[Northkeep] Blackberry Ratafia

[greddi66 at juno.com]

Here are a few answers to your questions:

>>>
Thinking ahead to Gulf war

Q: How much fruit will I be needing for each....5 gallon batch
maybe the first question should be...

*** In brewing, the fruit provides for flavor and it is the sugar that 
will be converted to alcohol, so it starts with a question on what 
fruit.

Q: will this work in Quantity, say 35 gallon trashcan full of smashed 
fruit, topped off with low grade alcohol, Shaking is not feasible, so 
I guess I could mix with a paddle for a month or so....then rack off  
and bottle?

*** Of course!  As long as the proportions are the same as a smaller 
batch it will work. But two more things need to be said here: Larger 
batches use larger containers, and containers not designed for brewing 
can allow for contamination.  Now the water-bearer/brewer in me needs 
to say clean & sterile!  Please do not use something previous used for 
non-food use (i.e.: trashcan that HELD trash or an oar that was in the 
river {ick!}).


Q: How much home brew can you transport across state lines before it 
is considered Bootlegging?

***  I want to say this carefully: If it has a controlled substance 
(alcohol included) it can be considered as illegal at ANY amount, but 
doesn't really matter so much about the alcohol but more about the 
state getting its taxes.  Mundanely in our recent history, traffickers 
where charged with what?  Tax evasion.  {problem: No tax stamps as 
proof of payment of taxes}.

Q: Any guesses on how honey added at the start would effect the 
outcome?

*** Going back and adding the statement "...topped off with low grade 
alcohol...” a question of what is desired effect you are hoping for 
comes forward.  Basic brewing yields a concentration of alcohol of 
mostly less than 20%.  Yeast dies/goes dormant when the concentration 
gets to high for it and more effort is required to get it to the 
higher of that range.  So back to your question, if the concentration 
of alcohol is very low and have a lot of head room left before say 15% 
then the sugars in the honey will ferment into more alcohol till the 
yeast goes dormant.  If you add enough so the entire batch is already 
over 15% (7.5 proof) then the sugars in the honey go towards 
sweetening the mixture.  

It has been a while since higher math but here goes:

(% concentration [fruit mixture = near zero] times volume) plus (% 
concentration of blending alcohol times its volume) equals the new 
percentage.  

Someone with more recent algebra skills on setting up equations can 
build & convert to a more usable format that allows you to plug into 
that formula the desired resulting % of alcohol using a certain % of 
commercial produced alcohol and get the result of how much of it you 
need to reach.

example for thought: 34 gals of mix to 1 gal of 180 proof (90%) equals 
35 gals @ 2.57% or less than Oklahoma beer at 3.20% and in this 
example the honey and fruit could fermintate and further increase the 
percentage, but that is another mathematical formula. . .lol.


Angus
<<<

Renault
Pre-apprentice Brewer

{sorry for the bad grammer & spelling, lousy web-based checker}



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