought, as someone who has grown a couple of citrus trees, those look really big to be key limes, but they look exactly like my meyer lemons, and you said they wind up looking like small oranges but not tasting like them, are you certain you don't have a meyer lemon? Just curious, gardening is a long-time hobby of mine, love your channel, I need to get more fermenting going, we are actually getting ready to rack our two gallons of hard cider which we made from foraged apples.
We think they are rangpur limes, at least that is today’s theory!
@@CitySteadingBrews cool, I love all this stuff, and I appreciate how active and responsive you two are
I have had trouble with my kilju. Once I almost accidentally started at 1.340. Went to 6 gallon and it dropped to 1.110 or so. But Ive also had problems with stalling out way too high. The cure, and its now part of the recipe is simply chalk. Best guess is CO2 acidity stall. Using DADY yeast, it dropped to .990. Whopping high ABV.
I think the etymology for the word Kilju is Kiljua. A Finnish word to Yell. Witch you probably will do after drinking... That! Never had that fancy way of brewed kilju. But I once tried the original Finnish kilju with just water, sugar, and yeast. That was terrible!😜
how about cacoa nibs instead lime for a chocolate mint flavor??? think i'll give it a try
If your 'lime tree' is more of a bush, it might actually be calamondin/calamansi. It tastes like a cross between a mandarin and a lime, tho they're usually smaller. Calamondin's are cold hardy to 20F and can bear fruit all year round.
We're thinking it might be Rangpur at this point.
I watched your kilju fermenting video and started a batch a two days ago. I was wondering if there would be any problem with the fermentation with no real nutrients for the yeast, and this video answers that question. I did make a few changes to my recipe, I inverted the sugar, my sg was 1.09 and I used distillers yeast (what I had on hand) I'll let you know how it turns out. It seems to be happily fermenting away.
How did it go?
When you are making kilju you should use thing called "turbohiiva" that makes it really good in 4 days it will be around 17% alcohol. That is the way to make kilju.
It’s just turbo yeast. I get it though!
I didn't watch the first video yet so just gonna shout in the middle without reading the comments. If you push it to 2 weeks you will need turbo yeast... Can't remember if fresh yeast did the same thing
Two my most watched channels City Steading and Barley and hops, George made a fast fermenter with a spout to taste when your getting close as he said you can stop it early if it satisfies your particular taste thanks for your video guys
Having a spout doesn't 'stop' fermentation. That's just a way to test it along the way!
@@CitySteadingBrews your right but it does give the brewer the chance to stop fermentation early or let it finish and back sweeten thanks for the reply
Mines still in primary. Started at 1.124 on August 24th, had the mint removed on 28 sep with a spgr of 1.050. Haven’t had time to deal with it, it’s still bubbling, and I’m out of starsan and money. So payday I can get starsan and test it to see if it’s moved at all....
We left the mint for over a month.
You have inspired me to attempt my first ever brew! Going to try for a hydromel, as
I can only find mead in store around 13%abv. Using lalvin EC-1118, which I think will make back-sweetening a little difficult.
I'm confused... if you're making your own mead, make it however you like. Also, 13% is not a hydromel, that's approaching sack mead territory. :)
EC-1118 is one of the worst yeasts for mead imo, especially if you want to keep the ABV low. It doesn't produce bad tasting mead, it just makes making a sweeter mead nearly impossible, like you said. I'd honestly use bread yeast before using EC-118.
@@CitySteadingBrews I'm planning on starting with 1.5lbs - 2lbs of honey. Problem is that its a lower expected abv than the tolerance of bread yeast or ec-1118. Is restarting the primary fermentation by back sweetening a realistic issue in the end? After racking and letting it sit for a couple weeks or is pasteurization the only option?
Ok I am a whiskey guy that loves to watch all of your channels. I want to start brewing. Wine is ok to me do you think I will like Mead more and if so what should I try first?
Wine and mead both have such varying flavors, I'm sure you can find a mead you like.
Brian, my Franklin is 14 days old and still fermenting. Bubbles coming up the sides nicely. My OG was 1.130. My concern is some of the mint leaves are turning white. Is that normal? The aroma coming from the air lock ( yes I smell mine too) is a fresh mint and lime.
Could be yeast.
@@CitySteadingBrews Well my Franklin is another week old (3weeks). I took a reading today and it is 0.990. Completely dry. It tastes like a dry mint wine. So I'm going to rack it today and add the lime and zest. I want to back sweeten it. Should I just mix in some more sugar or make a sugar wash with some warm water and pour it in? Not really sure just adding sugar and agitating it is the right thing to do.
@@jbafternoonpiper404 It's possible you could get a referment if you backsweeten, but just let it ride and sweeten again if needed.
ive been brewing mead very successfully and want to try this in a 3 gallon batch. could i use 2 pounds of sugar per gallon with yeast nutrient... would this work? im planning on proofing my yeast before pitching also
To make a larger batch, you just scale everything up except yeast.
This is really great, as usual. My question is this...if you add lemon zest/skins like I am going to do with my tea wine (5 gallons) in a week or two, do I need to "sanitize" the skins first? In other words, do I wash the lemons (I always wash fruit and vegetables) in sanitizer before extracting the skins? Or, is the alcohol level high enough at this point to not worry about wild yeasts colonies or contamination?
Some people sanitize it. We just wash them under the tap.
@@CitySteadingBrews Thank you for your very fast reply. I am looking forward to tasting the tea wine.
kilju is well kilju, you might want to try sugar wine. almost identical apart from added nutrient ( you already used wine yeast.) you can brew it in a month. :)
When(if) you guys reuse bottles what method works best for you to get labels off?
It depends on the glue used for the labels. Sometimes they simply need a good soak in hot water. Sometimes soaking in Sanitizer liquid helps. Sometimes a little Goo-be-gone does the trick though it can leave a greasy residue. Often I do the soak then scrape with a blade method, but be careful!
Add some yeast hulls to try to give it some nutrient?
Too late now really. Don't worry, it's fine :)
So hear me out. I keep fish and want to do a planted tank. I wanted to make diy a co2 diffuser to help with plant growth. All the how tos in making one tell you to mix yeast, sugar, and water in a sealed bottle with a tube running from its cap into the tank. And the pressure will push the newly created co2 through the tube.
Now, will the resulting mixture be safe to drink? How do i check? Since it will eventually stop producing co2 and I will have to dump it, if its technically homemade booze i want to atleast drink it.
I have no idea what could come of this and I'm reluctant to give opinions since it could be hazardous to your health.
Also, I don't think fermentations will give enough consistent CO2 production to make this worthwhile at all.
Is there a chart or formula that y’all trust to find out the gravity contribution of fruits? I’m asking because I’m wanting to make blueberry wine and want to try and not use ANY added sugar. Y’all talk about the points of white sugar and honey per pound I’m wanting to be able to calculate the same for different fruits and berries. I know y’all kinda touch on this subject in a couple episodes, but I’ve binge watched so many the past couple days I can’t remember which one it was! Also I do realize this will end up being multiple multiple of berries but I’m wanting to do a side by side comparison of a common berry +sugar combo vs a straight up berry. Like always y’all are awesome don’t stop putting out videos!!
I look up amount of sugar in any given fruit per pound and calculate from there.
Been dealing with a gallon of mint tea wine that's stuck. last addition was a full packet of ec-1118 four days ago and barely any burps happening. starting to wonder if mint is inhibiting the yeast's ability to thrive. started at 1.120 and before the ec addition it wouldn't budge below 1.080. it's at most at 5.3% alcohol and still very sweet; at most it should reach 15%. done some searching on the google, but other than a few articles on general antimicrobial properties, i'm not finding anything specific concerning mint and yeast or brewing. still, interested to see where both yours and mine goes!
Mint does have antimocrobial properties but I would think it wouldn't be that pronounced.
You brewed a mix drink. 🍸 I think you put together what's served at some resorts as a mixed drink.
Exactly.
My fermentation is going too slow can I put more yeast in there to speed up the process a little? Or should I add the sugar to help yeast?
Try raising the temperature? Yeast slow down when cold.
@@CitySteadingBrews thanks for help 😁👍
Superb
Can we make wine from holy basil? It may be a good immunity booster if taken in small quantities daily. I am growing the black one which fights cough and cold.
Sure. I might actually try that.
@@CitySteadingBrews oh! Basil with honey makes a great cough syrup. This is a wonderful herbal medicine in India. We just need to see if mead can be made out of it.👍
@@Dave_en I don't see why not.
I used this method for my most recent cider and it worked great.. Was wondering if you had some advice for me. A little off subject, I started making wines over shutdown in March. My second wine was from a batch of older blackberries from my in-law's patch. I've been making wine using by taking the potential abv method. I always felt that it came out strong. I recently picked up a refractometer to get actual readings on finished products and realized my abv was much higher than expected. In reality I didn't know I could obtain these numbers. My blackberry wine is reading at around 31%abv how do I keep my wine from producing such a high abv, potential was suppose to be 15%. What can I do without using chemicals? Any ideas?
Refractometers aren't accurate once fermentation starts. Use a hydrometer. There's no way you got 31%.
Okay, I saw on another video that y’all see questions from older videos all as one big comment section so I’m requesting knowledge if I may. I’m going the tea bag mint way, they’re in the mail. Should be the herbal route, but how many bags would you suggest. I know you probably wouldn’t know with out using the same product yourselves but can I get a ball park, please? I mean brew 1, 5 or 10 bags? I understand how it may be a loaded question if y’all used real mint. I think I’d start with five bags, but how much water with the teA to put into the jug at the same time? Hmm
What are you making and how much are you making?
@@CitySteadingBrews one gallon of Kilju
One or two should be enough.
You can kinda tell when portions of this was recorded by the size of Brian's "wine theif".
LOL, yep!
As far as lime leaves go, kaffir lime leaves are totally distinctive because they come as pairs a small leaf, with another behind it in an hourglass like shape. The fragrance is intense lime.... Not lemon, but lime. Kaffir lime fruits are wrinkled like small green brains and are small and not generally juicy, which is why the juice of kaffir limes is NOT generally used but the zest and the leaves. I'd go to a citrus nursery and get a smell of real kaffir lime leaves cos it's a great fragrance.
We've learned ours are NOT kaffir limes, probably rangpur.
Would you add yeast hulls if you do this again?
Maybe. Might help some.
So if you wanted sparkling wine you just skip the burping the wine step?
Not really. To carbonate properly, you degas it first, then create a small controlled fermentation in the bottle. The 'old' gasses will not taste so good, but the young gas is just enough to fizz.
there is a phone ap called NatureID, which allows you to take a picture of a leaf from a plant or a flower and it will give you all the info about that plant, and care of that plant.
Hi! Is it normal to have a lot of small white globs falling off mint? I started the batch about a week ago. 😬
Happened to us too, it's the wild yeast colonies.
@@CitySteadingBrews Oh ok! Thank you! Glad I didn't pitch it.
Waiting patiently for the Friday upload...
The one that went live 3 minutes ago?
@@CitySteadingBrews oh great! Thank you
Hey this might be a weird question, but what was the temperature it was sitting in?
74-78 f
What would be the best way to carbonate this beverage?
Easy is relative! Before bottling, add some priming sugar and a bit of champagne yeast. Then bottle and it will carb. An ounce of sugar per gallon should do.
Woohoo Kilju!!!
I know you've been waiting for this one!
Starting mine today! Very excited!
Im assuming the small amout of chlorine in tap water is ok to mix with star san for sanitation.
We use filtered water actually.
But for sanitation? Sure!
Pretty sure those fruits are like twice the size of a key lime. They might be Persian lime, or your tree might've been taken over by rootstock (e.g., citrange).
They are rangpur limes.
@@CitySteadingBrewsThe makrut or Thai lime* is among the most distinctive citruses I've ever grown or known. The leaf is unmistakable: it looks like someone took a standard three- to four-inch citrus leaf, folded it along the stem like a taco, made a decoratively curved V-shaped cut about an inch up from the base of the leaf, then unfurled it. The scent of a makrut leaf is likewise unmistakable: comparing it to a cross between lime zest and lime flower understates the perfume. When I owned a makrut tree, I used to make a lowish-alcohol potation that I called "margarita mead" with dark agave syrup plus piloncillo (Mexican very dark brown sugar in cone shape), fermented with lemongrass (I think) and extract of dried orange and bitter orange peel plus saison yeast, and at bottling I'd tuck a lightly torn whole makrut leaf in each bottle. It wasn't very margarita-like, but it was pretty yummy.
Makrut fruits are zestable, but the surface of the fruit - my makrut's fruit had the squat yurt-shaped profile of an especially wide-for-length satsuma tangerine - is knobbled in a pattern unsettlingly like the gyres of a human brain. The pith is easily the bitterest of any citrus in my experience; producing palatable zest and juice was generally too daunting to bother. I miss my little makrut tree! But it pleased me greatly, just last week, to discover that the "That's Tasty" brand of refrigerated fresh herbs has added "lime leaves" - makrut leaves - to the lineup!
*The scientific name of makrut or Thai lime is Citrus hystrix. The common name "kaffir lime" is increasingly disfavored; the least objectionable translation of the Arabic word "kaffir" is 'infidel', and as with most words that refer to Them Who Are Not Us, the connotations only get ruder from there.
These are rangpur, as I said above.
Ive started this one 3 days ago. This is my first ever alcoholic ferment. All the mint is kinda floating on top and i’m afraid it’s gonna get moldy if i just let it float. Is my fear correct? And if so what can i do to prevent it?
I also don’t have an airlock because i really wanted to try before going out to buy a bunch of stuff. So now i’ve just rubberbanded a thin cloth over the top
I wouldnt worry about stuff floating at the top. As long as everything was cleaned prior and you have a sealed airlock on it, you should be ok. Its been 5 months, how did it turn out?
@@Senorzilchnzero it was amazing
@@jumboolifant876 Anything you'd do different? I'm about to make the mint one today for the first time.
@@Senorzilchnzero i used the recipe as a pretty loose guide because this was my first time making booze and didn’t want to spend a lot of money. I only bought ingredients but no special equipment. I’d say if you use regular bakers yeast to be really carful moving the brew to rack it or maybe even put it in the racking location, let it sit for a few hours and carefully rack it. I got a lot of yeast in my final bottle and it tasted kind like licorice when it mixed in with the brew
What size is the graduated cylinder?
100 ml
Kilju should not be that slow fermenting. Maybe mint causes that or bad yeast. Normally real finnish kilju ferments in about week and another week for cold crash and racking. Original ingredients are table sugar(beet) bread yeast water and maybe very little fruit example one orange or so for relatively large amount of kilju
Well.... you say that but many others who have made Kilju are saying higher gravity ones NEVER ferment in less than a month. Sure, this isn't 'traditional' kilju. Then again... kilju is just sugar water and bread yeast.... the other things are added to make it palatable.
@@CitySteadingBrews It depends often traditional kilju has target abv 13%vol if higher then many people use turbo yeast that haves nutrients
@@CitySteadingBrews I cant seem to find the email address i have found a good Rooibos tea beer receipe for you to try
Can I put it in the fridge?
Sure if you want a nice cold beverage.
why you don't do an experiment where brewing three container one with wine yeast and other with champagne yeast, the third one mixing half of wine yeast and half of champagne yeast >>> sorry for my poor English
Why test wine yeast vs champagne yeast? I don't understand.
@@CitySteadingBrews what I mean wine yeast and champagne yeast tend to different in final product. my question is what if have a gallon of water and honey(batch) and we put 2.5 g of wine yeast and 2.5 champagne yeast (total of 5 g for a gallon) hope that makes sense
Generally when you mix yeast one colony will kill off the other by starving them out. You won't get a mix of properties. Whichever colony gets a head start in building itself up will starve the other. Wine yeast and champagne yeast are the same thing, in reality. There are a huge number of types of wine yeast and champagne yeast, so a comparison would be VERY complicated to do properly. Most wine yeasts are 12-15%, most champagne yeasts top out around 18% for alcohol tolerance, if that's what you mean by the differences, well... using the same recipe one will be sweeter so long as you surpass it's tolerance.
A question brought up by my brother I couldn't answer and im sure sounds stupid why cant you make a drink with just sugar water and yeast?
Pretty much what we did here. That’s kilju. We added mint and lime to make it mojito flavored.
@@CitySteadingBrews wow i just commented on your most recent video I had no idea if I actually watched the video I would have found my answer
Is ice distilling safe? Im not going to do that, its illegal.
Safe is such a relative term. All the methanol, ethanol, and everything stays in freeze distillation, whereas with regular distillation, you only keep the alcohol.
@@CitySteadingBrews thank you for all your responses, im still learning, im going to do a little more research before I start my first brew.
@@CitySteadingBrews from what you've said in your past videos, as long as i dont drink more than 1 gallon worth (you said 2 gallons+) the methanol level shouldnt be dangerous. Im not drinking a gallons worth, 😂 then id have another problem (like you said)
Well... yes and no. Technically speaking, ethanol is the cure for methanol poisoning so you really can't have a problem, but... alcohol is complex, and there are a lot of things in there already. Concentrating them seems like a bad idea, though it was done for centuries, and there's almost no records of harm. I don't promote it due to legalilty.
how do you filter it ?
We don't. It settles naturally.
Kilju is 2 to 3 days.
Depends on gravity, temp and yeast used :)
probably should've started with a lower gravity and done step additions with the sugar. that was a really high gravity must. plus fermenting first then adding the mint and lime peel for secondary.
1.124 is a bit higher than we like to start but it’s not that high really.
Ginger and mint are antimicrobial!!
That's why Yeast colony have hard time!!
Silence! I Kilju!
I knew someone would say it! :)
You girl look like Edna from Matchington Mansion, I don’t like them, but like you couple.
also that turkey baster looks wrong just wrong.