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Before proceeding to the consideration of the manufacture of wines, beer' and spirits, a general survey of the subject of fermentation will not be out of place.
May be divided into fermented drinks including beer and wines, and distilled drinks or spirits which are obtained from the former by distillation. Spirits usually contain about fifty per cent. of alcohol, beer and wines from one to twenty per cent. The alcohol in all cases results from the breaking up of the sugar in the fermenting liquid.
Ordinary sugar, or cane sugar, uncrystallizable, or fruit sugar; and grape sugar, or glucose, are the three most important varieties. Fruit sugar exists in all the sub-acid fruits as grapes, currants, apples, peaches, etc. When these are dried, it changes to grape sugar forming the whitish grains which are seen on the outside of prunes, raisins, etc. Grape sugar is found to a limited extent in fruits associated with fruit sugar. Cane sugar is readily changed by the action of acids or ferments into fruit sugar, and the latter into grape sugar, but the process cannot be reversed. Grape sugar is the only fermentable variety, the others becoming changed into it before fermentation.
Under the influence of acids, or diastare, a principle existing in germinating grains, starch is changed first into gum (dextrine) and afterwards into grape sugar. Hence one of our most important sources of alcohol is to be found in the starch of barley, corn, wheat, potatoes, etc. Wood may be converted into grape sugar by the action of strong sulphuric acid which is afterwards neutralized. An attempt to produce alcohol in this way on a commercial scale was made in France, but was not successful.
A solution of pure sugar will remain unchanged for an indefinite period of time. To induce fermentation, a portion of some nitrogenous body, itself undergoing decomposition, must be added. Such ferments are albumen (white of egg), fibrin (fibre of flesh), casein (basis of cheese), gluten (the pasty matter of flour). Yeast consists of vegetable egg-shaped cells, which is increased during its action as a ferment.
In order that fermentation shall begin we require, besides the contact of the ferment, the presence of air. The most easily decomposed articles of food may be preserved for an indefinite period by hermetically sealing them in jars, after drawing out the air. When once begun, however, fermentation will go on, if the air be excluded. Temperature is important. The most favorable temperature is between 68° and 77° Fahr. At a low temperature fermentation is exceedingly slow. Bavarian or lager beer is brewed between 32° and 46 1/2° Fahr. A boiling heat instantly stops fermentation, by killing the ferment.
To check fermentation we may remove the yeast by filtration. Hops, oil of mustard, sulphurous acid (from burning sulphur), the sulphites, sulphuric acid, check the process by killing the ferment.
Too much sugar is unfavorable to fermentation, the best strength for the syrup is ten parts of water to one of sugar.
The grape-sugar breaks up into carbonic acid which escapes as gas, alcohol and water which remain. In malting the grain is allowed to germinate, during which process the starch of the grain is changed into gum and sugar: the rootlets make their appearance at one end and the stalk or acrospire at the other. The germination is then checked by heating in a kiln; if allowed to proceed a certain portion of the sugar would be converted into woody matter, and lost.
In brewing the sacharine matter is extracted from the malt during the mashing. Yeast is added to cause fermentation; an infusion of hops afterwards, to add to the flavor and to check fermentation. In wine making there is sufficient albuminous matter in the grape to cause fermentation without the use of yeast.
Distillation separates the alcohol in great part from the water. Alcohol boils at 179° Fahr., and water at 212°. It is not possible, however, to separate entirely alcohol and water by distillation.
Weak fermented liquors will become sour on exposure to the air. This is owing to the conversion of their alcohol into acetic acid (see Vinegar). This change is due to the absorption of the oxygen of the air and is much promoted by the presence of a peculiar plant, the mother of vinegar. It is sometimes called the acetous fermentation.
By the action of yeast on beet-sugar a peculiar fermentation is set up; but little alcohol is formed. The same gives ropiness to wines and beer. It is checked by vegetable astringents,
Provide a copper holding full two-thirds of the quantity proposed to he brewed, with a gauge-stick to determine the number of gallons in the copper. A mash-tub, or tun, adapted to contain two-thirds of the quantity proposed to be brewed and one or two tuns of equal size to ferment the wort three or four shallow coolers; one or two wooden bowls; a thermometer; half a dozen casks of different sizes; a large funnel; two or three clean pails, and a hand-pump.
This proceeds on the supposition of two mashes for ale; but if only one mash is adapted for ale, with a view of making the table-beer better, then the copper and mash tun should hold one-third more than the quantity to be brewed.
The expenses of brewing depend on the price of malt and hops, and on the proposed strength of the article. Onequarter of good malt and eight pounds of good hops ought to make two barrels of good ale and one of table-beer. The other expenses consist of coal and labor.
Of public breweries, and their extensive utensils and machinery, we give no description, because books are not likely to be resorted to by the class of persons engaged in those extensive manufactories for information relative to their own particular business.
Soft water, or hard water softened by exposure to the air, is generally preferred, because it makes a stronger extract, and is more inclined to ferment; but hard water is better for keeping beer and is less liable to turn sour. Some persons soften hard water by throwing a spoonful of soda into a barrel, and others do it with a handful of common salt mixed with an ounce of salt of tartar.
Put about 6 quarters of good barley, newly threshed, etc., into a stone trough full of water, and let it steep till the water be of a bright reddish color, which will be in about 3 days, more or less, according to the moisture or dryness, smallness or bigness of the grain, the season of the year, or the temperature of the weather. In summer malt never makes well; in winter it requires longer steeping than in spring or autumn. It may be known when steeped enough by other marks besides the color of the water. The grains should be soft enough to be pierced with a needle, but not to be crushed between the nails. When sufficiently steeped take it out of the trough, and lay it in heaps, to let the water drain from it; then, after 2 or 8 hours, turn it over with a scoop, and lay it in a new heap, 20 or 24 inches deep. This is called the coming heap, in the right management of which lies the principal skill. In this heap it may lie 40 hours, more or less, according to the aforementioned qualities of the grain, etc., before it comes to the right temper of malt. While it lies it must be carefully looked to after the first 15 or 16 hours, for about that time the grains begin to put forth roots, which, when they have equally and fully done, the malt must, within an hour after, be turned over with a scoop; otherwise the grains will begin to put forth the blade and spire also, which must by all means be prevented. If all the malt do not come equally, but that which lies in the middle, being warmest, come the soonest, the whole must be turned, so that what was outmost may be inmost; and thus it is managed till it be all alike. As soon as the malt is sufficiently come, turn it over, and spread it to a depth not exceeding 5 or 6 inches; and by the time it is all spread out begin and turn it over again 3 or 4 times. Afterwards turn it over in like manner once in 4 or 5 hours, making the heap deeper by degrees, and continue to do so for the space of 48 hours at least. This cools, dries, and deadens the grain, so that it becomes mellow, melts easily in brewing, and separates entirely from the husk. Then throw up the malt into a heap as high as possible, where let it lie till it grows as hot as the hand can bear it, which usually happens in about the space of 30 hours. This perfects the sweetness and mellowness of the malt. After being sufficiently heated, throw it abroad to cool, and turn it over again about 6 or 8 hours after; and then lay it on a kiln with a hair cloth or wire spread under it. After one fire, which must last 24 hours, give it another more slow, and afterwards, if need be, a third; for if the malt be not thoroughly dried, it cannot be well ground, neither will it dissolve well in the brewing; but the ale it makes will be red, bitter, and unfit for keeping.
To obtain the infusion of malt it is necessary to break it, for which purpose it is passed through stones placed at such distance, as that they may crush each grain without reducing it to powder; for if ground too small it makes the worts thick, while if not broken at all the extract is not obtained. In general, pale malts are ground larger than amber or brown malts.
Malt should be used within two or three days after it is ground, but in the London brew-houses it is generally ground one day and used the next. A quarter of malt ground should yield nine bushels, and sometimes ten. Crushing mills or iron rollers have lately been used in preference to stones which make a considerable grit with the malt. On a small scale, malt may be broken by wooden rollers, by the hands.
Steel mills like coffee mills have also been used for crushing malt with great success.
First, examine well; if it has a round body, breaks soft, is full of flour all its length, smells well, and has a thin skin; next chew some of it, and if sweet and mellow, then it is good. If it is nerd and steely, and retains something of a barley nature, it has not been rightly made, and will weigh heavier than that which has been properly malted.
Secondly, take a glass nearly full of water; put in some malt, and if it swims, it is good, but if any sinks to the bottom then it is not true malt.
Pale malt is the slowest and least dried, producing more worts than high dried melt, and of better quality. Amber colored malt, or that between pale and brown, produces a flavor much admired in many malt liquors. Brown malt loses much of its nutritious qualities, but confers a peculiar flavor desired by many palates. Roasted malt, after the manner of coffee, is used by the best London brewers, to give color and flavor to porter, which in the first instance has been made from pale malt.
Rub them between the fingers or the palm of the hand, and if good, a rich glutinous substance will be felt, with a fragrant smell, and a fine yellow dust will appear. The best color is a fine olive green, but if too green, and the seeds are small and shrivelled, they have been picked too soon and will be deficient in flavor. If of a dusty brown color they were picked too late, and should not be chosen. When a year old, they are considered as losing one-fourth in strength.
From a single quarter, two barrels of liquor will produce but one barrel of wort. Three barrels will produce one barrel and three quarters. Four barrels will produce two barrels and a half. Five barrels will produce three barrels and a quarter. Six barrels will produce four barrels. Eight barrels will produce five barrels and a half, and ten barrels will produce seven barrels, and so on in proportion for other quantities.
First Mash. - For very pale malt turn on the liquor at 176° Fahr. For pale and amber mixed, 172°, all amber, 170°, high-colored amber, 168°. An equal quantity of pale, amber, and brown, 160°. If the quantity of brown is very dark, or any part of the grains charred by the fire upon the kiln, 155°.
Second Mash. - For very pale malt turn on the liquor at 182°. For pale and amber mixed, 178°; all amber, 176°; high-colored amber, 172°. An equal quantity of pale, ember and brown, 166°. If the quantity of brown is very dark, or any part of the grains charred by the fire, 164°.
The heat should in some measure be regulated by the temperature of the atmosphere, and should be two or three degrees higher in cold than in warm weather.
The proper degree of heat will give the strongest wort and in the greatest quantity, for though the heat were greater and the strength of the wort thereby increased, yet a greater quantity of liquor would be retained in the malt; and again, if it were lower, it would produce more wort, but the strength of the extract would be deficient, the beer without spirit, and likely to turn sour.
To effect this a saccharometer is necessary, and may be purchased at any mathematical instrument maker's. It determines the relative gravity of wort to the water used, and the quantity of farinaceous matter contained in the wort. It is used in all public breweries after drawing off the wort from each mash, and regulates the heat and quantity of liquor turned on at each succeeding mash, that the ultimate strength may be equal though the quantity is less. This signifies little to the private, but it is of great consequence to the public brewer. Those who brew frequently and desire to introduce it will obtain printed tables and instructions with the instrument.
The usual quantity is a pound to the bushel of malt, or 8 lbs. to the quarter, but for keeping beer, it should be extended to 10 or 12, and if for one or two years to 14 lbs. to the quarter. Small beer requires from 3 to 6 lbs. the quarter, and rather more when old hops are used.
Some persons, instead of boiling the hops with the wort, macerate them, and put the strong extract into the tun with the first wort, and make 2 or 3 extracts in like manner for the second and third worts
The first wort should be sharply boiled for 1 hour, and the second for 2 hours, but if intended for beer of longkeeping, the time should be extended half an hour. The hops should be strained from each preceding wort, and returned into the copper with the succeeding one. Between the boilings the fires should be damped with wet cinders, and the copper door set open.
For small beer only half an hour is necessary for the first wort, 1 hour for the second, and 2 hours for the third. The diminution from boiling is from one-eighth to one-sixteenth.
Worts should be laid so shallow as to cool within 6 or 7 hours to the temperature of 60°. In warm weather the depth should not exceed 2 or 3 inches, but in cold weather it may be 5 inches. As soon as they have fallen to 60° they should instantly be tunned and yeasted.
In cold weather the heats in the coolers should be 5° or 6° higher than in mild and warm weather. For ale, in cold weather, it should be tunned as soon as it has fallen to 60° Fahr. in the coolers; for porter to 64°, and for table beer to 74°, and in warm weather strong beer should be 4° or 5° less and table beer 7° or 8°. Care should also be taken that the worts do not get cold before the yeast is mixed to produce fermentation. The best rule for mixing the yeast is 1 1/2 lbs. to every barrel of strong beer wort, and 1 lb. to every barrel of table beer wort.
Ale brewed for keeping in winter should be no more than blood warm when the yeast is put to it. If it is intended for immediate drinking, it may be yeasted a little warmer. The best method of mixing the yeast is to take 2 or 3 quarts of the hot water wort in a wooden bowl or pan, to which when cool enough, put yeast enough to work the brewing, generally l or 2 quarts to the hogshead, according to its quality. In this bowl or pan the fermentation will commence while the rest of the worts are cooling, when the whole may be mixed together.
The yeast of strong beer is preferable to that from small beer, and it should be fresh and good. The quantity should be diminished with the temperature at which the worts are tunned, and less in summer than in winter. For strong beer a quart of yeast per quarter will be sufficient at 58° but less when the worts are higher and when the weather is hot. If estimated by the more accurate criterion of weight, 1 1/2 lbs. should be used for a barrel of strong beer, and 1 1/4 lbs. for a barrel of small beer. If the fermentation does not commence add a little more yeast, and rouse the worts for some time. But if they get cold, and the fermentation is slow, fill a bottle with hot water and put it into the tun.
In cold weather small beer should be tunned at 70°, keeping beer at 50° and strong beer at 54°. In mild weather at 50° for each sort. The fermentation will increase the heat 10°.
A proportion of the yeast should be added to the first wort as soon as it is let down from the coolers, and the remainder as soon as the second wort is let down.
The commencement of fermentation is indicated by a line of small bubbles round the sides of the tun, which in a short time extends over the surface. A crusty head follows, and then a fine rocky one, followed by a light, frothy head. In the last stage the head assumes a yeasty appearance, and the color is yellow or brown, the smell of the tun becoming strongly vinous. As soon as this head begins to fall, the tun should be skimmed, and the skimming continued every 2 hours till no more yeast appears; this closes the operation, and it should then be put in casks, or, in technical language, cleansed. A minute attention to every stage of this process is necessary to secure fine flavored and brilliant beverage. Should the fermentation be unusually slow, it should be accelerated by stirring or rousing the whole. After the first skimming, a small quantity of salt and flour, well mixed, should be stirred in the tun The fermentation will proceed in the casks, to encourage which the bung-hole should be placed a little aside, and the casks kept full by being filled up from time to time with old beer. When this fermentation has ceased the casks may be bunged up.
Spread some flour with the hand over the surface, and it will form a crust, and keep the worts warm, or throw in an ounce or two of powdered ginger, or fill a bottle with boiling water and sink it in the worts, or heat a small quantity of the worts and throw into the rest, or beat up the whites of two eggs with some brandy and throw it into the tun or cask, or tie up some bran in a coarse, thin cloth and put it into the vat, and above all things do not disturb the wort, as fermentation will not commence during any agitation of the wort.
Mix some cold raw wort in the tun, or divide the whole between two tuns, where, by being in smaller body, the energy of the fermentation of the whole will be divided. Also open the doors and windows of the brew-house; but, if it still frets, sprinkle some cold water over it, or if it frets in the cask, put a mixture of a 1/4 of a lb. of sugar with a handful of salt to the hogshead.
Thames or New River water is indifferently used, or hard water, raised into backs and exposed for a few days to the air.
Take a mixture of brown, amber and pale malts in nearly equal quantities, and turn them into the mash-tub in this order. Turn on the first liquor at 165°, mash 1 hour and then coat the whole with dry salt. In 1 hour set the tap.
Mix 10 lbs. of brown hops to the quarter of malt, half old, half new; boil the first wort briskly with the hops for three-quarters of an hour, and after putting into the copper 1 1/2 lbs. of sugar and 1 1/2 lbs. of Leghorn juice (extract of liquorice) to the barrel, turn the whole into the coolers, rousing the wort all the time.
Turn on the second liquor at 174°, and in an hour set tap again. This second wort having run off, turn on again at 145°; mash for an hour and stand for the same; in the meantime boiling the second wort with the same hops for an hour. Turn these into the coolers as before, and let down into the tub at 64°, mixing the yeast as it comes down. Cleanse the second day at 80°, previously throwing in a mixture of flour and salt, and rousing thoroughly.
For private use, every quarter of malt ought to yield 2 barrels and a half, but brewers would run 3 barrels to a quarter.
Take 1 sack of pale malt, 1/2 a sack of amber malt, and 1/2 a sack of brown malt.
Turn on 2 barrels for first mash at l65°; second mash, 1 1/2 barrels at 172°; third mush, 2 barrels at 142°. Boil 10 lbs. of new and old hops and 2 oz. of porter extract in the first wort. Cool, ferment, and cleanse according to the previous instructions.
The procedure is the same as in the preceding article, except that one-third or one-half the malt should be brown.
A bushel and three quarters of ground malt and a pound of hops are sufficient to make 18 gallons of good family ale. That the saccharine matter of the malt may be extracted by infusion, without the farina, the temperature of the water should not exceed 155° or 160°. The quantity of water should be poured on the malt as speedily as possible, and the whole being well mixed together by active stirring, the vessel should be closely covered over for an hour; if the weather be cold, for an hour and a half. If hard water be employed it should be boiled, and the temperature allowed, by exposure to the atmosphere, to fall to 155° or 160°; but if rain water is used, it may be added to the malt as soon as it arrives to 155°. During the time this process is going on, the hops should be infused in a close vessel, in as much boiling water as will cover them, for 2 hours. The liquor may then be squeezed out, and kept closely covered.
The hops should then be boiled for about 10 minutes, in double the quantity of water obtained from the infused hops, and the strained liquor, when cold, may be added with the infusion to the wort, when it has fallen to the temperature of 70°. The object of infusing the hops in a close vessel previously to boiling, is to preserve the essential oil of hops, which renders it more sound, and at the same time more wholesome. A pint of good thick yeast should be well stirred into the mixture of wort and hops, and covered over in a place of the temperature of 65°, and when the fermentation is completed, the liquor may be drawn off into a clean cask previously rinsed with boiling water. When the slow fermentation which will ensue has ceased, the cask should be loosely bunged for two days, when, if the liquor be left quiet, the bung may be properly fastened. The pale malt is the best, because, when highly dried, it does not afford so much saccharine matter. If the malt be new, it should be exposed to the air, in a dry room, for 2 days previously to its being used; but if it be old, it may be used in 12 or 20 hours after it is ground. The great difference in the flavor of ale made by different brewers appears to arise from their employing different species of hops.
For 36 gallons, take of malt (usually pale), 2 1/2 bushels; sugar, 3 lbs. just boiled to a color; hops, 2 lbs. 8 oz.; coriander seeds, 1 oz.; capsicum, 1/2 a drachm.
Work it 2 or 3 days, beating it well up once or twice a day; when it begins to fall, cleanse it by adding a handful of salt and some wheat flour.
The first mash should be at 170°, viz. 2 barrels per quarter; let it stand on the grains 3/4 of an hour in hot weather, or 1 hour if cold. Second mash, 145° at 1 1/2 barrels per quarter, stands 1/2 an hour. Third, 165°, 2 barrels per quarter, stands 1/2 an hour. Fourth, 130°, 3 barrels, stands 2 hours. The first wort to be boiled with 6 lbs. of hops per quarter for 1 1/2 hours, the second wort to be boiled with the same hops 2 hours, and the remainder 3 hours. The whole is to be now heated as low as 55° if the weather permits, and put to work with about 5 pints of yeast per quarter; if the weather is too warm to get them down to 55°, a less proportion will be sufficient. The 8 barrels of liquor first used will be reduced to 6 of beer to each quarter; 1 barrel being left in the grains, and another evaporated in boiling, cooling and working.
These are first, a copper that will contain at least 40 gallons. Second, a mashing-tub to contain 60 gallons; for the malt is to be in this along with the water. It must be a little broader at top than at bottom, and not quite so deep as it is wide across the bottom. In the middle of the bottom there is a hole about 2 inches over, to draw the wort off. Into this hole goes a stick a foot or two longer than the tub is high. This stick is to be about 2 inches through, and tapered for about 8 inches upwards, at the end that goes into the hole, which at last it fills up as closely as a cork. Before anything else is put into the tubs, lay a little bundle of fine birch about half the bulk of a birch broom, and well tied at both ends. This being laid over the hole (to keep back the grains as the wort goes out), put the tapered end of the stick down through it into the hole, and thus cork the whole up. Then have something of weight sufficient to keep the birch steady at the bottom of the tub, with a hole through it to slip down the stick, the best thing for this purpose will be a leaden collar for the stick, with the hole large enough, and it should weigh 3 or 4 pounds.
Third, an underback or shallow tub, to go under the mash-tub for the wort to run into when drawn from the grains.
Fourth, a tun-tub that will contain 30 gallons, to put the ale into to work, the mash-tub serving as a tun-tub for the small beer. Besides these, a couple of coolers or shallow tubs, about a foot deep; or, if there are four it may be as well, in order to effect the cooling more quickly.
Begin by filling the copper with water, and next by making the water boil. Then put into the mashing-tub water sufficient to stir and separate the malt. The degree of heat that the water is to be at, before the malt is put in, is 170° by the thermometer; but, without one, take this rule: when you can, looking down into the tub, see your face clearly in the water, the water is hot enough. Now put in the malt and stir it well in the water. In this state it should continue for about 1/4 of an hour. In the meanwhile fill up the copper, and make it boil; and then put in boiling water sufficient to give 18 gallons of ale.
When the proper quantity of water is in stir the malt again well, and cover the mashing-tub over with sacks, and there let the mash stand for 2 hours; then draw off the wort. The mashing-tub is placed on a couple of stools, so as to be able to put the underback under it to receive the wort as it tomes out of the hole. When the underback is put in its place, let out the wort by pulling up the stick that corks the hole. But observe, this stick (which goes 6 or 8 inches through the hole) must be raised by degrees, and the wort must be let out slowly in order to keep back the sediment. So that it is necessary to have something to keep the stick up at the point where it is to be raised, and fixed at for the time. To do this the simplest thing is a stick across the mashing-tub.
As the ale-wort is drawn off into the small underback, lade it out of that into the tun-tub; put the wort into the copper, and add 1 1/2 pounds of good hops, well rubbed and separated as they are put in. Now make the copper boil, and keep it with the lid off, at a good brisk boil for a full hour, or an hour and a half. When the boiling is done, put the liquor into the coolers, but strain out the hops in a small clothes-basket or wickerbasket. Now set the coolers in the most convenient place, in doors or out of doors, as most convenient.
The next stage is the tun-tub, where the liquor is set to work. A great point is, the degree of heat that the liquor is to be at, when it is set to work. The proper heat is 70°; so that a thermometer makes the matter sure. In the country they determine the degree of heat by merely putting a finger into the liquor.
When cooled to the proper heat, put it into the tuntub, and put in about half a pint of good yeast. But the yeast should first be put into half a gallon of the liqueur, and mixed well; stirring in with the yeast a handful of wheat or rye-flour. This mixture is then to be poured out clean into the tun-tub, and the mass of the liquor agitated well, till the yeast be well mixed with the whole. When the liquor is thus properly put into the tun-tub and set a working, cover over the top, by laying a sack or two across it.
The tun-tub should stand in a place neither too warm nor too cold. Any cool place in summer, and any warm place in winter, and if the weather be very cold, some cloths or sacks should be put round the tun-tub while the beer is working. In about 6 or 8 hours a frothy head will rise upon the liquor, and it will keep rising, more or less slowly for 48 hours. The best way is to take off the froth at the end of about 24 hours, with a common skimmer, and in 12 hours take it off again, and so on, till the liquor has done working, and sends up no more yeast. Then it is beer, and, when it is quite cold (for ale or strong beer), put it into the cask by means of a funnel. It must be cold before this is done, or it will be foxed; that is, have a rank and disagreeable taste.
The cask should lean a little on one side when filling it, because the beer will work again, and send more yeast out of the bung hole. Something will go off in this working, which may continue for 2 or 3 days, so that when the beer is being put in the cask, a gallon or two should be left, to keep filling up with as the working produces emptiness. At last when the working is completely over, block the cask up to its level. Put in a handful of fresh hops, fill the cask quite full, and bung it tight, with a bit of coarse linen round the bung.
When the cask is empty, great care must be taken to cork it tightly up, so that no air gets in; for, if so, the cask is moulded and spoilt for ever.
Thirty-six gallons of boiling water are to go into the mashing-tub; the grains are to be well stirred up, as before; the mashing-tub is to be covered over, and the mash is to stand in that state for an hour; then draw it off into the tun-tub.
By this time the copper will be empty again, by putting the ale liquor to cool. Now put the small beer wort into the copper with the hops used before, and with half a pound of fresh hops added to them; and boil this liquor briskly for an hour.
Take the grains and the sediment clean out of the mashing-tub, put the birch twigs in again, and put down the stick as before. Put the basket over, and take the liquor from the copper (putting the fire out first) and pour it into the mashing-tub through the basket. Take the basket away, throw the hops on the dunghill, and leave the small beer liquor to cool in the mashing-tub.
Here it is to remain to be set to working, only more yeast will be wanted in proportion; and there should be for 36 galls. of small beer, 3 half pints of good yeast.
Proceed now as with the ale, only, in the case of the small beer it should be put into cask, not quite cold; or else it will not work in the barrel, as it ought to do. It will not work so strongly nor so long as ale; and may be put in the barrel much sooner, in general the next day after it is brewed.
All the utensils should be well cleaned and put away as soon as they are done with. "I am now," says Mr. Cobbet, "in a farm house, where the same set of utensils has been used for forty years; and the owner tells me that they may last for forty years longer."
To every quarter of malt take 100 lbs. of brown sugar, and in the result, it will be found that the sugar is equal to the malt. The quarter of malt is to be brewed with the same proportions, as though it were 2 quarters; and sugar is to be put into the tun, and the first wort let down upon it, rousing the whole well together.
The other worts are then to be let down, and the fermentation and other processes carried on as in the brewing of malt.
Of this strong ale, only a barrel and a half is drawn from a quarter, at 180° for the first mash and 190° for the second, followed by a gyle of table beer. It is tunned at 58°, and cleansed at 72°. The Burton brewers use the finest pale malt, and grind it a day or two before being used. They employ Kentish hops, from 6 to 8 lbs. per quarter.
The first copperful of boiling water is to be put into the mash-tub, there to lie a quarter of an hour till the steam is far spent; or as soon as the hot water is put in, throw into it a pail or two of cold water, which will bring it at once to a proper temperature; then let 3 bus. of malt run leisurely into it, and stir or mash all the while, but no more than just to keep the malt from clotting or balling; when that is done, put 1 bus. of dry malt at the top, and let it stand covered 2 hours, or till the next copperful of water is boiled, then lade over the malt 3 handbowlsful at a time. These run off at the cock or tap by a very small stream before more is put on, which again must be returned into the mash-tub till it comes off exceedingly fine. This slow way takes 16 hours in brewing 4 bus. of malt. Between the ladings, put cold water into the copper to boil, while the other is running off; by this means, the copper is kept up nearly full, and the cock is kept running to the end of the brewing. Only 21 galls. must be saved of the first wort, which is reserved in a tub, wherein 4 oz. of hops are put, and then it is to be set by.
For the second wort there are 20 galls. of water in the copper boiling which must be laded over in the same manner as the former, but no cold water need be mixed. When half of this is run out into a tub, it must be directly put into the copper with half of the first wort, strained through the brewing sieve as it lies on a small loose wooden frame over the copper, in order to keep those hops that were first put in to preserve it, which is to make the first copper 21 galls. Then, upon its beginning to boil, put in 1 lb. of hops in 1 or 2 canvas bags, somewhat larger than will just contain the hops, that an allowance may be given for their swell; this boil very briskly for 1/2 an hour, when take the hops out and continue boiling the wort by itself till it breaks into particles a little ragged; it is then done, and must be dispersed into the cooling tubs very shallow. Put the remainder of the first and second wort together, and boil it in the same manner, and with the same quantity of fresh hops, as the first.
By this method of brewing, ale may be made as strong or as small as is thought fit, and so may the small beer that comes after.
Procure 2 mashing-tubs, 1 that will mash 4 bus., and the other 2 bus., and a copper that holds 1/2 a hogshead. The water, when boiled, is put in to the largest tub, and a pail of cold water immediately on that; then put the malt in by a handbowlful at a time, stirring it all the while, and so on in a greater quantity by degrees (for the danger of balling is mostly at first), till at last 1/2 a bus. of dry malt is left for a top-cover; thus let it stand 3 hours. In the meanwhile, another copper of water is directly heated, and put as before into the other mash-tub. for mashing 2 bus. of malt, which stands that time. Then, after the wort of the 4 bus. is run off, let that also of the 2 bus. spend, and lade it over the 4 bus., the cock running all the while, and it will make in all a copper and a half of wort, which is boiled twice; that is, when the first copper is boiled an hour, or till it breaks into large cakes; then take half out, and put the remaining raw wort to it, and boil it about 1/2 an hour till it is broken. Now while the 2 worts are running off, a copper of water almost scalding hot is made ready, and put over the goods or grains of both tubs; after an hour's standing the cock is turned, and this second wort is boiled away and put over the grains of both tubs to stand 1 hour; when off, it is put into the copper and boiled again, and then serves hot instead of the first water, for mashing 4 bus. of fresh malt; after it has again lain 3 hours, and is spent off, it is boiled, but while in the mash-tub, a copper of water is heated to put over the goods or grains, which stands 1 hour, and is then boiled for small beer. And thus may be brewed 10 bus. of malt with 2 1/2 lbs. of hops for the whole.
Adopt the best pale malt.
1st. Mash two barrels per quarter, at 183° (170°); mash three-quarters of an hour, let it stand one hour, and allow half an hour to run off the wort.
2nd. Mash one barrel per quarter, at 190° (183°); mash three-quarters of an hour, let it stand three-quarters of an hour, and tap as before.
3rd. Mash one barrel per quarter, at 160°; mash half an hour, let it stand half an hour' and tap as before.
The first and second wort may be mixed together, boiling them about an hour or an hour and a quarter, with a quantity of hops proportioned to the time the beer is intended to be kept.
The two first may be mixed at the heat of 60° or 65° in the gyle-tun, and the second should be fermented separately for small beer.
The malt is first mixed with water of ordinary temperature, for 1 part of malt about 39 parts of water are employed. The whole is allowed to rest 6 or 8 hours, after which the mashing is begun by mixing the mass with 3 parts of boiling water added gradually during continual agitation, by which its temperature is raised to 106° Fahr. The thick part of the mash is then transferred to the copper and heated to boiling with constant agitation, and after an hour's boiling again returned to the mash-tun and mixed thoroughly with its liquid contents, by which the temperature in the mash-tun is raised to 133°. The thick part of the mash is once more transferred to the copper and boiled for an hour and returned to the mash-tun, by which the temperature is raised to 154°. The fluid part of the mash is then transferred to the copper and boiled for a quarter of an hour, and then poured back upon the mash in the tun, and mixed thoroughly with it. The temperature is thereby raised to from 167° to 180°. After agitation for a quarter of an hour the mash is left at rest for an hour or an hour and a half, after which the clear wort is drawn off.
The fermentation of lager is peculiar, it is performed very slowly, and at a temperature from 32° to 46 1/2° Fahr. The yeast, instead of rising, falls to the bottom. The high temperature of the mash causes all albuminous matter to be coagulated and much gummy matter remains unchanged. This, together with the bottom fermentation, carries off all nitrogenous matter; the beer is exceedingly clear. It is put in hogsheads lined with common rosin, and is preserved a long time in vaults or cellars before being used.
Boil enough ale wort, preferably pale, for 1 barrel, with 3 handsful of hops and 14 pounds of groats (hulled oats), until all the soluble matter is extracted from the latter. Strain, and when lukewarm add 2 pints of yeast, and when fermenting briskly bottle in strong stoneware bottles.
Take 15 galls. of water and boil one-half, putting the other into a barrel; add the boiling water to the cold, with 1 gall. of molasses and a little yeast. Keep the bung-hole open till the fermentation is abated.
Very excellent beer is made of sugar, and also of treacle. First boil a peek of bran in to galls. Of water, strain the bran off, and mix with the branny water 3 pounds of sugar, first stirring it well. When cool enough add a teacupful of the best yeast, and a tablespoonful of flour to a bowl nearly full of the saccharine matter, which, when it has fermented for about an hour, is to be mixed with the remainder, and hopped with about 1/2 lb. hops; and the following day it may be put into the cask, to ferment further, which usually takes 3 days, when it is to be bunged and it will be fit for drinking in a week. Treacle beer is made in the same way, 3 lbs. of it being used instead of 3 lbs. of sugar.
N.B. - This beer will not keep any length of time.
Boil 8 galls. of water and when in a state of complete ebullition pour it into a beer barrel which contains 8 galls. more of cold water; then add 16 lbs. of molasses, with a few tablespoonfuls of the essence of spruce, stirring the whole well together; add half a pint of yeast, and keep it in a temperate situation, with the bung-hole open for two days till the fermentation be abated, when the bung may be put in and the beer bottled off. It is fit to drink in a day or two. If you can get no essence of spruce make a strong decoction of the small twigs and leaves of the spruce firs.
Take of oil of spruce, sassafras, and wintergreen, each 40 drops; pour 1 gall. of boiling water on the oils, then add 4 galls. of cold water, 3 pints of molasses, 1 pint of yeast. Let it stand for 2 hours and bottle.
Take 3 galls. of molasses; add 10 galls. of water at 60° Fahr. Let this stand 2 hours, then pour into a barrel, and add powdered or bruised sassafras and wintergreen bark each 3 lb., bruised sarsaparilla root 1/2 lb., yeast 1 pint, water enough to fill the barrel, say 25 galls. Ferment for 12 hours and bottle.
Crushed white sugar 28 lbs, water 30 galls., yeast 1 pint, powdered ginger (best) 1 lb., essence of lemon 1/2 oz., essence of cloves 1/4 oz. To the ginger pour half a gallon of boiling water and let it stand 15 or 20 minutes. Dissolve the sugar in 2 gall. of warm water, pour both into a barrel half filled with cold water, then add the essence and the yeast, let it stand half an hour, then fill up with cold water.
Let it ferment 6 to 12 hours, and bottle.
Take of good Jamaica ginger 2 1/2 oz., moist sugar 3 lbs., cream of tartar 1 oz., the juice and peel of two middling-sized lemons, brandy 1/2 pint, good solid ale yeast 1/4 pint, water 3 1/2 galls. This will produce 4 1/2 dozen of excellent ginger beer, which will keep 12 months. Bruise the ginger and sugar, and boil them for 20 or 25 minutes in the water; slice the lemon and put it and the cream of tartar into a large pan, pour the boiling liquor upon them, stir it well round, and when milk warm add the yeast. Cover it over, let it remain 2 or 3 days to work, skimming it frequently; then strain it through a jelly-bag into a cask; add the brandy, bung down very close, and at the end of a fortnight or 3 weeks draw it off and bottle, and cork very tight; tie the cork down with twine or wire. If it does not work well at first, add a little more yeast, but be careful not to add too much, lest it taste of it.
Take of honey 3 galls., heat to the boiling point, taking great care that it does not boil over, pour this into a barrel half filled with cold water, let it stand 20 or 25 minutes, and add yeast 1 pint, oil nutmeg 1 tablespoonful, oil of lemon or orange 1 ounce. Fill the barrel with water, and let it ferment.
Take of compound syrup of sarsaparilla 1 pint, good pale ale 7 pints. Use no yeast.
Pour 10 galls. of boiling water upon 1 peck of malt in a tub, stir it about well with a stick, let it stand about half an hour, and then draw off the wort, pour 10 galls. more of boiling water upon the malt, letting it remain another half hour, stirring it occasionally, then draw it off and put it to the former wort. When this is done, mix 4 oz. of hops with it, and boil it well; then strain the hops from it, and when the wort becomes milk warm put some yeast to it to make it ferment; when the fermentation is nearly over, put the liquor into a cask, and, as soon as the fermentation has perfectly subsided, bung it close down. The beer is then fit for use.
No production of this country abounds so much with vegetable saccharine matter as the shells of green peas. A strong decoction of them so much resembles, in odor and taste, an infusion of malt (termed wort) as to deceive a brewer. This decoction, rendered slightly bitter with the wood sage, and afterwards fermented with yeast, affords a very excellent beverage. The method employed is as follows:
Fill a boiler with the green shells of peas, pour on water till it rises half an inch above the shells, and simmer for three hours. Strain off the liquor, and add a strong decoction of the wood-sage, or the hop, so as to render it pleasantly bitter, then ferment in the usual manner. The woodsage is the host substitute for hops, and, being free from any anodyne property, is entitled to a preference. By boiling a fresh quantity of shells in the decoction before it becomes cold, it may be so thoroughly impregnated with saccharine matter as to afford a liquor, when fermented, as strong as ale.
This depends on the temperature at which the beer has been made, thus:
Beer made at 110° will produce beer which may l in a fortnight; at 124°, in a month; at ' months; at 134°, in 4 months; at 138° months; at 143°, in 8 months; at 145° in 10 . months; at 152°, in 15 months: at 157°, in 20 months; at 162°, in 24 months.
This depends on the temperature at which the malt has been made, and on its color, thus:
Malt made at 119° produces a white; at 124° a cream color; at 129°, a light yellow; at 134°, an amber color.
These, when properly brewed, become spontaneously fine, even as far as 138°. When brewed for amber, by repeated fermentations, they become pellucid. At 138°, a high amber, at 143°, a pale brown.
By precipitation, these grow bright in a short time. At 148°, a brown, at 152°, a high brown.
With precipitation these require 8 or 10 months to be bright. At 157°, a brown, inclining to black; at 162°, a brown speckled with black.
With precipitation these may be fined, but will never become bright. At 167°, a blackish brown speckled with black; at 171°, a color of burnt coffee, at 176°, a black.
These with difficulty can be brewed without setting the goods, and will by no means become bright, not even with the strongest acid menstruum.
Amber is now out of fashion, but formerly was drunk in great quantities in London, mixed with bitters, and called purl. The proportions of malt were 3 qrs. amber, and 1 qr. pale, with 6 lbs. of hops to the qr. The first liquor is usually tunned at 170°, and the second at 187°. The worts are boiled together for 2 hours. It is tunned at 64°, and after 24 hours roused every 2 hours till the heat is increased to 74°. It is then skimmed every hour for 6 hours and cleansed, and generally used as soon as it has done working in the barrels.
For 36 galls.: malt, 1 1/2 bus.; hops, 1 lb., liquorice root, 1 lb. 8 oz.; treacle, 5 lb., Spanish liquorice, 2 oz.; capsicum, 2 drs. Frequently drunk the week after it is brewed; used in cold weather as a stimulant.
For small beer, put 9 lbs. of molasses into a barrelcopper of cold water, first mixing it well and boiling it briskly with 1/4 lb. of hops or more 1 hour, so that it may come off 27 galls.
To fine beer, should it be requisite, take an ounce of isinglass, cut small, and boil it in 3 qts. of beer, till completely dissolved; let it stand till quite cold then; put it into a cask, and stir it well with a stick or whisk; the beer so fined should be tapped soon, because the isinglass is apt to make it flat as well as fine.
Take a handful of salt, and the same quantity of chalk scraped fine and well dried; then take some isinglass, and dissolve it in some stale beer till it is about the consistence of syrup; strain it, and add about a quart to the salt and chalk, with 2 qts. of molasses. Mix them all well together with a gallon of the beer, which must be drawn off; then put it into the cask, and take a stick or whisk, and stir it well till it ferments. When it has subsided, stop it up close, and in 2 days it may be tapped. This is sufficient for a butt.
Another. - Take 1 pt. of water, and 1/2 an oz. of unslaked lime, mix them well together, letting the mixture stand for 3 hours, that the lime may settle at the bottom. Then pour off the clear liquor, and mix with it 1/2 oz. of isinglass, cut small and boiled in a little water; pour it into the barrel, and in 5 or 6 hours the beer will become fine.
Another. - In general, it will become sufficiently fine by keeping, but fineness may be promoted by putting a handful of scalded hops into the cask. If the beer continues thick, it may then be fined by putting 1 pt. of the following preparation into the barrel:
Put as much isinglass into a vessel as will occupy 1/3; then fill it up with old beer. When dissolved rub it through a sieve, and reduce it to the consistency of treacle with more beer. A pint of this put into the cask and gently stirred with a short stick, will fine the barrel in a few hours.
Rack off the cask, and boil 1 lb. of new hops in water, with coarse sugar, and when cold put in at the bunghole.
Or, new hops soaked in beer, and squeezed, may be put into the cask.
Or, take 10 lbs. of baked pebblestone powder, with the whites of 6 eggs, and some powdered baysalt, and mix them with 2 galls. of the beer. Pour in the whole into the casks, and in 3 or 4 days it will settle, and the beer be fine and agreeable.
Make strong hop tea with boiling water and salt of tartar, and pour it into the cask.
Or; rack the cask into 2 casks of equal size, and fill them up with new beer.
Old beer may be renewed by racking 1 cask into 2, and filling them from a new brewing, and in 3 weeks it will be a fine article.
Run it through some hops that have been boiled in strong wort, and afterwards work it with double the quantity of new malt liquor; or if the fault is in the cask, draw it off into a sweet cask, and having boiled 1/2 lb. of brown sugar in 1 qt. of water, add 1 or 2 spoonsful of yeast before it is quite cold, and when the mixture ferments, pour it into the cask.
Boil some water and sugar, or water and treacle, together, and when cold add some new yeast; this will restore dead beer, or ripen bottled beer in 24 hours, and it will also make worts work in the tun if they are sluggish.
Or, a small teaspoonful of carbonate of soda may be mixed with a quart of it as it is drawn for drinking.
Or, boil for every gallon of the liquor 3 oz. of sugar in water; when cold add a little yeast, and put the fermenting mixture into the flat beer, whether it be a full cask or the bottom of the cask.
Or, beer may often be restored which has become flat or stale, by rolling and shaking the casks for a considerable time, which will create such a new fermentation as to render it necessary to open a vent-peg to prevent the cask from bursting.
Take a handful of the hops boiled in the first wort, and dried; 1/2 lb. of loaf sugar dissolved in the beer; 1 lb. of chalk; and 1/2 lb. of calcined oyster-shells. Put the whole in at the bung-hole, stirring them well and then rebunging. This preparation will also suit for racked beer; in putting in the hops it may be advisable to place them in a net with a small stone in the bottom so as to sink them, otherwise they will swim at the top.
To a quart of French brandy put as much wheat or bean flour as will make it into a dough, and pat it in, in long pieces, at the bung-hole, letting it fall gently to the bottom. This will prevent the beer growing stale, keep it in a mellow state, and increase its strength.
To 1 lb. of treacle or honey add 1 lb. of the powder of dried oyster shells, or of soft mellow chalk; mix these into a stiff paste and put it into the butt. This will preserve the beer in a soft and mellow state for a long time.
Dry a peek of egg-shells in an oven, break and mix them with 2 lbs. of soft mellow chalk, and then add some water wherein 4 lbs. of coarse sugar have been boiled, and put it into the cask. This will be enough for 1 butt.
In a cask containing 18 gals. of beer, put a pint of ground malt suspended in a bag, and close the bung perfectly; the beer will be improved during the whole time of drawing it for use.
Make use of any of these receipts most approved of, observing that the paste or dough must be put into the cask when the beer has done working, or soon after, and bunged down. At the end of 9 or 12 months tap it, and you will have a fine, generous, wholesome and agreeable liquor.
When the great quantity of sediment that lies at the bottom of the cask is neglected to be cleaned, this compound of malt, hops and yeast so affects the beer that it renders it prejudicial to health. On this account, during the whole process of brewing do not allow the least sediment to mix with the wort in removing it from one tub or cooler to the other; especially be careful, when tunning it into the cask, not to disturb the bottom of the working tub, which would prevent its ever being clear and fine. Again, by keeping it too long in the working tub, persons who make a profit of the yeast frequently promote an undue fermentation, and keep it constantly in that state for 5 or 6 days, which causes all the spirit that should keep the beer soft and mellow to evaporate; and it certainly will get stale and hard unless it has something wholesome to feed on.
It is the practice of some persons to beat in the yeast while the beer is working, for several days together, to make it strong and heady and to promote its sale. This is a pernicious custom. Therefore let the wort have a free, natural and light fermentation, and one day in the working tub will be long enough during cold weather, but turn it the second day at the farthest, throw out the whole brewing, and afterwards introduce no improper ingredients.
Foxing, sometimes called bucking, is a disease of malt fermentation which taints the beer. It arises from dirty utensils, putting the separate worts together in vessels not deep enough, using bad malt; by turning on the liquors at too great heats, and brewing in too hot weather. It renders the beer ropy and viscid like treacle, and it goon turns sour. When there is danger of foxing, a handful of hops should be thrown into the raw worts while they are drawing off and before they are boiled, as foxing generally takes place when, from a scantiness of utensils, the worts are obliged to be kept some time before they are boiled. When there is a want of shallow coolers, it is a good precaution to put some fresh hops into the worts and work them with the yeast. If the brewing foxes in the tun while working, hops should then be put into it, and they will tend to restore it, and extra care ought to be taken to prevent the lees being transferred to the barrels.
Some persons sift quick-lime into the tun when the brewing appears to be foxed. If care is not taken to cleanse and scald the vessels after foxing subsequent brewings may become tainted.
Cut a handful of hyssop small; mix it with a handful of salt, and put it into the cask. Stir and stop close.
Or, infuse a handful of hops and a little salt of tartar in boiling water; when cold strain the liquor off and pour it into the cask, which stop close.
Or, mix 1 oz. of alum with 2 oz. of mustard seed, and 1 oz. of ginger; stir them in the rack and stop close.
Or, in a fortnight rack off the foxed beer, and hang 2 lbs. of bruised Malaga raisins in a bag within the cask, and put in a mixture of treacle, bean-flour, mustard-seed, and powdered alum.
Mix a handful of bean-flour with a handful of salt, and stir it in at the bung-hole; or take some well infused hops, and mix them in with some settlings of strong wort, and stir the mixture in at the bung-hole. Or, powder 1/2 oz. of alum very fine, and mix with a handful of bean-flour.
Insert 4 galls. of molasses and some finings; stir it well. In a week draw off the cask by a cock inserted half way down.
Such beer is usually sweet and foul, and will never recover of itself, but to remedy this, make a pailful of fresh wort, into which put a handful of rubbed hops, and boil them half an hour, so that it may be very bitter, and when almost cold, draw a pailful from the cask, and re-fill it with the bitter wort. Fermentation will re-commence, but when this is over bung it up for a month. If it is not then restored, rack it into another cask, and put into it 1/2 a peck of parched wheat, and 1 lb. of good hops, dried and rubbed, and tied up in a net. Bung it down, leaving the venthole open for a day or two, and in a month it will be fine liquor.
Take out the bung, and put into the cask a handful of pickled cucumbers; or a sliced Seville orange, and either mode will add an apparent six months to the age of the ale.
Put six sea biscuits into a bag of hops, and put them into the cask.
In cleaning them before being put away, avoid the use of soap, or any greasy material, and use only a brush and scalding water, being particularly careful not to leave any yeast or fur on the sides.
To prevent their being tainted, take wood ashes and boil them to a strong lye, which spread over the bottoms of the vessels scalding, and then with the broom scrub the sides and other parts.
Or, take bay-salt, and spread it over the coolers, and strew some on their wet sides, turning in scalding water and scrubbing with a broom.
Or, throw some stone-lime into water in the vessel, and scrub over the bottom and sides, washing afterwards with clean water.
Make a strong lye of ash, beech, or other hard wood ashes, and pour it, boiling hot, into the bung-hole, repeating it as often as there is occasion.
Or, fill the cask with boiling water, and then put into it some pieces of unslaked lime, keeping up the ebullition for half an hour. Then bung it down, and let it remain until almost cold when turn it out.
Or, mix bay-salt with boiling water, and pour it into the cask, which bung down, and leave it to soak.
Or, if the copper be provided with a dome, and a steampipe from its top, pass the steam into the casks.
Or, unhead the cask, scrub it out, head it again; put some powdered charcoal into the bung-hole, and two quarts of a mixture of oil of vitriol and cold water. Then bung it tight, and roll and turn the cask for some time. Afterwards wash it well and drain it dry.
Or, take out the head, and brush the inside with oil of vitriol; afterwards wash it, then burn a slip of brown paper steeped in brimstone within the bung-hole, and stop it close for two hours, when it should be well washed with hot water.
Mix half a pint of the sulphuric acid (not the diluted) in an open vessel, with a quart of water, and whilst warm, put it into the cask, and roll it about in such a manner that the whole internal surface may be exposed to its motion. The following day add about 1 lb. of chalk or sal soda, and bung it up for three or four days, when it may be washed out with boiling water. By this process a very musty cask may be rendered sweet.
For sweetening musty bottles, it will be only necessary to rinse the inside with the diluted sulphuric acid in the above-mentioned proportions. The addition of chalk, if it were immediately corked, would burst the bottle, and if the cask be old, it would be advisable to let a little of the gas escape before bunging it.
Another. - If a cask, after the beer is drunk out, be well stopped, to keep out the air, and the lees be suffered to remain in it till used again, scald it well, taking care that the hoops be well driven on, before filling; but should the air get into an empty cask, it will contract an ill scent, notwithstanding the scalding; in which ease a handful of bruised pepper, boiled in the water, will remove it, though the surest way is to take out the head of the cask that it may be shaved, then burn it a little, and scald it for use; if this cannot be conveniently done, get some limestone, put about 3 lbs. into a barrel (and in same proportion for larger or smaller vessels), put to it about 6 gall. of cold water, bung it up, shake it about for some time and afterwards scald it well. Or, in lieu of lime, match it well and scald it. Then the smell will be entirely removed. If the casks be new, dig holes in the earth, and lay them in to about half their depth, with their bung-holes downwards, for a week. After which scald them well, and they will be ready for use.
Another. - The process of charring fails only in the fire not being able to penetrate into the chasms or chinks of the cask, into which the coopers (to mend bad work) often insert strips of paper, or other substance, to make it watertight, which in time become rotten and offensive; in order to remedy this, put into a cask containing a quantity of water (say about 2 gall. in a hogshead) 1/10th of its weight of sulphuric acid (oil of vitriol), and let this be shaken for some time; this is to be poured out, the cask well washed, and then rinsed with a few gallons of lime-water or sal soda. It is needless to say, that it ought likewise to be washed out.
The theory is, that sulphuric acid has the property, when used alone, of charring wood, and when diluted has sufficient strength to destroy must, etc., with the additional advantage of entering into every crevice. The lime in solution seizes any particle of acid which the first washing might leave, and converts it into an insoluble, inoffensive, neutral salt, such as, if left in the cask, would not in the least injure the most delicate liquor.
It is their system to take out the head, place the cask over a brisk fire, and char the inside completely. The head is then put in again, and the cask, before used, is filled 2 or 3 times with hot liquor, bunged down and well shaken before it is used again.
Put the staves just cut and shaped, before they are worked into vessels, loose in a copper of cold water, and let them heat gradually so that they are well boiled, and in boiling take out a handbowl of water at a time, putting in fresh, till all the redness is out of the liquor, and it becomes clear from a scum of filth that will arise from the sap so boiled out; also take care to turn the staves upside down, that all their parts may equally have the benefit of the hot water. Observe also that in a dry, sultry summer the sap is more strongly retained in the wood, than in a cool and moist one, and therefore must have the more boiling. Then, when the vessel is made, scald it twice with water and salt boiled together and it may be readily filled with strong beer without fearing any twang from the wood.
Mix 2 quarts of water with wheat flour to the consistence of thick gruel, boil it gently for half an hour, and when almost cold stir into it 1/2 lb. of sugar and 4 spoonfuls of good yeast. Put the whole into a large jug or earthen vessel with a narrow top, and place it before the fire, so that it may by a moderate heat ferment. The fermentation will throw up a thin liquor, which pour off and throw away; keep the remainder for use (in a cool place) in a bottle or jug tied over. The same quantity of this, as of common yeast, will suffice to bake or brew with. Four spoonfuls of this yeast will make a fresh quantity as before, and the stock may be always kept up by fermenting the new with the remainder of the former quantity.
Take 6 quarts of soft water and 2 handfuls of wheaten meal or barley; stir the latter in the water before the mixture is placed over the fire, where it must boil till twothirds are evaporated. When this decoction becomes cool incorporate with it, by means of a whisk, 2 drachms of salt of tartar and 1 drachm of cream of tartar, previously mixed. The whole should be kept in a warm place. Thus a very strong yeast for brewing, distilling and baking may be obtained. For the last-mentioned purpose, however, it ought to be diluted with pure water, and passed through a sieve before it is kneaded with the dough, in order to deprive it of its alkaline taste.
In countries where yeast is scarce, it is a common practice to twist hazel twigs so as to be full of chinks, and then steep them in ale-yeast during fermentation. The twigs are then hung up to dry, and at the next brewing they are put into the wort instead of yeast. In Italy the chips are frequently put into turbid wine for the purpose of clearing it; this is effected in about 24 hours.
Take 1 lb. of fine flour, make it the thickness of gruel with boiling water, add to it 1/2 a lb. of raw sugar. Mix them well together. Put 3 spoonfuls of well purified yeast into a large vessel, upon which put the above ingredients; they will soon ferment violently. Collect the yeast off the top and put it into a brown small-neck pot, and cover it up from the air; keep it in a dry and warmish place; when used in part, replace with flour made into a thin paste, and sugar in the former proportions. The above will be fit for use in five months, and no yeast is necessary except the first time.
Boil flour and water to the consistence of treacle, and when the mixture is cold saturate it with fixed air. Pour the mixture thus saturated into one or more large bottles or narrow-mouthed jars; cover it over loosely with paper, and upon that lay a slate or board with a weight to keep it steady. Place the vessel in a situation where the thermometer will stand from 70° to 80°, and stir up the mixture 2 or 3 times in the course of 24 hours. In about 2 days such a degree of fermentation will have taken place as to give the mixture the appearance of yeast. With the yeast in this state and before it has acquired a thoroughly vinous smell, mix the quantity of flour intended for bread in the proportion of 6 lbs. of flour to a quart of the yeast, and a sufficient portion of warm water. Knead them well together in a proper vessel, and covering it with a cloth, let the dough stand for 12 hours, or till it appears to be sufficiently fermented in the forementioned degree of warmth. It is then to be formed into loaves and baked. The yeast would be more perfect if a decoction of malt were used instead of simple water.
A decoction of malt alone, without any addition, will produce a yeast proper enough for the purpose of brewing. This discovery was made by Joseph Senyor, and he received for it a reward of 20£. from the Society for Promoting Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. The process is as follows: Procure 3 earthen or wooden vessels of different sizes and apertures, one capable of holding 2 quarts, The other 3 or 4, and the third 5 or 6; boil 1/4 of a peck of malt for about 8 or 10 minutes in 3 pints of water, and when a quart is poured off from the grains, let it stand in the first or smaller vessel in a cool place till not quite cold but retaining that degree of heat which the brewers usually find to be proper when they begin to work their liquor. Then remove the vessel into some warm situation near a fire, where the thermometer stands between 70° and 80°, and there let it remain till the fermentation begins, which will be plainly perceived within 30 hours; add then 2 qts. more of a like decoction of malt, when cool as the first was, and mix the whole in the second or larger vessel, and stir it well in, which must be repeated in the usual way, as it rises in a common vat; then add a still greater quantity of the same decoction, to be worked in the largest vessel, which will produce yeast enough for a brewing of 40 gallons.
Boil 1 lb. of good flour, 1/4 lb. of brown sugar and a little salt in 2 galls. of water for 1 hour. When milk warm bottle it and cork it close. It will be fit for use in 24 hours. One pint of this will make 18 lbs. of bread.
To 1 lb. of mashed potatoes (mealy ones are best) add 2 oz. of brown sugar and 2 spoonfuls of common yeast; the potatoes first to be pulped through a colander, and mixed with warm water to a proper consistence. Thus a pound of potatoes will make a quart of good yeast. Keep it moderately warm while fermenting.
Infuse malt, and boil it as for beer, in the mean time soak isinglass, separated to fibres, in small-beer. Proportion the quantity of each, 1 oz. of isinglass to 2 qts. of beer. This would suffice for a hogshead of boiling wort, and the proportion may be diminished or increased accordingly. After soaking 5 minutes, set the beer and isinglass on the fire, stirring till it nearly boils; then turn it into a dish that will allow beating it up with a syllabub whisk to the consistence of yeast, and when almost cold put it to the wort.
Make a wort of the consistence of water-gruel with either rye or malt, ground very fine; put 5 galls. of it into a vessel capable of holding a few gallons more; dissolve 1 lb. of leaven in a small portion of the wort, and add it to the remainder with 2 1/4 lbs. of fine ground malt; mix the whole by agitation for some minutes, and in half an hour add 2 large spoonfuls of good yeast; incorporate it thoroughly with the mass, cover it close, and let it remain undisturbed for 48 hours in a moderate temperature. At the end of that period it will be found to be wholly converted into good yeast. It is requisite that the rye and malt should be fine and the leaven completely dissolved before being put to the remaining wort, which, previous to the yeast being added, should be at about 100°.
Common ale yeast may be kept fresh and fit for use several months by the following method: Put a quantity of it into a close canvas bag, and gently squeeze out the moisture in a screw-press till the remaining matter be as firm and stiff as clay. In this state it may be close-packed up in a tight cask, for securing it from the air, and will keep fresh, sound, and fit for use for a long time.
Stir a quantity of yeast and work it well with a whisk, till it seems liquid and thin; then get a large wooden dish or tub, clean and dry, and with a soft brush lay a thin layer of yeast thereon turning the mouth downwards, to prevent its getting dusty, but so that the air may come to it to dry it. When that coat or crust is sufficiently dried, lay on another, which serve in the same manner and continue putting on others as they dry till 2 or 3 inches thick, which will be useful on many occasions; but be sure the yeast in the vessel be dry before more be laid on. When wanted for use, cut a piece out, lay it in warm water, stir it together, and it will be fit for use. If for brewing, take a handful of birch tied together, dip it into the yeast, and hang it to dry taking care to keep it free from dust. When the beer is fit to set to work, throw in one of these and it will work as well as fresh yeast. Whip it about in the wort and then let it lie. When the beer works well take out the broom, dry it again, and it will do for the next brewing.
Take of Roman wormwood 2 doz. lbs., gentian root 6 lbs., calamus aromaticus (or the sweet-flag root) 2 pounds, snake-root 1 lb., horse-radish 1 bunch, orange-peel dried and juniper-berries, each 2 lbs., seeds or kernels of Seville oranges cleaned and dried 2 lbs. Cut these and bruise them, and put them into a clean butt, and start some mild brown or pale beer upon them, so as to fill up the vessel, about the beginning of November, which let stand till the next season. If a pound or two of galanga root is added to it the composition will be better.
In general, the beer should be racked off first, because the sediments and lees will not accord with the foreign substances. Salt and alum in too large quantities induce staleness. The powder of soft stone, unburnt, should be avoided; too many whites of eggs are apt to make the beer ropy. The introduction of cocculus indicus confers a pernicious strength or headiness, which gratifies drunkards, but destroys the nervous system, and produces palsies and premature old age. It has been well remarked, that the brewer that uses this slow but certain poison, as a substitute for a due quantity of malt, ought to be boiled in his own copper.
Bitters are in like manner pernicious in many states of the stomach. When oyster-shells are used the bung should be left out to avoid bursting.
Families brewing their own malt liquor may use 32 lbs. of brown sugar with 2 bushels of malt, which will produce 50 galls. of ale, as good in every respect as if made from 6 bushels of malt. The sugar is mixed with the wort as it runs from the mash-tub.
Some persons cover the bung-hole simply with brown paper, fastened at the sides, and covered with clay; others have found a single piece of bladder, well fixed at the edges, a complete and efficacious substitute for a bung. These methods at least prevent the bursting of the cask from changes of air.
In the first place the bottles should be clean, sweet and dry, the corks sound and good, and the porter or ale fine. When the bottles are filled, if for home consumption, they should not be corked till the day following, and if for exportation to a hot climate, they must stand 3 days or more; if the liquor is new, it should be well corked and wired, but for a private family they may do without wiring, only they should be well packed in saw-dust, and stand upright. But if some ripe are wanted, keep a few packed on their sides, so that the liquor may touch the corks, and this will soon ripen, and make it fit for drinking.
Put a teaspoonful of carbonate of soda into a quart of tart beer, and it will be pleasant and wholesome.
It should be ripe, and not too young. Cork loose at first, and afterwards firm. For a day or two, keep the bottles in cold water, or in a cold place, or throw some cold water over them. Steep the corks in scalding water, to make them more elastic. Lay the bottles on their sides. When it is desired that the liquor should ripen soon, keep the bottles in a warmer place. October beer should not be bottled till midsummer; nor March beer till Christmas. If the ale is flat, or stale, put 3 horse-beans, or 3 raisins into each bottle, and to prevent the bottles' bursting, make a hole in the middle of the cork with an awl, or put into each bottle 1 or 2 peppercorns. If it is desired to ripen it quick, boil some coarse sugar in water and when cold ferment it with yeast. Then put in 3 or 4 spoonsful of it, with 2 cloves, and if kept in a warm place it will be ripe the next day. When the ale is sour, put into it a little syrup of capillaire, and ferment it with yeast; when settled bottle it, and put a clove or two with a small lump of sugar into each bottle. It is also useful to put 2 or 3 pieces of chalk, or some powdered chalk into the barrel before bottling.
As soon as a cask of table beer is received into the house, it is drawn off into quart stone bottles with a lump of white sugar in each, and securely corked. In three days it becomes brisk, is equal in strength to table ale, remarkably pleasant, very wholesome, and will keep many months.
The following method is employed in Paris by some venders of bottled beer, to render it what they term ripe. It is merely by adding to each bottle 3 or 4 drops of yeast and a lump of sugar of the size of a large nutmeg. In the course of 24 hours, by this addition, stale or flat beer is rendered most agreeably brisk. In consequence of the fermentative process that takes place in it, a small deposit follows, and on this account the bottles should be kept in an erect position By this means white wine may likewise be rendered brisk.
In general nothing is more necessary than to keep it well stopped in a cool cellar, looking occasionally to see that there is no leakage, and to open the vent holes, if any oozings appear between the staves of the stacks; but connoisseurs in malt liquor may adopt some of the following means: Leave the cock-hole of an upright cask or the venthole of an horizontal one, open for 2 or 3 months; then rack off into another cask with 1 or 2 lbs. of new hops, and closely bung and stop down.
Or, leave the vent-holes open a month, then stop, and about a month before tapping draw off a little and mix it with 1 or 2 lbs. of new hops, which, having poured into the cask, it is again closely stopped.
Or, salt may be used with the hops, as it always gives beer the flavor of age.
Hops lose all their fine flavor by exposure to the air and damp. They should be kept in a dry, close place, and lightly packed.
After the apples are gathered from the trees they are ground into what is called pommage, either by means of a common pressing stone, with a circular trough, or by a cider mill, which is either driven by the hand, or by horse-power. When the pulp is thus reduced to a great degree of fineness, it is conveyed to the cider press, where it is formed by pressure into a kind of cake, which is called the cheese.
This is effected by placing clear, sweet straw, or hair cloths between the layers of pommage till there is a pile of 10 or 12 layers. This pile is then subjected to different degrees of pressure in succession, till all the must or juice is squeezed from the pommage. This juice, after being strained in a coarse hair-sieve, is then put either into open vats or close casks, and the pressed pulp is either thrown away or made to yield a weak liquor called washings.
After the liquor has undergone the proper fermentation in these close vessels, which may be best effected in a temperature of from 40° to 60°, and which may be known by its appearing tolerably clear, and having a vinous sharpness upon the tongue, any further fermentation must be stopped by racking off the pure part into open vessels exposed for a day or two in a cool situation. After this the liquor must again be put into casks and kept in a cool place during winter. The proper time for racking may always be known by the brightness of the liquor, the discharge of the fixed air, and the appearance of a thick crust formed of fragments of the reduced pulp. The liquor should always be racked off anew, as often as a hissing noise is heard, or as it extinguishes a candle held to the bung-hole.
When a favorable vinous fermentation has been obtained, nothing more is required than to fill up the vessels every 2 or 3 weeks, to supply the waste by fermentation. On the beginning of March the liquor will be bright and pure and fit for final racking, which should be done in fair weather. When the bottles are filled they should be set by uncorked till morning, when the corks must be driven in tightly, secured by wire or twine and melted rosin, or any similar substance.
Prefer the bitter sweet apples, mixed with mild sour, in the proportion oft one-third. Gather them when ripe, and lay them in heaps in the orchard. Then take them to the crushing engine, made of iron rollers at top and of stone underneath; after passing through which they are received into large tubs or sieves, and are then called pommage. They are afterwards laid on the vat in alternate layers of the pommage and clean straw, called reeds. They are then pressed, the juice running through a hair sieve. After the cider is pressed out it is put into hogsheads, where it remains for 2 or 3 days previously to fermenting. To stop the fermentation it is drawn off into a clean vessel, but if the fermentation be very strong, 2 or 3 cans of cider are put into a clean vessel, and a match of brimstone burnt in it; it is then agitated, by which the fermentation of that quantity is completely stopped. The vessel is then nearly filled, the fermentation of the whole is checked, and the cider becomes fine; but if, on the first operation, the fermentation is not checked, it is repeated till it is so, and continued from time to time till the cider is in a quiet state for drinking.
Some persons, instead of deadening a small quantity with a match, as above directed, put from 1 to 2 pints of an article called stum (bought of the wine coopers) into each hogshead, but the system of racking as often as the fermentation appears, is generally preferred by the cider manufacturers of Devonshire, England.
About 6 sacks, or 24 bus., of apples, are used for a hogshead of 63 galls. During the process, if the weather is warm, it will be necessary to carry it on in the shade, in the open air, and by every means keep it as cool as possible.
In 9 months it will be in condition for bottling or drinking; if it continue thick, use some isinglass finings, and if at any time it ferments and threatens acidity, the cure is to rack it and leave the head and sediment.
The apples are reduced to mucilage, by beating them in a stone trough (one of those used at pumps for watering horses) with pieces of ashpoles, used in the manner that potatoes are mashed. The press consists of a strong box, 3 feet square, and 20 inches deep, perforated on each side with small auger or gimblet holes. It is placed on a frame of wood, projecting 3 inches beyond the base of the box. A groove is cut in this projection 1 1/2 inches wide, and 1 inch deep, to convey the juice when pressed out of the box into a receiving pail. This operation is performed in the following manner: The box is filled alternately with strata of fresh straw and mashed fruit, in the proportion of 1 inch of straw to 2 inches of mucilage; these are piled up 1 foot higher than the top of the box, and care is taken in packing the box itself, to keep the fruit and straw about 1 inch from the sides of the box, which allows the juice to escape freely. A considerable quantity of the liquor will run off without any pressure. This must be applied gradually at first, and increased regularly towards the conclusion. A box of the above dimensions will require about 2 tons weight to render the residuum completely free from juice.
[The residuum is excellent food for pigs, and peculiarly acceptable to them.]
The necessary pressure is obtained very easily, and in a powerful manner, by the compound lever pressing upon a lid or sink made of wood, about 2 inches thick, and rendered sufficiently strong by 2 cross-bars. It is made to fit the opening of the box exactly, and as the levers force the lid down they are occasionally slacked or taken off, and blocks of wood are placed on the top of the lid, to permit the levers to act, even after the lid has entered the box itself. Additional blocks are repeated, until the whole juice is extracted. The pressure may be increased more or less, by adding or diminishing the weight suspended at the extremity of the lever.
The liquor thus obtained is allowed to stand undisturbed 12 hours, in open vessels, to deposit sediment. The pure juice is then put into clean casks, and placed in a proper situation to ferment, the temperature being from 55° to 60°. The fermentation will commence sooner or later, depending chiefly on the temperature of the apartment where the liquor is kept; in most cases, during the first 3 or 4 days, but sometimes it will require more than a week to begin this process. If the fermentation begins early and proceeds rapidly, the liquor must be racked off, and put into fresh casks in 2 or a days, but if this does not take place at an early period, and proceeds slowly, 5 or 6 days may elapse before it is racked. In general it is necessary to rack the liquor at least twice. If, notwithstanding, the fermentation continues briskly, the racking must be repeated, otherwise the vinous fermentation, by proceeding too far may terminate in acetous fermentation, when vinegar would be the result.
In racking off the liquor it is necessary to keep it free of sediment, and the scum or yeast produced by the fermentation. A supply of spare liquor must be reserved to fill up the barrels occasionally, while the fermentation continues. As soon as this ceases, the barrels should be bunged up closely and the bungs covered with rosin, to prevent the admission of air. If the cider is weak, it should remain in the cask about 9 months; if strong, 12 or 18 months is necessary before it should be bottled.
To fine and improve the flavor of 1 hogshead take 1 gal. of good French brandy, with 1/2 oz. of cochineal, 1 lb. of alum, and 3 lbs. sugar-candy; bruise them all well in a mortar, and infuse them in the brandy for a day or two, then mix the whole with the cider, and stop it close for 5 or 6 months. After which, if fine, bottle it off.
Cider or perry, when bottled in hot weather should be left a day or two uncorked, that it may get flat; but if too flat in the cask, and soon wanted for use, put into each bottle a small lump or two of sugar-candy, 4 or 5 raisins, or a small piece of raw beef, any of which will much improve the liquor, and make it brisker.
Cider should be well corked and waxed, and packed upright in a cool place. A few bottles may always be kept in a warmer place to ripen and be ready for use.
Take 14 lbs. of raisins with the stalks, wash them out in 4 or 5 waters, till the water remains clear; then put them into a clean cask with the head out, and put 6 galls. of good water upon them; after which cover it well up, and let it stand 10 days. Then rack it off into another clean cask, which has a brass cock in it, and in 4 or 5 days' time it will be fit for bottling. When it has been in the bottles 7 or 8 days, it will be fit for use. A little coloring should be added when putting into the cask the second time. The raisins may afterwards be used for vinegar.
Perry is made after the same manner as cider only from pears, which must be quite dry. The best pears for this purpose are such as are least fit for eating, and the redder they are the better.
From the great diversity of soil and climate in the United States, and the almost endless variety of its apples, it follows that much diversity of taste and flavor will necessarily be found in the cider that is made from them.
To make good cider the following general, but important rules should be attended to. They demand a little more trouble than the ordinary mode of collecting and mashing apples of all sorts, rotten and sound, sweet and sour, dirty and clean, from the tree and the soil, and the rest of the slovenly process usually employed; but in return they produce you a wholesome, high-flavored, sound, and palatable liquor, that always commands an adequate price, instead of a solution of "villainous compounds," in a poisonous and acid wash, that no man in his senses will drink.
1. Always choose perfectly ripe and sound fruit.
2. Pick the apples by hand. An active boy with a bag slung over his shoulders, will soon clear a tree. Apples that have lain any time on the soil contract an earthy taste, which will always be found in the cider.
3. After sweating, and before being ground, wipe them dry, and if any are found bruised or rotten, put them in a heap by themselves, for an inferior cider to make vinegar.
4. Always use hair-cloths instead of straws, to place between the layers of pommage. The straw when heated gives a disagreeable taste to the cider.
5. As the cider runs from the press, let it pass through a hair sieve into a large open vessel that will hold as much juice as can be expressed in one day. In a day, or sometimes less, the pumice will rise to the top, and in a short time grow very thick; when little white bubbles break through it draw off the liquor by a spigot placed about three inches from the bottom, so that the lees may be left quietly behind.
6. The cider must be drawn off into very clean sweet casks, and closely watched. The moment the white bubbles before mentioned are perceived rising at the bung-hole, rack it again. When the fermentation is completely at an end, fill up the cask with cider, in all respects like that already contained in it, and bung it up tight; previous to which a tumbler of sweet-oil may be poured into the bung hole.
Sound, well-made cider, that has been produced as described, and without any foreign mixtures, excepting always that of good cogniac brandy (which added to it in the proportion of 1 gal. to 30, greatly improves it), is a pleasant, cooling and useful beverage.
The term wine is properly applied only to the fermented juice of the grape, but is popularly used in a more extended sense. What are termed domestic wines made from the currant, gooseberry, etc., are often supposed to be more wholesome and less intoxicating than the wine of the grape. This is an error; they are more acid than true wine, and have added to them sugar and spirits, neither of which are necessary with good grape juice. The culture of the grape and manufacture of wine have increased very rapidly in the United States of late years and the time is not very distant when we shall be independent of foreign sources of supply.
The varieties of grape employed in wine making, in the United States, are the Catawba, Delaware, Schuylkill (Cape), Isabella, and Scuppernong. In California, now so noted for its wine product, the vines are of Spanish origin. Of those named, the two first varieties are most prized. Vines require a dry, airy situation, preferably with a southern or eastern exposure.
The fruit should be allowed to stay on the vines until fully ripe. If any error is committed it should be that of allowing it to remain too long. A slight frost will not injure the grape for winemaking, but rather improve it. Remove all unripe and bad berries. In some cases the berries are detached from the stem, in others not; the latter method is most usual. All vessels and utensils used in wine-making, must be most scrupulously clean when used, and should be thoroughly cleansed after using. Without attention to this good wine cannot be made. Grapes should not be gathered in damp weather nor when the dew is on them.
The grapes are first crushed, the object being to break the skin and pulp, but not the seeds. This may be done in any of the ordinary cidermills sold at the agricultural warehouses, or on the small scale by bruising in a mashingtub. The juice is then expressed as directed in making cider. For extracting juice of fruits on the small scale the ordinary clothes-wringer will be found very useful. The expressed juice is termed must, the remaining seeds, husks, etc., after being pressed, are put on the manure pile or used for making inferior brandy.
In this country the fermentation is performed in barrels; abroad vats are used. The barrels should, if new, be filled with pure water, and left to soak for 10 or 15 days; then well scalded out, and fumigated by means of a match made by dipping paper or rag into melted sulphur. When not in use they must be kept bunged, and each year they must be thoroughly cleansed or fumigated before using.
The barrels are to be filled within 5 or 6 inches of the top. The beginning of the fermentation is shown by a slight rise in temperature; this soon increases, the liquid froths, and carbonic acid gas escapes; in 2 or 3 weeks this ceases, the lees settle and the wine becomes clear. Fermentation out of of contact of air is accomplished by having a bung fitted with a tube which dips under the surface of a pan of water. The gas escapes through the water, but the air cannot enter the cask. This is considered a great improvement by many. The bung should not be inserted until fermentation has begun. As soon as fermentation has ceased fill up the cask and bung tightly. If you have not the same wine with which to fill the cask, put in enough well-washed flinty pebbles.
The object of racking is to draw the wine from its lees, which contain various impurities, and the yeast is the fermentation. Some rack more than once, others but once. Rehfuss recommends to draw off the wine into fresh casks in December and again in March or April, and again in the fall, after that only in the fall. Buchanan recommends one racking in March or April. It is objected to frequent racking that it injures the aroma of the wine, and renders it liable to become acid. The wine may be drawn off with the syphon or by the spigot; care being taken not to disturb the lees.
About the time that the vines begin to shoot the wine undergoes a second but moderate fermentation, after which it fines itself, and if kept well bunged will continue to improve by age. During the spring fermentation the bungs may be slightly loosened, otherwise the casks, if not strong, may burst, and the wine be lost. It is better kept in bottles. Wine may be bottled in a year after it is made, two years will be better. The bottles should be sealed and laid on their sides in a cool place.
The above directions will give a still wine of fine quality; no sugar, spirits or other addition is required. To make a sparkling wine is a matter of nicety, and requires considerable experience; and cellars, vaults and buildings especially adapted to the process. Abroad the wine is bottled during the first fermentation, although air is necessary to the beginning of fermentation, yet it will go on when once begun if air be excluded. The must continuing to ferment in the bottles, the gas generated is absorbed by the liquid under its own pressure. A very large percentage of bottles bursts.
In the spring following the pressing of the grapes the wine is mixed with a small quantity of sugar, and put into strong bottles, the corks of which are well fastened with wire and twine. The spring fermentation is accelerated by the sugar, and the carbonic acid generated produces pressure enough to burst a considerable percentage of the bottles. At the end of a year the liquid has become clear. To get rid of the sediment the bottles are put in a rack with the necks inclining downward, and frequently shaken, the sediment deposits near and on the cork, and is blown out when the wires are cut. More sugar is added for sweetness; the bottles recorked, and in a few weeks the wine is ready for use.
The acidity of wine made from ripe grapes is due to cream of tartar or bitartrate of potassa. The grapes always contain a larger proportion than the wine, as much of it is deposited during fermentation, forming Argols of commerce. Tannic acid always present, giving, when in quantity, astringency or roughness. Citric acid is found in wine made from unripe grapes; malic and oxalic acids in those made from currants, rhubarb, etc. The cream of tartar gradually deposits as wine grows older, forming the crust or bees-wing. Hence wine of grape improves with age. Domestic wines do not deposit their acids, which have therefore to be disguised by the addition of sugar. Acetic acid is formed by the oxidation of the alcohol of wine. When considerable in quantity the wine is raid to be "pricked." Moselle and Rhine wine are among the most acid, and Sherry and Port among the least so.
Such as Malaga, are made by allowing the grapes to remain on the vine until partially dried. The must is also evaporated about one-third before fermentation. Wines, such as still Catawba, Claret, etc., which contain little or no sugar, are called dry.
The following gives the average proportion of absolute alcohol in 100 parts by measure: Port Madeira, Sherry, 20; Claret, Catawba, Hock, and Champagne, 11; Domestic wines, 10 to 20; alcohol gives the strength or body to wine. It is often added to poor wines to make them keep and to increase their intoxicating qualities.
Fine clear weather is best for bottling all sorts of wines, and much cleanliness is required. The first consideration, in bottling wines, is to examine and see if the wines are in a proper state. The wines should be fine and brilliant, or they will never brighten after.
The bottles must be all sound, clean and dry, with plenty of good sound corks.
The cork is to be put in with the hand, and then driven well in with a flat wooden mallet, the weight of which ought to be 1 1/4 lbs., but, however not to exceed 1 1/2 lbs., for if the mallet be too light or too heavy it will not drive the cork in properly and may break the bottle. The corks must so completely fill up the neck of each bottle as to render them air-tight, but leave a space of an inch between the wine and the neck.
When all the wine is bottled, it is to be stored in a cool cellar, and on no account on the bottles' bottoms, but or their sides and in saw-dust.
Take cold soft water, 10 galls.; red gooseberries, 11 galls., and ferment. Now mix raw sugar, 16 lbs.; beet-root, sliced, 2 lbs.; and red tartar, in fine powder, 1 oz. Afterwards put in sassafras chips, 1 lb., and brandy, 1 gall., or less. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - When the weather is dry, gather gooseberries about the time they are half ripe; pick them clean, put the quantity of a peak into a convenient vessel, and bruise them with a piece of wood, taking as much care as possible to keep the seeds whole. Now having put the pulp into a canvas bag, press out all the juice; and to every gallon of the gooseberries add about 3 lbs. of fine loaf sugar; mix the whole together by stirring it with a stick, and as soon as the sugar is quite dissolved, pour it into a convenient cask, which will hold it exactly. If the quantity be about 8 or 9 galls., let it stand a fortnight; if 20 galls., 40 days and so on in proportion taking care the place you set it in be cool. After standing the proper time draw it off from the lees, and put it into another clean vessel of equal size, or into the same, after pouring the lees out, and making it clean: let a cask of 10 or 12 galls. stand for about 3 months and 20 galls. for 5 months, after which it will be fit for bottling off.
Take cold soft water, 3 galls; red gooseberries, 1 1/2 galls.; white gooseberries, 2 galls. Ferment.
Now mix raw sugar, 5 lbs.; honey, 1 1/2 lbs., tartar, in fine powder, 1 oz. Afterwards put in bitter almonds, 2 oz.; sweetbriar, 1 small handful, and brandy, 1 gall., or less. This will make 6 galls.
Take cold soft water, 4 1/2 galls.; white gooseberries, 5 galls. Ferment.
Now mix refined sugar, 6 lbs.; honey, 4 lbs.; white tartar, in fine powder, 1 oz. Put in orange and lemon-peel, 1 oz. dry, or 2 oz. fresh, and add white brandy, 1/2 gall. This will make 9 galls.
To each pint of full ripe gooseberries, mashed add one pint of water, milk warm, in which has been dissolved one pound of single-refined sugar; stir the whole well, and cover up the tub with a blanket, to preserve the heat generated by the fermentation of the ingredients, let them remain in this vessel 3 days, stirring them twice or thrice a day; strain off the liquor through a sieve, afterwards through a coarse linen cloth; put it into the cask; it will ferment without yeast. Let the cask be kept full with some of the liquor reserved for the purpose. It will ferment for 10 days, sometimes for 3 weeks; when ceased, and only a hissing noise remains, draw off 2 or 3 bottles, according to the strength you wish it to have from every 20 pint cask, and fill up the cask with brandy or whiskey; but brandy is preferable. To make it very good, and that it may keep well, add as much Sherry, together with 1/4 oz. of isinglass dissolved in water to make it quite liquid: stir the whole well. Bung the cask up, and surround the bung with clay; the closer it is bunged the better; a fortnight after, if it be clear at top, taste it, if not sweet enough, add more sugar; 22 lbs. is the just quantity in all for 20 pints of wine; leave the wine 6 months in the cask; but after being quite fine, the sooner it is bottled the more it will sparkle and resemble Champagne. The process should be carried on in a place where the heat is between 48° and 56° Fahr. Currant wine my be made in the same manner.
The following method of making superior gooseberry and currant wines is recommended in a French work: For currant wine, 8 lbs. of honey are dissolved in 15 galls. of boiling water, to which, when clarified, is added the juice of 8 lbs. of red or white currants. It is then fermented for 24 hours, and 2 lbs. of sugar to every 2 galls. of water are added. The preparation is afterwards clarified with the whites of eggs and cream of tartar. For gooseberry wine, the fruit is gathered dry when about half ripe, and then pounded in a mortar. The juice, when properly strained through a canvas bag, is mixed with sugar, in the proportion of 3 lbs. to every 2 galls. of juice. It is then left in a quiet state for 15 days, at the expiration of which it is carefully poured off, and left to ferment for 3 months when the quantity is under 15 galls., and for 5 months when double that quantity. It is then bottled, and soon becomes fit for drinking.
Another. - Take cold soft water, 5 1/2 galls.; gooseberries and currants, 4 galls. Ferment. Then add, raw sugar, 12 1/2 lbs.; tartar, in fine powder, 1 oz., ginger, in powder 3 oz., sweet marjoram, 1/2 a handful; whiskey, 1 qt. This will make 9 galls.
Take cold soft water, 11 galls.; red currants, 8 galls.; raspberries, 1 qt. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 20 lbs., beet-root, sliced, 2 lbs.; and red tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz. Put in 1 nutmeg, in fine powder; add brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Put 5 qts. of currants and 1 pint of raspberries to every 2 galls. of water; let them soak a night; then squeeze and break them well. Next day rub them well through a fine sieve till the juice is expressed, washing the skins with some of the water, then, to every gallon, put 4 lbs. of the best sugar, put it into your barrel, and set the bung lightly in. In 2 or 3 days add a bottle of good Cogniac brandy to every 4 galls.; bung it close, but leave out the spigot for a few days. It is very good in 3 years, better in 4.
Another. - Boil 4 galls. of spring water, and stir into it 8 lbs. of honey; when thoroughly dissolved, take it off the fire; then stir it well in order to raise the scum, which take clean off, and cool the liquor.
When thus prepared, press out the same quantity of the juice of red currants moderately ripe, which being well strained, mix well with the water and honey, then put them into a cask or a large earthen vessel, and let them stand to ferment for 24 hours, then to every gallon add 2 lbs. of fine sugar, stir them well to raise the scum, and when well settled take it off, and add 1/2 an oz. of cream of tartar, with the whites of 2 or 3 eggs, to refine it. When the wine is well settled and clear draw it off into a small vessel, or bottle it up, keeping it in a cool place.
Of white currants a wine after the same manner may be made, that will equal in strength and pleasantness many sorts of white wine; but as for the black or Dutch currants, they are seldom used, except for the preparation of medicinal wines.
Another. - Gather the currants in dry weather, put them into a pan and bruise them with a wooden pestle; let them stand about 20 hours, after which strain through a sieve; add 3 lbs. of fine powdered sugar to each 4 quarts of the liquor, and after shaking it well fill the vessel, and put a quart of good brandy to every 7 gallons. In 4 weeks, if it does not prove quite clear, draw it off into another vessel, and let it stand previous to bottling it off about 10 days.
Take of cold soft water, 12 galls.; white currants, 4 galls., red currants, 3 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 25 lbs., white tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz. Put in sweet-briar leaves, 1 handful; lavender leaves, 1 handful; then add spirits, 2 qts. or more. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 9 galls., red currants, 10 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 10 lbs.; beet-root, sliced, 2 lbs.; red tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Put in bitter almonds, 1 oz., ginger, in powder, 2 oz.; then add brandy, 1 qt. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 11 galls., red currants, 8 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 12 lbs.; red tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Put in coriander seed, bruised, 2 oz., then add whiskey, 2 qts. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 11 galls.; fruit, 8 galls. Ferment. Mix, treacle, 14 or 16 lbs., tartar, in powder, 1 oz. Put in ginger, in powder, 4 oz.; sweet herbs, 2 handfuls; then add spirits, 1 or 2 qts. This will make 18 galls.
An excellent family wine may be made of equal parts of red, white and black currants, ripe cherries, and raspberries, well bruised, and mixed with soft water, in the proportion of 4 lbs. of fruit to 1 gall. of water. When strained and pressed, 3 lbs. of moist sugar are to be added to each gall. of liquid. After standing open for 3 days, during which it is to be stirred frequently, it is to be put into a barrel, and left for a fortnight to work, when a ninth part of brandy is to be added, and the whole bunged down. In a few months it will be a most excellent wine.
Take of cold soft water, 2 galls.; fruit, 18 galls. Ferment. Honey, 6 lbs.; tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Put in peach leaves, 6 handfuls: then add brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 9 galls., white currants, 9 galls.; white gooseberries, 1 gall. Ferment. Mix, refined sugar, 25 lbs.; white tartar, in powder, 1 oz.; clary seed, bruised, 2 oz.; or clary flowers or sorrel flowers, 4 handfuls, then add white brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Take of cold soft water, 10 galls.; white currants, 10 galls. Ferment. Mix, refined sugar, 25 lbs.; white tartar, in fine powder, 1 oz.; then add hitter almonds, 2 oz. and white brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 10 galls.; black currants, 6 galls.; strawberries, 3 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 25 lbs.; red tartar, in fine powder, 6 oz.; orange-thyme, 2 handfuls; then add brandy, 2 or 3 qts. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Take of cold soft water, 12 galls.; black currants, 5 galls.; white or red currants, or both, 3 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 30 lbs. or less; red tartar, in fine powder, 5 oz.; ginger, in powder, 5 oz. then add brandy, 1 gall. or less. This will make 18 galls.
Another, very fine. - To every 3 qts. of juice add as much of cold water, and to every 3 qts. of the mixture add 3 lbs. of good, pure sugar. Put it into a cask, reserving some to fill up. Set the cask in a warm, dry room, and it will ferment of itself. When this is over skim off the refuse, and fill up with what you have reserved for this purpose. When it has done working, add 3 qts. of brandy to 40 qts. of the wine. Bung it up close for 10 months, then bottle it. The thick part may be separated by straining, and the percolating liquor be bottled also. Keep it for 12 months.
Take of cold soft water, 7 galls.; cider, 6 galls.; strawberries, 6 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 16 lbs.; red tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz.; the peel and juice of 2 lemons; then add brandy, 2 or 3 qts. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Take of cold soft water, 10 galls.; strawberries, 9 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 25 lbs.; red tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz., 2 lemons and 2 oranges, peel and juice; then add brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 6 galls., cider, 4 galls. raspberries, 6 galls.; any other fruit, 3 galls. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 18 or 20 lbs., red tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz., orange and lemonpeel, 2 oz. dry, or 4 oz. fresh; then add brandy, 3 qts. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Gather the raspberries when ripe husk them and bruise them, then strain them through a bag into jars or other vessels. Boil the juice, and to every gall. put 1 1/2 lbs. of lump sugar. Now add whites of eggs, and let the whole boil for 15 minutes, skimming it as the froth rises. When cool and settled, decant the liquor into a cask, adding yeast to make it ferment. When this has taken place, add 1 pint of white wine, or a pint of proof spirit to each gall. contained in the cask, and hang a bag in it containing 1 oz. of bruised mace. In 3 months, if kept in a cool place, it will be very excellent and delicious wine.
On a dry day gather mulberries, when they are just changed from redness to a shining black; spread them thinly on a fine cloth, or on a floor or table, for 24 hours, and then press them. Boil a gall. of water with each gall. of juice; putting to every gall. of water 1 oz. of cinnamon bark and 6 oz. of sugar candy finely powdered. Skim and strain the water when it is taken off and settled, and put to it the mulberry-juice. Now add to every gall. of the mixture a pint of white or Rhenish wine. Let the whole stand in a cask to ferment for 5 or 6 days. When settled, draw it off into bottles and keep it cool.
Take of cold soft water, 16 galls.; Malaga raisins, 50 lbs.; elderberries, 4 galls., red tartar in fine powder, 4 oz. Mix ginger in powder, 5 oz.; cinnamon, cloves, and mace, of each 2 oz., 3 oranges or lemons, peel and juice; then add 1 gall. of brandy. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - In making elder juice let the berries be fully ripe, and all the stalks clean picked from them; then, have a press ready for drawing off all the juice, and 4 haircloths, somewhat broader than the press. Lay one layer above another having a hair-cloth betwixt every layer, which must be laid very thin, and pressed a little at first and then more till the press be drawn as close as possible. Now take out the berries, and press all the rest in the like manner, then take the pressed berries, break out all the lumps, put them into an open-headed vessel, and add as much liquor as will just cover them. Let them infuse so for 7 or 8 days; then put the best juice into a cask proper for it to be kept in, and add l gall. of malt spirits not rectified, to every 20 galls. of elder-juice, which will effectually preserve it from becoming sour for two years at least
Another. - Pick the berries when quite ripe, put them into a stone jar, and set them in an oven, or in a kettle of boiling water, till the jar is hot through, then take them out, and strain them through a coarse sieve. Squeeze the berries and put the juice into a clean kettle. To every quart of juice put 1 lb. of fine sugar; let it boil and skim it well. When clear and fine, pour it into a cask. To every 10 galls. of wine add 1 oz. of isinglass dissolved in cider, and 6 whole eggs. Close it up, let it stand 6 months, and then bottle it.
To 10 galls. of water put 10 qts. of the juice of white elderberries, pressed gently from the berries by the hand and passed through a sieve, without bruising the seeds; add to every gallon of liquor 3 lbs. of sugar, and to the whole quantity 2 oz. of ginger sliced, and 1 oz. of cloves. Boil this nearly an hour, taking off the scum as it rises, and pour the whole to cool, in an open tub, and work it with ale yeast, spread upon a toast of bread for 3 days. Then turn it into a vessel that will just hold it, adding about 1 1/2 lbs. of bruised raisins, to lie in the liquor till drawn off, which should not be done till the wine is fine.
Boil 18 lbs. of white powdered sugar in 6 galls. of water and 2 whites of eggs well beaten, skim it, and put in a quarter of a peek of elder-flowers; do not keep them on the fire. When cool stir it and put in 6 spoonfuls of lemon juice, 4 or 5 of yeast, and beat well into the liquor; stir it well every day, put 6 lbs. of the best raisins, stoned, into the cask, and tun the wine. Stop it close and bottle in 6 months. When well kept, this wine will pass very well for Frontignac.
Another. - To 6 galls. of spring-water put 6 lbs. of sun raisins out small, and 12 lbs. of fine sugar. Boil the whole together for about an hour and a half. When the liquor is cold put half a peek of ripe elder-flowers in, with about a gill of lemonjuice, and half the quantity of ale yeast. Cover it up and, after standing 3 days, strain it off. Now pour it into a cask that is quite clean, and that will hold it with ease. When this is done put a quart of Rhenish wine to every gallon; let the bung be slightly put in for 12 or 14 days, then stop it down fast, and put it in a cool, dry place for 4 or 5 months, till it be quite settled and fine; then bottle it off.
Take 6 galls. of good cider, 1 1/2 galls. of Port wine, 1 1/2 galls. of the juice of elder-berries, 3 qts. of brandy, 1 1/2 oz. of cochineal. This will produce 9 1/2 galls.
Bruise the cochineal very fine, and put it with the brandy into a stone bottle; let it remain at least a fortnight, shaking it well once or twice every day. At the end of that time procure the the cider, and put 5 galls. into a 9 gallon cask; add to it the elder-juice and Port wine, then the brandy and cochineal. Take the remaining gallon of cider to rinse out the bottle that contained the brandy; and, lastly, pour it into the cask, and bung it down very close, and in 6 weeks it will be ready for bottling.
It is, however, sometimes not quite so fine as could be wished: in that case add 2 oz. of isinglass, and let it remain a fortnight or 3 weeks longer, when it will be perfectly bright. It would not be amiss, perhaps, if the quantity of isinglass mentioned was added to the wine before it was bunged down; it will tend very considerably to improve the body of the wine. If it should not appear sufficiently rough flavored, add 1 oz. or 1 1/2 oz. of roche-alum, which will, in most cases, impart a sufficient astringency.
After it is bottled it must be packed in as cool a place as possible. It will be fit for using in a few months, but if kept longer it will be greatly improved.
Take of cold soft water 6 galls., cider 6 galls., berries 8 galls., ferment. Mix raw sugar 20 lbs., tartar in fine powder 4 oz.; add ginger in powder 4 oz.; lavender and rosemary leaves 2 handfuls, rum or British spirits 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
The season for obtaining the liquor from birchtrees is in the latter end of February, or the beginning of March, before the leaves shoot out, and as the sap begins to rise; if the time is delayed the juice will grow too thick to be drawn out. It should be as thin and clear as possible. The method of procuring the juice is by boring holes in the trunk of the tree and fixing faucets of elder; but care should be taken not to tap it in too many places at once, for fear of injuring the tree. If the tree is large it may be bored in 5 or 6 places at once, and bottles are to be placed under the aperture for the sap to flow into. When 4 or 5 galls. have been extracted from different trees cork the bottles very close, and wax them till the wine is to be made, which should be as soon as possible after the sap has been obtained. Boil the sap, and put 4 lbs. of loaf sugar to every gallon, also the peel of a lemon cut thin; then boil it again for nearly an hour, skimming it all the time. Now pour it into a tub and, as soon as it is almost cold, work it with a toast spread with yeast, and let it stand 5 or 6 days, stirring it twice or 3 times each day. Into a cask that will contain it put a lighted brimstone snatch, stop it up till the match is burnt out, and then pour the wine into it, putting the bung lightly in, till it has done working. Bung it very close for about 3 months, and then bottle it. It will be good in a week after it is put into the bottles.
Another. - Birch wine may be made with raisins in the following manner: To a hogshead of birchwater, take 400 Malaga raisins; pick them clean from the stalks and cut them small. Then boil the birch liquor for an hour at least, skim it well, and let it stand till it is no warmer than milk. Then put in the raisins and let it stand close covered, stirring it well 4 or 5 times every day. Boil all the stalks in a gallon or two of birch liquor, which, added to the other when almost cold, will give it an agreeable roughness. Let it stand 10 days, then put it in a cool cellar, and when it has done hissing in the vessel, stop it up close. It must stand at least 9 months before it is bottled.
Having procured berries that are fully ripe, put them into a large vessel of wood or stone with a cock in it, and pour upon them as much boiling water as will cover them. As soon as the heat will permit the hand to be put into the vessel, bruise them well till all the berries are broken. Then let them stand covered till the berries begin to rise towards the top, which they usually do in 3 or 4 days. Then draw off the clear into another vessel, and add to every 10 quarts of this liquor 1 lb. of sugar. Stir it well and let it stand to work a week or 10 days in another vessel like the first. Then draw it off at the cock through a jelly-bag into a large vessel. Take 4 oz. of isinglass and lay it to steep 12 hours in a pint of white wine. The next morning boil it upon a slow fire till it is all dissolved. Then take 1 gallon of blackberry-juice, put it in the dissolved isinglass, give them a boil together, and pour all into the vessel. Let it stand a few days to purge and settle, then draw it off and keep it in a cool place.
Take of cold soft water, 18 galls., Malaga or Smyrna raisins, 35 lbs. juniper-berries, 9 quarts, red tartar, 4 oz., wormwood and sweet marjoram, each 2 handfuls; whiskey, 2 quarts or more. Ferment for 10 or 12 days. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water 11 galls., damsons, 8 galls. Ferment. Mix raw sugar, 30 lbs., red tartar, in fine powder, 6 oz. Add brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
"When the must," says Mr. Carnell, "has fermented 2 days, (during which time it should be stirred up 2 or 3 times) take out of the vat about 2 or 3 quarts of the stones and break them and the kernels, and then return them into the vat again."
Take a considerable quantity of damsons and common plums inclining to ripeness; slit them in halves so that the stones may be taken out, then mash them gently and add a little water and honey. Add to every gallon of the pulp 1 gall. of spring-water, with a few bay-leaves and cloves; boil the mixture, and add as much sugar as will sweeten it; skim off the froth and let it cool. Now press the fruit, squeezing out the liquid part, strain all through a fine strainer, and put the water and juice together in a cask. Having allowed the whole to stand and ferment for 3 or 4 days, fine it with white sugar, flour, and white of eggs; draw it off into bottles, then cork it well. In 12 days it will be ripe, and will taste like weak Port, having the flavor of Canary.
Another. - Gather the damsons on a dry day, weigh them and then bruise them. Put them into a cask that has a cock in it, and to every 8 lbs. of fruit add 1 gall. of water. Boil the water, skim it and put it scalding hot to the fruit. Let it stand 2 days, then draw it off and put it into a vessel, and to every gallon of liquor put 2 1/2 lbs. of fine sugar. Fill up the vessel and stop it close, and the longer it stands the better. Keep it for 12 months in the vessel, and then bottle, putting a lump of sugar into every bottle. The small damson is the best for this purpose.
Take of soft cold water, 10 galls., cherries, 10 galls. Ferment. Mix raw sugar, 30 lbs., red tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz. Add brandy, 2 or 3 quarts. This will make 18 galls.
Two days after the cherries have been in the vat, take out about 3 quarts of the cherry-stones, break them and the kernels, and return them into the vat again.
Another. - Take cherries nearly ripe, of any red sort, clear them of the stalks and stones, then put them into a glazed earthen vessel and squeeze them to a pulp. Let them remain in this state for 12 hours to ferment, then put them into a linen cloth not too fine and press out the juice with a pressing-board, or any other convenient instrument. Now let the liquor stand till the scum rises, and with a ladle or skimmer take it clean off; then pour the clear part, by inclination, into a cask, where to each gallon put 1 lb. of the best loaf sugar, and let it ferment for 7 or 8 days. Draw it off when clear, into lesser casks or bottles; keep it cool as other wines, and in 10 or 12 days it will be ripe.
Cleanse from the stalks 60 lbs. of Morella cherries, and bruise them so that the stones shall be broken. Now press out the juice and mix it with 6 galls. of Sherry wine, and 4 galls. of warm water. Having grossly powdered separate ounces of nutmeg, cinnamon and mace, hang them separately in small bags in the cask containing the mixture. Bung it down and in a few weeks it will become a deliciously flavored wine.
Take of cold soft water, 18 galls., refined sugar 25 lbs., honey, 6 lbs., white tartar, in fine powder 2 oz., peaches, 60 or 80 in number. Ferment. Then add 2 galls. of brandy. This will make 18 galls.
The first division is to be put into the vat, and the day after, before the peaches are put in, take the stones from them, break them and the kernels, then put them and the pulp into the vat and proceed with the general process.
Take peaches, nectarines, etc.; pare them and take the stones out; then slice them thin and pour over them from 1 to 2 galls. of water and a quart of white wine. Place the whole on a fire to simmer gently for a considerable time, till the sliced fruit becomes soft; pour off the liquid part into another vessel containing more peaches that have been sliced but not heated; let them stand for 12 hours, then pour out the liquid part and press what remains through a fine hair bag. Let the whole be now put into a cask to ferment; add of loaf sugar 1 1/2 lbs. to each gallon. Boil well 1 oz. of beaten cloves in a quart of white wine and add it to the above.
Apricot wine may be made by only bruising the fruit and pouring the hot liquor over it. This wine does not require so much sweetening. To give it a curious savor, boil 1 oz. of mace and 1/2 an oz. of nutmegs in 1 qt. of white wine; and when the wine is fermenting pour the liquid in hot. In about 20 days, or a month, these wines will be fit for bottling.
Pare off the rinds of 6 large lemons, cut them, and squeeze out the juice. Steep the rinds in the juice, and put to it 1 qt. of brandy. Let it stand 3 days in an earthen pot close stopped; then squeeze 6 more, and mix with it 2 qts. of springwater, and as much sugar as will sweeten the whole. Boil the water, lemons and sugar together and let it stand till it is cool. Then add 1 qt. of white wine, and the other lemons and brandy; mix them together, and run it through a flannel beg into some vessel. Let it stand 3 months and then bottle it off. Cork the bottles well; keep it cool, and it will be fit to drink in a month or 6 weeks.
Another. - Pare 5 dozen of lemons very thin, put the peels into 5 qts. of French brandy, and let them stand 14 days. Then make the juice into a syrup with 3 lbs. of singlerefined sugar, and when the peels are ready boil 15 galls. of water with 40 lbs. of single-refined sugar for 1/2 an hour. Then put it into a tub, and when cool add to it 1 spoonful of yeast, and let it work 2 days. Then tun it, and put in the brandy, peels and syrup. Stir them all together, and close up the cask. Let it stand 3 months, then bottle it, and it will be as pale and us fine as any citron-water.
Take of cold soft water, 2 galls.; apples, well bruised, 3 bushels, honey, 10 lbs., white tartar 2 oz.; 1 nutmeg, in powder; rum, 3 qts. This will make 18 galls.
To every gall. of apple-juice, immediately as it comes from the press, add 2 lbs. of common loaf sugar; boil it as long as any scum rises, then strain it through a sieve, and let it cool; add some good yeast, and stir it well; let it work in the tub for 2 or 3 weeks, or till the head begins to flatten, then skim off the head, draw it clear off, and tun it. When made a year rack it off, and fine it with isinglass, then add 1/2 a pt. of the best rectified spirit of wine, or a pt. of French brandy, to every 8 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 2 galls; apples, well bruised, 3 bushels. Ferment. Mix, raw sugar, 15 lbs.; beet root, sliced, 4 lbs., red tartar, in fine powder, 3 oz.; then add ginger, in powder, 3 oz.; rosemary and lavender leaves, of each 2 handfuls; whiskey, 2 quarts. This will make 18 galls.
Gather the quinces when pretty ripe, on a dry day, rub off the down with a linen cloth, then lay them in hay or straw for 10 days to perspire. Now cut them in quarters, take out the cores and bruise them well in a mashing-tub with a wooden pestle. Squeeze out the liquid part bv pressing them in a hair bag by degrees, in a cider press; strain this liquor through a fine sieve, then warm it gently over a fire and skim it, but do not suffer it to boil.. Now sprinkle into it some loaf sugar reduced to powder; then in a gall. of water and a qt. of white wine; boil 12 or 14 large quinces, thinly sliced; add 2 lbs. of fine sugar and then strain off the liquid part, and mingle it with the natural juice of the quinces; put this into a cask (not to fill it) and mix them well together; then let it stand to settle, put in 2 or 3 whites of eggs, then draw it off. If it be not sweet enough, add more sugar, and a qt. of the best Malmsey. To make it still better boil 1/4 of a lb. of stoned raisins, and 1/2 an oz. of cinnamon bark in a qt. of the liquor, to the consumption of a third part and straining it, put it into the cask when the wine is fermenting.
Another. - Take 20 large quinces, gathered when they are dry and full ripe. Wipe them clean with a coarse cloth, and grate them with a large grater or rasp as near the cores as possible; but do not touch the cores. Boil a gall. of spring-water, throw in the quinces, and let them boil softly about 1/4 of an hour. Then strain them well into an earthen pan, on 2 lbs. of double-refined sugar. Pare the peel of 2 large lemons, throw them in, and squeeze the juice through a sieve. Stir it about till it is very cool, and then toast a thin bit of bread very brown, rub a little yeast on it, and let the whole stand close-covered 24 hours. Take out the toast and lemon, put the wine in a cask, keep it 3 months, and then bottle it. If a 20-gallon cask is wanted, let it stand 6 months before bottling it; and remember, when straining the quinces, to wring them hard in a coarse cloth.
Put 12 lbs. of powdered sugar, with the whites of 8 or 10 eggs well beaten, into 6 galls. of spring-water; boil them 3/4 of an hour; when cold, put into it 6 spoonfuls of yeast and the juice of 12 lemons, which being pared, must stand with 2 lbs. of white sugar in a tankard, and in the morning skim off the top, and then put it into the water; add the juice and rinds of 50 oranges, but not the white or pithy parts of the rinds; let it work all together 2 days and 2 nights: then add 2 qts. of Rhenish or white wine, and put it into the vessel.
Another. - To 6 galls. of water put 15 lbs. of soft sugar; before it boils, add the whites of 6 eggs well beaten, and take off the scum as it rises; boil it 1/2 an hour; when cool add the juice of 50 oranges, and 2/3 of the peels cut very thin, and immerse a toast covered with yeast. In a month after it has been in the cask, add a pt. of brandy and 2 qts. of Rhenish wine; it will be fit to bottle in 3 or 4 months, but it should remain in bottle for 12 months before it is drunk.
To 12 lbs. of parsnips, cut in slices, add 4 galls. of water; boil them till they become quite soft. Squeeze the liquor well out of them, run it through a sieve, and add to every gall. 3 lbs. of loaf sugar. Boil the whole three quarters of an hour, and when it is nearly cold add a little yeast. Let it stand for 10 days in a tub, stirring it every day from the bottom; then put it into a cask for 12 months; as it works over fill it up every day.
Take of cold soft water 17 galls., white currants 6 qts. Ferment. Mix honey 30 lbs., white tartar in powder 3 oz. Add balm and sweetbriar, each 2 handfuls, white brandy 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold water 17 galls., red currants 6 qts., black currants 2 qts. Ferment. Mix, honey 25 lbs. beet root sliced 1 lb., red tartar in fine powder 4 oz. Add cinnamon in powder 2 oz., brandy 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Fermented mead is made in the proportion of 1 lb. of honey to 3 pints of water or by boiling over a moderate fire, to two-thirds of the quantity, three parts water and one part honey. The liquor is then skimmed and casked, care being taken to keep the cask full while fermenting. During the fermenting process the cask is left untopped and exposed to the sun, or in a warm room, until the working ceases. The cask is then bunged, and a few months in the cellar renders it pleasant, by the addition of cut raisins, or other fruits boiled after the rate of 1/2 lb. of raisins to 6 lbs. of honey, with a toasted crust of bread; 1 oz. of salt of tartar in a glass of brandy being added to the liquor when casked, to which some add 6 or 6 drops of the essence of cinnamon; others, pieces of lemon-peel with various syrups.
To every gallon of water put 3 1/2 lbs. of honey, and boil them together three-quarters of an hour. Then to every gallon of liquor put about 2 dozen of walnut leaves; pour the boiling liquor upon them and let them stand all night. Then take out the leaves, put in a spoonful of yeast, and let it work for 2 or 3 days. Then make it up, and after it has stood for 3 months bottle it.
Put a quantity of the comb from which honey has been drained in a tub, and add a barrel of cider immediately from the press; this mixture stir and leave for one night. It is then strained before fermentation and honey added until the specific gravity of the liquor is sufficient to bear an egg. It is then put into a barrel, and after the fermentation is commenced the cask is filled every day for 3 or 4 days, that the froth may work out of the bung-hole. When the fermentation moderates put the bung in loosely, lest stopping it tight might cause the cask to burst. At the end of 5 or 6 weeks the liquor is to be drawn off into a tub, and the whites of 8 eggs, well beaten up with a pint of clean sand, are to be put into it; then add 1 gall. of cider spirits, and after mixing the whole together, return it into the cask, which is to be well cleaned, bunged tight, and placed in a proper situation for racking off when fine. In the month of April following draw it off into kegs for use, and it will be equal to almost any foreign wine.
Take of cold soft water 18 galls., Smyrna raisins, 40 lbs. Ferment. Mixed beet-root, sliced, 3 lbs., red tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Add cowslip flowers, 14 lbs.; cloves and mace, in powder 1 oz. brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 18 galls.; Malaga raisins, 35 lbs.: white tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Ferment. Mix cowslip-flowers, 16 lbs. Add white brandy, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Is made in this manner: To 15 galls. of water put 30 lbs. of honey, and boil it till 1 gall. be wasted. Skim it, take it off the fire, and have ready 16 lemons cut in halves. Take 1 gall. of the liquor and put it to the lemons. Put the rest of the liquor into a tub with 7 pecks of cowslips, and let them stand all night. Then put in the liquor with the lemons 8 spoonfuls of new yeast and a handful of sweetbriar. Stir them all well together, and let it work 3 or 4 days. Then strain it, put into the cask, and after it has stood 6 months bottle it off.
Take of cold soft water, 2 qts.; cider, 9 galls.; honey, 8 lbs., white tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Ferment. Mix cinnamon, cloves, and mace, 2 oz. Add rum, 1/2 gall. This will make 9 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 3 galls.; cider, 16 galls.; honey, 10 lbs. Ferment. Add raw sugar, 4 lbs. beet-root, sliced, 4 lbs.; red tartar, in fine powder, 6 oz. Mix sweet marjoram and sweetbriar, 3 handfuls; rum. 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Take of cold soft water, 4 galls.; cider, 15 galls.; honey, 12 lbs., tartar, in fine powder, 2 oz. Ferment. Mix ginger, in powder, 6 oz., sage and mint, 2 handfuls. Add whiskey, 1 gall. This will make 18 galls.
Let the raisins be well washed and picked from the stalks; to every pound thus prepared and chopped, add 1 qt. of water which has been boiled and has stood till it is cold. Let the whole stand in the vessel for a month, being frequently stirred. Now let the raisins be taken from the cask, and let the liquor be closely stopped in the vessel. In the course of a month let it be racked into another vessel, leaving all the sediment behind, which must be repeated as it becomes fine, when add to every 10 galls. 6 lbs. of fine sugar, and 1 doz. of Seville oranges the rinds being pared very thin, and infused in 2 qts of brandy, which should be added to the liquor at its last racking. Let the whole stand 3 months in the cask, when it will be fit for bottling; it should remain in the bottle for a twelve-month.
To give it the flavor of Madeira, when it is in the cask, put in a couple of green citrons, and let them remain till the wine is bottled.
Put 200 weight of raisins, with the stalks, into a hogshead, and fill it almost with spring-water; let them steep for about 12 days, frequently stirring, and after pouring off the juice dress the raisins and mash them. The whole should then be put together into a very clean vessel that will exactly contain it. It will hiss for some time, during which it should not be stirred; but when the noise ceases it must be stopped close and stand for about 6 or 7 months, and then, if it prove fine and clear, rack it off into another vessel of the same size. Stop it up, and let it remain for 12 or 14 weeks longer, then bottle it off. If it should not prove clear fine it down with 3 oz. of isinglass, and 1/4 lb. of sugar-candy dissolved in some of the wine.
Put into a very nice boiler l0 galls. of water, 15 lbs. of lump sugar, with the whites of 6 or 8 eggs, well beaten and strained; mix all well while cold, when the liquor boils skim it, put in 1/2 a lb. of common white ginger, bruised, and boil it 20 minutes. Have ready the rinds (cut very thin) of 7 lemons, and pour the hot liquor on them; when cool put it into your cask, with 2 spoonfuls of yeast, put a quart of the warm liquor to 2 oz. isinglass shavings, whisk it well 3 or 4 times, and put all into the barrel. Next day stop it up, in 3 weeks bottle it, and in 3 months it will be a delicious and safe liquor.
Another. - Take of cold soft water, 19 galls.; Malaga raisins, 50 lbs.; white tartar, in powder, 4 oz. Ferment. Mix ginger in powder or bruised, 20 oz.; 18 lemons, peel and juice; add brandy, 2 qts. or more. This will make 18 galls.
Another. - Take 20 qts. of water; 5 lbs. of sugar; 3 oz. of white ginger; 1 oz. of stick liquorice. Boil them well together, when it is cold put a little new yeast upon it, but not too much, then put it into the barrel for 10 days, and after that bottle it putting a lump of white sugar into every bottle.
Another. - To 7 galls. of water put 19 lbs. of clayed sugar and boil it for 1/2 an hour, taking off the scum as it rises; then take a small quantity of the liquor and add to it 9 oz. of the best ginger bruised. Now put it all together, and when nearly cold, chop 9 lbs of raisins very small, and put them into an 8 gall. cask (beer measure), with 1 oz. of isinglass. Slice 4 lemons into the cask, taking out all the seeds, and yeast. Leave it unstopped for 3 weeks, and in about 3 months it will be fit for bottling.
There will be 1 gall. of the sugar and water more than the cask will hold at first; this must be kept to fill up as the liquor works off, as it is necessary that the cask should be kept full till it has done working. The raisins should be 2/3 Malaga, and 1/3 Muscatel. Spring and autumn are the best seasons for making this wine.
Take of fresh mare's milk any quantity; add to it 1/3 part of water, and pour the mixture into a wooden vessel. Use as a ferment 1/8 part of skimmed milk, but at any future preparation a small portion of old koumiss will answer better. Cover the vessel with a thick cloth, and set it in a place of moderate warmth; leaving it at rest for 24 hours, at the end of which time the milk will become sour, and a thick substance will be gathered on its top. Now, with a churn staff, beat it till the thick substance above-mentioned be blended intimately with the subjacent fluid. In this situation leave it at rest for 24 hours more, after which pour it into a higher and narrower vessel, resembling a churn, where the agitation must be repeated as before, till the liquor appears to be perfectly homogenous. In this state it is called koumiss; of which the taste ought to be a pleasant mixture of sweet and sour. Agitation must be employed every time before it is used. Sometimes aromatic herbs, as Angelica, are infused in the liquor during fermentation.
Take of sliced rhubarb, 2 1/2 oz.; lesser cardamon seeds, bruised and husked, 1/2 oz.; saffron, 2 drs.; Spanish white wine, 2 pints, proof spirit, 1/2 pint. Digest for 10 days and strain. This is a warm, cordial, laxative medicine. It is used chiefly in weakness of the stomach and bowels, and some kinds of looseness. It may be given in doses of from 1/2 spoonful to 3 or 4 spoonfuls or more, according to the circumstances of the disorder and the strength of the patient.
Boil 26 quarts of spring-water 1/4 of an hour, and when it is blood warm put 25 lbs. of Malaga raisins picked, rubbed and shred, into it, with almost 1/2 bushel of red sage shred, and a small pitcher of ale yeast; stir all well together and let it stand in a tub covered warm 6 or 7 days, stirring it once a day, then strain it off and put it in a runlet. Let it work 3 or 4 days, and then stop it up; when it has stood 6 or 7 days, put in a quart or two of Malaga Sherry, and when it °8 fine bottle it.
Pare and slice a number of turnips, put them into a cider press and press out all the juice. To every gallon of the juice add 3 lbs. of lump sugar; have a vessel ready large enough to hold the juice and put 1/2 pint of brandy to every gallon. Pour in the juice and lay something over the bung for a week, to see if it works; if it does, do not bung it down till it has done working, then stop it close for 3 months, and draw it off into another vessel. When it is fine bottle it off.
This is an excellent wine for gouty habits, and is much recommended in such oases in lieu of any other wine.
Take a well-glazed earthen vessel and put into it 3 galls. of rose-water drawn with a cold still. Put into that a sufficient quantity of rose-leaves, cover it close and set it for an hour in a kettle or copper of hot water, to take out the whole strength and tincture of the roses; and when it is cold press the rose-leaves hard into the liquor, and steep fresh ones in it, repeating it till the liquor has got the full strength of the roses. To every gallon of liquor put 3 lbs. of loaf sugar, and stir it well, that it may melt and disperse in every part. Then put it into a cask or other convenient vessel, to ferment, and put into it a piece of bread toasted hard and covered with yeast. Let it stand about 80 days, when it will be ripe and have a fine flavor, having the whole strength and scent of the roses in it; and it may be greatly improved by adding to it wine and spices. By this method of infusion, wine of carnations, glove gilliflowers, violets, primroses, or any other flower having a curious scent, may be made.
Take the large blue figs when pretty ripe, and steep them in white wine, having made some slits in them, that they may swell and gather in the substance of the wine. Then slice some other figs and let them simmer over a fire in water until they are reduced to a kind of pulp. Then strain out the water, pressing the pulp hard, and pour it as hot as possible on the figs that are imbrued in the wine. Let the quantities be nearly equal, but the water somewhat more than the wine and figs. Let them stand 24 hours, mash them well together, and draw off what will run without squeezing. Then press the rest, and if not sweet enough add a sufficient quantity of sugar to make it so. Let it ferment, and add to it a little honey and sugar candy; then fine it with the whites of eggs and a little isinglass, and draw it off for use.
Take 40 lbs. of sugar and 9 galls. of water, boil it gently for 2 hours, skim it well, and put it into a tub to cool. Take 2 1/2 lbs. of the tops of balm, bruise them and put them into a barrel with a little new yeast, and when the liquor is cold pour it on the balm. Stir it well together and let it stand 24 hours, stirring it often. Then close it up, and let it stand 6 weeks. Then rack it off and put a lump of sugar into every bottle. Cork it well, and it will be better the second year than the first.
Take the best large scurvy-grass tops and leaves, in May, June, or July; bruise them well in a stone mortar, put them in a well-glazed earthen vessel and sprinkle them over with some powder of crystal of tartar; then smear them with virgin honey, and being covered close, let it stand 24 hours. Set water over a gentle fire, putting to every gallon 3 pints of honey, and when the scum rises take it off and let it cool, then put the stamped scurvy grass into a barrel, and pour the liquor to it, setting the vessel conveniently endways, with a tap at the bottom. When it has been infused 24 hours, draw off the liquor, strongly press the juice and moisture out of the herb into the barrel or vessel, and put the liquor up again; then put a little Dew yeast to it, and suffer it to ferment 3 days, covering the place of the bung or vent with a piece of bread spread over with mustard seed, downward, in a cool place, and let it continue till it is fine and drinks brisk. Draw off the finest part, leaving only the dregs behind; afterwards add more herbs, and ferment it with whites of eggs, flour, and fixed nitre, verjuice, or the juice of green grapes, if they are to be had; to which add 6 lbs. of the syrup of mustard, all mixed and well beaten together, to refine it down, and it will drink brisk, but is not very pleasant; being here inserted among artificial wines rather for the sake of health, than for the delightfulness of its taste.
Take a quart of fine draft Devonshire cider, and an equal quantity of good Port. Mix them, and shake them. Bottle them, and let them stand for a month.
Those who like a dry wine, should put into the vat, at the commencement of the vinous fermentation, an ounce or two of calcined gypsum, in fine powder.
If the season proves bad so that some fruits are not sufficiently ripe, immediately after the vinous fermentation, and the must of such fruit is put into the cask, it is to be rolled 2 or 3 times a day for a week or two. A spirituous fermentation will soon commence; the bung of the cask must then be taken out, and the hole covered with a bit of light wood or canvas, and as any scum arises, it should be taken away. When the scum disappears, fill up the cask, and bung it up. But a vent hole must be left open for a week.
Wines will diminish, therefore the cask must be kept filled up with some of the same wine, or some other that is as good or better.
They must at all times be kept in a cool cellar; if not, they will ferment. If wines are kept in a warm cellar, an acetous fermentation will soon commence, and the result consequently will be vinegar. The more a wine frets and ferments, the more it parts with its strength and goodness; when wines are found to work improperly in the cellar, the vent-peg must be taken out for a week or two.
If any wine ferments, after being perfected, draw off a quart and boil it, and pour it hot into the cask, add a pint or a quart of brandy, and bung up a day or two after.
Or, draw off the wine, and fumigate the cask, with 1 oz. of flower of brimstone, and 1/2 oz. of cinnamon in powder. Mix the two together, and tie them up in a rag. Turn the bung-hole of the cask downwards, place the rag under the bunghole, and set fire to it, so that the gas ascends into the cask. As soon as it is burnt out, fill up the cask with wine, and bung it up tight.
Set fire to 1 lb. or more of broken charcoal, put it into the cask, and immediately fill up the cask with boiling water. After this roll the cask once or twice a day for a week; then, pour out the charcoal and water, wash out the cask with clean cold water, and expose it to the external air for some days.
Poor wines may be improved by being racked off, and returned to the cask again; and then putting into the wine about 1 lb. of jar or box raisins, bruised, and 1 quart of brandy.
Or, put into the wine 2 lbs. of honey, and a pint or two of brandy. The honey and brandy to be first mixed together.
Or, draw off 3 or 4 quarts of such wine and fill the cask up with strong wine.
Take l oz. of alum, make it into powder; then draw out 4 galls. of wine, mix the powder with it, and beat it well for 1/2 an hour; then fill up the cask, and when fine (which will be in a week's time or little more), bottle it off. This will make it drink fine and brisk.
Flat wines may be restored by 1 lb of jar raisins, 1 lb. of honey, and 1/2 a pint of spirits of wine, beaten up in a mortar with some of the wine, and then the contents put into the cask.
Put into the cask 3 or 4 sticks of charcoal, and bung up the cask tight. In a month after take them out.
Or, cut two ripe medlars, put them in a gauze bag, and suspend them from the bung hole into wine, and bung up the cask air-tight. A month after take them out, and bung up the cask again.
Or, mix 1/2 lb. of bruised mustard seed, with 1 pint or more of brandy, and stir it up in the wine; and 2 days after bung up the cask.
At the finish of the process, when the brandy or spirit is put to the wine, it is particularly recommended that 1/4 oz. of camphor, in the lump, be dropped into the bung-hole of each 18 galls. of wine.
Oil poured upon wine, or any other liquor, will prevent it from growing musty, or turning corrupt.
Bake a long roller of dough, stuck well with cloves, and hang it in the cask.
Take great care to rack off the wine well, and in March bottle it as quickly as possible. The bottles must be very clean and dry, and the corks of the best sort, made of velvet or white cork. In 2 months' after, the wine will be in a fine condition to drink.
Take 1/2 oz. of chalk in powder, 1/2 oz. of burnt alum, the white of an egg, and l pint of springwater.
Beat the whole up in a mortar, and pour it into the wine; after which, roll the cask 10 minutes; and then place it on the stand, leaving the bung out for a few days. As soon as the wine is fine, rack it off.
Or, take 1 oz. of ground rice, 3 oz. of burnt alum, and 1/2 oz. of bay-salt.
Beat the whole up in a mortar, with 1 pint or more of the wine, pour it into the cask, and roll it 10 minutes. The cask must be bunged up for a few days. As soon as such wine becomes fine, rack it off.
Or, bring the cask of wine out of the cellar and place it in a shady situation to receive the circulation of the air, and take out the bung. In 3 weeks or a month reek it off into a sweet cask which fill up, and put into the wine 1 oz. of cinnamon, in the stick; and bung it up tight.
Tap the cask, and put a piece of coarse linen cloth upon that end of the cock which goes to the inside of the cask; then rack it into a dry cask to 30 galls. of wine, and put in 6 oz. of powdered alum. Roll and shake them well together, and it will fine down, and prove a very clear and pleasant wine.
Take l oz. of salt, 1/2 oz. calcified gypsum, in powder, and 1 pt. of skimmed milk. Mix these up with a little of the wine, and then pour the mixture into the cask, put in a few lavender leaves, stir the wine with a stick, so as not to disturb the lees, and bung it up.
Mix 1 oz. of calcined gypsum in powder and 2 lbs. of honey in l qt. of brandy, pour the mixture into the wine, and stir it so as not to disturb the lees; fill up the cask, and the following day bung it up. Rack this wine as soon as fine.
Or, mix 1/2 oz. of the salt of tartar, 1/2 oz. of calcined gypsum, in powder, with a pint of the wine; pour it into the cask, and put an ounce of cinnamon in the stick, stir the wine without disturbing the lees, fill up the cask, and the day following bung it up.
Or, boil 3 oz. of rice; when cold put it into a gauze bag, and immerse it into the wine; put into the wine also a few sticks of cinnamon, and bung up the cask. In about a month after, take the rice out.
Take calcined gypsum in powder l oz., cream of tartar in powder 2 oz. Mix them in a pint or more of brandy; pour it into the cask, put in also, a few sticks of cinnamon, and then stir the wine without disturbing the lees. Bung up the cask the next day.
Boil a gallon of wine with some beaten oyster-shells and crab's claws, burnt into powder, 1 oz. of each to every 10 galls. of wine, then strain out the liquor through a sieve, and when cold put it into wine of the same sort, and it will give it a pleasant lively taste. A lump of unslaked lime put into the cask will also keep wine from turning sour.
Many wines require fining before they are racked, and the operation of fining is not always necessary. Most wines, well made, do not want fining; this may be ascertained by drawing a little into a glass from a peg-hole.
One of the best finings is as follows: Take 1 lb. of fresh marsh-mallow roots, washed clean, and cut into small pieces; macerate them in 2 qts. of soft water for 24 hours, then gently boil the liquor down to 3 half pints, strain it, and when cold mix with it 1/2 oz. of pipe-clay or chalk in powder; then pour the mucilage into the cask, and stir up the wine so as not to disturb the lees, and leave the vent-peg out for some days after.
Or, take boiled rice 2 tablespoonfuls, the white of 1 new egg, and 1/2 oz. of burnt alum, in powder. Mix with a pint or more of the wine, then pour the mucilage into the cask, and stir the wine with a stout stick, but not to agitate the lees.
Or, dissolve in a gentle heat 1/2 oz. of isinglass in a pint or more of the wine, then mix with it 1/2 oz. of chalk, in powder; when the two are well incorporated pour it into the cask, and stir the wine, so as not to disturb the lees.
Or, beat up the white of eggs, l egg to 6 galls.; draw the wine into the beaten egg, and keep stirring all the while, then return the wine and froth to the cask, and bung up.
It is in the first place necessary to consider whether the existing state of fermentation be the original or secondary stage of that process which comes on after the former has ceased for several days, and is indeed the commencement of acetone fermentation. That of the former kind rarely proceeds beyond what is necessary for the perfect decomposition of the saccharine and other parts of the vegetable substance necessary for the production of spirit, unless the liquor be kept too warm or is too weak, and left exposed to the air after the vinous fermentation is completed. The means to correct these circumstances are sufficiently obvious. The heat for spirituous fermentation should not be above 60°; when it is much above that point the liquor passes rapidly through the stage of vinous fermentation, and the acetous immediately commences. When too long continued fermentation arises from the liquor having been kept in a warm situation, it will be soon checked by bunging, after being removed into a cold place; the addition of a small proportion of spirits of wine or brandy, previously to closing it up, is also proper. A degree of cold, approaching to the freezing point, will cheek fermentation of whatever kind. Fermentation of this kind cannot be stopped by using a chemical agent, except such as would destroy the qualities of the liquor intended to be produced.
The secondary stage of fermentation, or the commencement of the acetous, may be stopped by removing the liquor to a cool situation, correcting the acid already formed; and it the liquor contain but little spirit, the addition of a proper proportion of brandy is requisite.
The operation of racking is also necessary to preserve liquor in a vinous state, and to render it clear. This process should be performed in a cool place.
Rack the wines down to the lees into another cask, where the lees of good wines are fresh; then put a pint of strong aqua vitae, and scrape 1/2 lb. of yellow beeswax into it, which, by heating the spirit over a gentle fire, will melt; after which dip a piece of cloth into it, and when a little dry set it on fire with a brimstone match, put it into the bunghole, and stop it up close.
First prepare a fresh empty cask that has had the same kind of wine in which it is about to be racked, then match it, and rack off the wine, putting to every 10 galls. 2 oz. of oyster powder and 1/2 oz. of bay-salt; then get the staff and stir it well about, letting it stand till it is fine, which will be in a few days; after which rack it off into another cask previously matched, and if the lees of some wine of the same kind can be got, it will improve it much. Put likewise a quart of brandy to every 10 galls., and, if the cask has been emptied a long time, it will match better on that account; but, even if a new cask, the matching must not be omitted. A fresh empty cask is to be preferred.
This method will answer for all made wines.
The principal object to be attended to in the management of foreign wine-vaults is to keep them of a temperate heat. Care must be taken, therefore, to close up every aperture or opening, that there may be no admission given to the external air. The floor of the vault should likewise be well covered with saw-dust, which must not be suffered to get too dry and dusty, but must receive now and then an addition of new, lest, when bottling or racking wine, some of the old dust should fly into it. At most vaults, in the winter, it is necessary to have a stove or chafing-dish, to keep up a proper degree of warmth. In the summer time it will be best to keep them as cool as possible.
Provide a good rope and tackling to let down the casks into the vaults or cellar, and a slide, ladder or pully for the casks to slide or roll on; a pair of strong slings; a pair of can hooks and a pair of crate hooks; a block of wood to put under the pipes when tipping them over in a narrow passage, or in easing them; a small valinch to taste wines, a crane, and a small copper pump to rack off; 2 or 3 gallon cans made of wood; a large wooden funnel; 2 or 3 copper funnels, from a quart to a gallon each; 2 racking cocks; 2 wine bottling-cocks; a brace and various bits; 2 small tubs; a square basket to hold the corks; 2 small tin funnels; a small strainer; 2 cork-screws; 2 or 3 baskets; a whisk to beat the finings; 3 flannel or linen bags; a strong iron screw to raise the bungs; a pair of pliers; bungs, corks, and ventpegs; 2 frets or middle-sized gimblets; some sheet-lead and tacks to put on broken staves; brown paper to put round cocks and under the lead, when stopping leaks; a staff with a chain at one end to rummage the wines, etc.; shots and lead canister or bristle brush, and 2 cloths to wash bottles; 2 large tubs; some small racks that will hold 6 dozen each; a cooper's adze; an iron and a wooden driver to tighten hoops; 2 dozen of wooden bungs of different sizes; a thermometer, which is to be kept in the vault; a stove or chafingdish, to keep the heat of the vault at a known temperature; a few dozen of delph labels; a cupboard to hold all the tools; a spade; 2 good stiff birch brooms, and a rake to level the sawdust.
The dark red port is made from grapes gathered indiscriminately and thrown into a cistern; they are then trodden, and their skins and stalks left in the mass, which separate during fermentation and form a dry head over the liquid. When the fermentation is completed, the liquor underneath is drawn out and casked. Before being exported it is mixed with one-third of brandy, to enable it to keep during the voyage; otherwise the carriage brings on the acetous fermentation, and the wine is converted into vinegar.
In the southern parts of France their way is with red wines to tread or squeeze the grapes between the hands, and let the whole stand, juice and husks, till the tincture is to their liking; after which they press it. For white wines they press the grapes immediately, and when pressed they tun the must and stop up the vessel, leaving only the depth of a foot or more to give room for it to work. At the end of 10 days they fill this space with some other good wine that will not work it again.
The vault or cellar should be of a temperate heat, and the casks sweet and clean. Should they have an acid or musty smell, it may be remedied by burning brimstone matches in them, and if not clean rinse them well out with cold water, and after draining, rinse with a quart of brandy, putting the brandy afterwards into the ullage cask. Then strain the lees or bottoms through a flannel or linen bag. But put the bottoms of Port into the ullage-cask without going through the filtering-bag. In racking wine that is not on the stillage, a wine-pump is desirable.
If wanting in body, color and flavor, draw out 30 or 40 galls. and return the same quantity of young and rich wines. To a can of which put 3 gills of coloring, with a bottle of wine or brandy. Then whisk it well together and put it into the cask stirring it well. If not bright in about a week or ten days, fine it for use; previous to which put in at different times a gallon of good brandy. If the wine is short of body put a gallon or two of brandy in each pipe, by a quart or two at a time, as it feeds the wine better than putting it in all at once. But if the wines are in a bonded cellar, procure a funnel that will go to the bottom of the cask, that the brandy may be completely incorporated with the wine.
Claret is not a wine of a strong body, though it requires to be of a good age before it is used, and therefore it should be well managed; the best method is to feed it every 2 or 3 weeks with a pint or two of French brandy. Taste it frequently, to know what state it is in, and use the brandy accordingly; but never put much in at a time, while a little incorporates with the wine and feeds and mellows it.
If the claret is faint, rack it into a fresh emptied hogshead, upon the lees of good claret, and bung it up, putting the bottom downwards for two or three days, that the lees may run through it.
If the color be not yet perfect, rack it off again into a hogshead that has been newly drawn off, with the lees, then take 1 lb. of turnsole and put it into a gallon or two of wine; let it lie a day or two, and then put it into the vessel; after which lay the bung downwards for a night, and the next day roll it about.
Or, take any quantity of damsons or black sloes, and strew them with some of the deepest colored wine and as much sugar as will make it into a syrup. A pint of this will cover a hogshead of claret. It is also good for red Port wines, and may be kept ready for use in glass bottles.
Rack it off from the dregs on some fresh lees of its own kind, and then take a dozen of new pipping, pare them and take away the cores or hearts; then put them in the hogshead, and if that is not sufficient, take a handful of the oak of Jerusalem and bruise it, then put it into the wine and stir it well.
Put into l qt. of Claret or Port 2 qts. of sloes; bake them in a gentle oven, or over a slow fire, till a good part of their moisture is stewed out; then pour off the liquor, and squeeze out the rest. A pint of this will be sufficient for 30 or 40 galls.
Red Hermitage must be managed in the same way as Claret, and the White likewise, except the coloring, which it does not require. Burgundy should be managed in the same manner as Red Hermitage.
If the Lisbon is dry, take out of the pipe 35 or 40 galls., and put in the same quantity of calcavella; stir it well about, and this will make a pipe of good mild Lisbon; or, if it be desired to convert mild into dry, Take the same quantity out as above mentioned before, and fill the pipe with Malaga Sherry, stirring it about as the other. The same kind of fining used for Vidonia will answer for Lisbon wine or it may be fined with the whites and shells of 16 eggs, and a small handful of salt; beat it together to a froth, and mix it with a little of the wine, then pour it into the pipe, stir it about, and let it have vent for 3 days; after which bung it up, and in a few days it will be fine. Lisbon, when bottled, should be packed either in saw-dust or leaths in a temperate place.
If the Sherry be new and hot, rack it off into a sweet cask, add 5 galls. of mellow Lisbon, which will take off the hot taste, then give it a head, take 1 qt. of honey, mix it with a can of wine, and put it into the cask when racking. By this method Sherry for present use will be greatly improved, having much the same effect upon it as age.
If the wine have an unpleasant taste, rack off onehalf, and to the remainder add 1 gall. of new milk, a handful of bay-salt, and as much rice; after which take a staff, beat them well together for half an hour, and fill up the cask, and when rolled well about, stillage it, and in a few days it will be much improved.
If the white wine is foul and has lost its color, for a butt or pipe take 1 gall. of new milk, put it into the cask, and stir it well about with a staff, and when it has settled, put in 3 oz. of isinglass made into a jelly, with 1/4 lb. of loaf sugar scraped fine, and stir it well about. On the day following, bung it up, and in a few days it will be fine, and have a good color.
Add a little chalk to the must, when it is somewhat sour; for the acidity arising from citric and tartaric acids, there is thus formed a precipitate of citrate and tartrate of lime, while the must becomes sweeter, and yields a much finer wine. Too much chalk may render the wine insipid, since it is proper to leave a little excess of acid in the must. Concentrate the must by boiling, and add the pro per quantity of chalk to the liquor, while it is still hot. Even acid wine may be benefited by the addition of chalk. Oyster shells may be used with this view, and when calcined are a cleaner carbonate of lime than common chalk.
Wines on the fret should be racked; if their own lee indicates decay they should be racked on the sound lee of another wine of similar but stronger quality, to protract their decline; if this be done at an early period, it may renovate the sick wine; on these occasions giving the sick wine a cooler place will retard its progress to acidity; if convenient, such wines should be forced and bottled. Previous to bottling, or rather at the forcing, give it 1, 2, or 3 tablespoonfuls of calcined gypsum finely pulverized. This will check its tendency to acidity, without exciting much in tumescence, without injuring the color of the red wine and without retarding its coating to the bottle, which it rather promotes. The proper forcing for red wines are, the whites of 10 or 12 eggs, beat up with l or 2 teaspoonfuls of salt, per hogshead, and well worked into the wine with a forcing-rod; the gypsum should be first boiled in a little water.
Cover the orifices of the vessels containing it with bladder closely fastened instead of the usual materials, and an aqueous exhalation will pass through the bladder, leaving some fine crystallization on the surface of the wine, which, when skimmed off, leaves the wine in a highly improved state of flavor. Remnants of wine covered in this manner, whether in bottles or casks, will not turn mouldy as when stopped in the usual way, but will be improved instead of being deteriorated.
Put a small quantity of powdered charcoal in the wine, shake it, and after it has remained still for 48 hours decant steadily.
If any kind of wine be exposed to a sufficient degree of cold in frosty weather, or be put into any place where ice continues all the year, as in ice-houses, and there suffered to freeze, the superfluous water contained in the wine will be frozen into ice and will leave the proper and truly essential part of the wine unbroken, unless the degree of cold should be very intense, or the wine but weak and poor. When the frost is moderate, the experiment has no difficulty, because not above a third or a fourth part of the superfluous water will be frozen in a whole night; but if the cold be very intense, the best way is, at the end of a few hours, when a tolerable quantity of ice is formed, to pour out the remaining fluid liquor, and set it in another vessel to freeze again by itself.
The frozen part, or ice, consists only of the watery part of the wine, and maybe thrown away, and the liquid part retains all the strength, and is to be preserved. This will never grow sour, musty, or mouldy, and may at any time be reduced to wine of the common strength, by adding to it as much water as will make it up the former quantity.
Put 4 oz. of turnsole rags into an earthen vessel, and pour upon them a pint of boiling water; cover the vessel close, and leave it to cool, strain off the liquor, which will be of a fine deep red, inclining to purple. A small portion of this colors a large quantity of wine. This tincture may either be made in brandy, or mixed with it, or else made into a syrup, with sugar, for keeping.
In those countries which do not produce the tingeing grape which affords a blood-red juice, wherewith the wines of France are often stained, in defect of this the juice of elderberries is used, and sometimes logwood is used at Oporto.
Put a few qts. of skimmed milk into the cask.
If a few quarts of well-skimmed milk be put to a hogshead of red wine, it will soon precipitate the greater part of the color, and leave the whole nearly white, and this is of known use in turning red wines, when pricked, into white; in which a small degree of acidity is not so much perceived.
Milk is, from this quality of discharging color from wines, of use also to the wine-coopers, for the whitening of wines that have acquired a brown color from the cask, or from having been hastily boiled before fermenting; for the addition of a little skimmed milk, in these cases, precipitates the brown color, and leaves the wines almost limpid, or of what they call a water whiteness, which is much coveted abroad in wines as well as in brandies.
Take a pint of wheat and boil it in a quart of water till it bursts and becomes soft; then squeeze through a linen cloth, and put a pint of the liquor into a hogshead of unsettled white wine; stir it well about, and it will become fine.
Melt some brimstone, and dip into it a piece of coarse linen cloth, of which, when cold, take a piece of about 1 inch broad and 5 inches long, and set fire to it, putting it into the bung-hole, with one end fastened under the bung, which must be driven in very tight. Let it remain a few hours before removing it out.
Get some fresh oyster-shells, wash them, and scrape off the yellow part from the outside; lay them on a clear fire till they become red-hot; then lay them to cool, and take off the softest part, powder it, and sift it through a fine sieve; after which use it immediately, or keep it in bottles well corked up and laid in a dry place.
This bag is made of a yard of either linen or flannel, not too fine or close, and sloping, so as to have the bottom of it run to a point, and the top as broad as the cloth will allow. It must be well sewed up the side, and the upper part of it folded round a wooden hoop, and well fastened to it; then tie the hoop in three or four places with a cord to support it, and when used, put a can or pail under it to receive the liquor, filling the bag with the sediments; after it has ceased to run, wash out the bag in three or four clear waters, then hang it up to dry in an airy place, that it may not get musty. A wine-dealer should always have two bags by him, one for red and the other for white wines.
Wine merchants add alum to red wine to communicate to it a rough taste and deeper color. For the discovery of the fraud in question adopt the following means: - The wine is to be discolored by means of a concentrated solution of chlorine; the mixture is to be evaporated until reduced to nearly the fourth of its original volume; the liquor is to be filtered; it then possesses the following properties when it contains alum: - 1st, it has a sweetish, astringent taste; 2d, it furnishes a white precipitate (sulphate of baryta) with nitrate of baryta, insoluble in water and in nitric acid; 3d, caustic potash gives rise to a yellowish white precipitate of alumina, soluble in an excess of potash.
Add a few drops of sulphydrate of ammonia. If a precipitate is formed the wine is impure. Lead is used by many wine merchants to give an astringency to port wine, that, like old port, it may appear rough to the tongue. Sometimes they hang a sheet of lead in the cask; at others they pour in a solution of acetate (sugar) of lead, for the purpose of sweetening, as they term it.
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