If you’ve been following us on Twitter, you know I’ve been trying to recreate my legendary Parsnip wine which put North Wales to sleep in 2006. You’ll also have read that it hasn’t been plain sailing…
I dug up the last of the parsnips on the allotment. They were massive. And there was tons of them – more than a man could reasonably eat in six months. The obvious solution was to brew with them but due to my mysteriously lack of demijohns (I still think Fendog nabbed them), I was only able to make a single gallon batch and had to compost the rest.
But the problems didn’t stop there! Having not brewed for so long, the only wine yeast I had was seriously out of date. I put in extra to try and compensate but no joy. After a day or two in the bucket, there was still no action. Desperate times call for desperate measures and so I added some of the yeast I use for the bread maker. I put in more than I intended but was reassured a few hours later when fermentation had clearly begun.
I came downstairs the next morning and was greeted by the most delicious smell of freshly-baked bread. Worryingly, it was was the parsnip wine! It was the weirdest thing. Thankfully, a few days later the bready aroma was replaced by the more reassuring odour of rotting vegetables and I strained it into a demijohn.
I thought all was well now, but unfortunately fermentation appeared to stop soon after it went in the demijohn. I wonder if the bread yeast was not as tolerant to alcohol as wine yeast? Anyway, having by now obtained some of the latter, I removed the airlock and added a spoonful. Big mistake. The liquid fizzed up and our for the demijohn like when you drop a Mento in Diet Coke. It was amazing, but messy.
Well, I fitted a clean airlock and now its bubbling away. Now I am just waiting for the next disaster.