#no.103123

I strained the forbidden rice wine (made from Dongbei black glutinous rice aka "forbidden" rice) today with a nut milk bag. Way more labor intensive than I anticipated squeezing all the liquid out, and clean-up was a pain. My fingers were all wrinkled by the time I was done. The jar ended up a little over ¾ full after straining, and then I added a couple glasses of water. It still tastes a bit sweet so I don’t think it’s quite done fermenting.

I'm pleased with how I did.

My hōjicha tea mead scored well overall, but based on the judge's feedback I think it would have worked better as a semi-sweet mead instead of a completely dry mead, to help balance the acid/tannins.

Notes for "Tujku" hōjicha tea wildflower mead:

Judge 1: David S

Bouquet - Honey, very slight Alcohol Tea comes through. 8/10

Appearance - No complaints! 6/6

Flavor - Acidic, slightly hot. Tea comes through, Sour. 18/24

Overall - 7/10

Total - 39/50

Feedback - A bit acidic. Very slightly hot. Smoke comes through as well as the tea. A bit unbalanced. I would pull back on the acid a bit.

Judge 2: Shawn B

Bouquet - Nice nose, honey, curious smoke/grass 8/10

Appearance - amber brown, clear 5/6

Flavor - a bit tannic and tart, but nails the described flavors 20/24

Overall - 7/10

Total - 40/50

Feedback - Interesting mead. Each ingredient choice shines through. A bit tart, dry. Could be better balanced

.

The mead I used for my experimental rice wine "braggot" lost a lot a lot of points due to the fact that the mead I used in it had a flawed ferment. I didn't add enough nutrients. Aging helped some, but not enough.

Notes for "The Empress" 60/50 cactus mead/forbidden rice wine blend:

Judge 1: Jake Tweedy

Bouquet - chalky, fruity, heavy mineral presence 10/10

Appearance - 6/6

Flavor - interesting blend of flavors, presenting as acidic fruit mixed with gently floral honey. Faint bitter aftertaste lingers. 10/24

Overall - 7/10

Total - 33/50

Feedback - An interesting blend, there's a heavy mineral presence amongst a bright, zesty, fruity honey character. But a lingering bitterness keeps this mead from landing a world class score. Please keep experimenting! This was fun to try!

Judge 2: Susan Jimenez

Bouquet - prickly pear - mineral notes, clean & interesting med alcohol, inviting 9/10

Appearance - very clear, small bubbles around the rim 6/6

Flavor - low honey, lower acid and soft lingering tannin smooth alcohol for a sack. I get a tuna fishy off-flavor in the taste. maybe sulpher 10/24

Overall - 6/10

Total - 31/50

As you can see in the photo, the color of the pomegranate wine (right) is almost exactly the same as the forbidden rice wine (left).

I also racked the blackberry blossom honey mead from a gallon wide mouth fermenter into 2 half gallon bottles. One ended up much fuller than the other, and there were about 16 oz of pomegranate wine+lees left in the pomegranate fermenter after bottling, so I added the pomegranate dregs to the less full half gallon bottle.

Technically that makes that bottle my first attempt at a melomel.

So I tasted the forbidden rice wine.

The reason it looks insanely bright red in the second photo is because I have it backlit by my laptop screen. In the big half gallon bottle it looks indistinguishable from red grape wine, but when you put it in a smaller container you can see that it's much, much more translucent.

I want to say there's a fruityness to it that rice wine made with white rice doesn't have. I don't like it yet, but I think I will like it if it ages longer. I started this batch on Halloween, so it's just about 3.3 months old. Another 3 months, and I think I'll start to like it.

I haven't tried it chilled.

Added 1lb of molasses to the "beer" batch. As you can see it has all sunk to the bottom. I'll stir it up tomorrow. I also tried adding a couple crushed up digestive enzyme supplement tablets to help along the saccharification of the oat flour. I sense the rice wine starter I used had an easier time processing the starch in the maca powder than the starch in the oat flour.

If I did it again, I wouldn't use EC-1118 yeast. K1-V1116 is supposed to do a better job of preserving the flavor of the honey.

I siphoned the forbidden rice wine. I got about 2 liters. It looks a lot like red wine, but darker. It tastes like rice wine. Not exactly the same as the rice wine I made with white rice, but very similar, and I don't really know how to describe the differences. The lees layer was 3 inches thick in the gallon fermenter. I think I can eke some more wine out of it if I let it settle for longer, so instead of just tossing the lees, I poured them into one of my tall glass 65oz milk bottles.

4lb of rice is a lot more rice than I thought it was. I was expecting the volume to double after cooking but I feel like it's significantly more than doubled.