by gregtpayne | Feb 2, 2017 | Uncategorized
21g of Tie Kwan Yin. 2 steeps in 6 cups of water for 10 minutes each, stirring halfway through. One cup of sugar and we’re off for a week or fermentation.
We harvested tbis on 2/9. One batch was a little stronger than the other so we flavored that one with 1/4 cup of fresh blueberry puree and a 6:1 mix of sugar to cinnamon. The weaker batch we flavored with 1/2 tbsp of sugar. We’ll check the blueberry cinnamon in 2 days and the plain in 5.
by gregtpayne | Jan 30, 2017 | Uncategorized
21g of Tie Kwan Yin. 2 steeps in 6 cups of water for 10 minutes each, stirring halfway through. One cup of sugar and we’re off for a week or fermentation.
We harvested this on 2/2 after 8 days. That extra day seems to make it too strong but it wasn’t too bad. We flavored one batch with 1/4 cup of fresh pressed apple juice and 1/2 tbsp of 6:1 sugar and cinnamon. The other batch we left plain and flavored it with 1/2 tsp of sugar. I’ll check the apple in two days and the plain in 4.
by gregtpayne | Jan 18, 2017 | Uncategorized
This week we made the usual two batches with 21 grams of Tie Kwan Yin tea each. We did two 10 minute steeps with 6 cups of water each, stirring midway through.
We harvested this on 1/25. Batch A turned out stronger than batch B for some reason even though it had less SCOBY. Had we tried both before bottling batch A (note to self) we probably would have done this the other way around but we flavored batch A with just 1/2 tsp of sugar and batch B with 1/4 cup of fresh pressed apple juice and a 1/2 tsp of a 6:1 sugar:cinnamon ratio (3 tbsp sugar, 1/2 tbsp cinnamon). We’ll check the apple in a couple of days and the plain in 5.
by gregtpayne | Jan 11, 2017 | Uncategorized
We did this a little different than last time. This time we did a first steep of 15 minutes, stirring mid-way through. Followed by a second steep of 7 minutes. Still using 21 grams of Tie Kwan Yin tea.
We harvested this on 1/18. It was fizzy and not very sweet. Another day would have been too much. We are flavoring batch A with 1/2 tbsp of a mixture of 6:1 sugar to cinnamon ratio (3 tbsp sugar, 1/2 tbsp sugar) and 1/4 cup of fresh pressed apple juice. Batch B we made plain with 1/2 tsp of sugar.
We moved the Apple Pie after only 2 days and it turned out great! We just moved the plain tonight after 7 days and I’m afraid we waited too long. We’ll see tomorrow.
by gregtpayne | Jan 4, 2017 | Uncategorized
This is Babs Happy Buch! Our new method of brewing was producing a very strong nute (nutrition for the SCOBY) so we reduced it to 21 grams. This is the amount we were originally using for Oolong but we were doing a longer steep of 6 cups diluted with water. This new method should yield about the same results, two 6 cup, 15 minutes steeps, but we’ll see. We’re going to check this after six days. This is turning out to be a cold winter and we’re running our heater a lot. This makes for a much warmer fermenting environment on the top shelf of our upstairs closet which shortens fermentation time, for both first and second fermentations.
Batch A seemed a little sweeter than batch B. I forget which had more SCOBY, probably B. So we added 1/2 tbsp of sugar for bottles #51-54. For bottles #61-65 we added 1 tbsp of sugar. #65 is a blend of batch A and B. We thinned the SCOBY families for both batches to about an inch each.
by gregtpayne | Dec 28, 2016 | Uncategorized
I used the new method of two 15 minute steeps of 1 oz of tea in 6 cups of water at 195 degrees. This is our house favorite tea, Tie Kwan Yin. We steeped 1 oz of loose leaf tea at 195 degrees twice, using 6 cups of water for each steep. We used 11 cups of tea, 1 cup of sugar and 1 1/4 cup of starter buch. As usual we made 2 gallons.
We harvested this on 1/4 but I think it was a day late. It was a bit strong and not sweet at all. We flavored it with 1 tbsp of sugar and 1/4 of concord grape juice. We’ll check it after only 3 days (usually grape takes 5) and we need to start checking the first fermentation at six days. This’ll be a strong batch but hopefully still good.
We refrigerated the grape after 2 1/2 days because it seemed explosive. This batch didn’t turn out so good. I think because it was too strong when we bottled it and we did a short 2nd fermentation to compensate. The results while not bad, were not up to our standard. I’ll try to keep a closer eye on the temperature of the fermentation environments.
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