Between one gallon and two (rhubarb, ginger, honey)

I have started some brew.  I steeped rhubarb and root ginger in honey and a bit of white sugar for three days until a load of juice had been pulled out of the rhubarb.  I've strained it and added water to bring it down to the "start wine" level on the hydrometer, and added some yeast.  It's back in the bucket with the lid just cracked until it starts working.

My problem is, there is going to be more than a gallon, but not as much as two.  I hate waste.  So when I have siphoned off a demijohn-full, what to do with the remaining portion?

I have a vague idea of adding apple juice, getting it working again, and then setting up another demijohn with that.  It will be neither wine nor mead nor cider, but would this be a feasible method to create something nice?

Hester Winterbourne wrote:
My problem is, there is going to be more than a gallon, but not as much as two.  I hate waste.  So when I have siphoned off a demijohn-full, what to do with the remaining portion?
 It will be neither wine nor mead nor cider, but would this be a feasible method to create something nice?

The lees (dead yeast) can be compacted or fluffy this can change what remains. Adding clarifying aids can help but time also helps too. Siphoning can be more of an art that an science, one key is to stop before the lees get up the siphon. I think that rhubarb, ginger and honey would go well together. Could you post the recipe you used? Also what was the starting gravity?

T Blankinship wrote:

Hester Winterbourne wrote:
My problem is, there is going to be more than a gallon, but not as much as two.  I hate waste.  So when I have siphoned off a demijohn-full, what to do with the remaining portion?
 It will be neither wine nor mead nor cider, but would this be a feasible method to create something nice?

The lees (dead yeast) can be compacted or fluffy this can change what remains. Adding clarifying aids can help but time also helps too. Siphoning can be more of an art that an science, one key is to stop before the lees get up the siphon. I think that rhubarb, ginger and honey would go well together. Could you post the recipe you used? Also what was the starting gravity?

The recipe called for 2.3kg of rhubarb, 1.4kg of sugar, and a couple of inches of ginger root.  We had to work out how much sugar there is in honey.  It was steeped for three days.  We added water until the specific gravity was 85.

So you make a good point about not disturbing the lees, I think we will prepare two demijohns when the time comes and siphon everything off rather than just filling one and then adding apple juice into the remaining liquid in the bucket.   It smells wonderful at the moment - no one flavour dominating.  The recipe also called for adding a mug of strong black tea at some point but having consulted with someone who makes very good mead, he said not to bother.

 

Have people over?

Hester Winterbourne wrote:
The recipe called for 2.3kg of rhubarb, 1.4kg of sugar, and a couple of inches of ginger root.  We had to work out how much sugar there is in honey.  It was steeped for three days.  We added water until the specific gravity was 85.

So you make a good point about not disturbing the lees, I think we will prepare two demijohns when the time comes and siphon everything off rather than just filling one and then adding apple juice into the remaining liquid in the bucket.   It smells wonderful at the moment - no one flavour dominating.  The recipe also called for adding a mug of strong black tea at some point but having consulted with someone who makes very good mead, he said not to bother.

1.085 starting gravity? I have a program called Beer Smith and it has a lot of tools. One of the tools is attenuation and percent alcohol. If your mead has a final gravity of 1.000 it would be about 11% alcohol by volume. My father and I have made mead in the past. If we wanted to add tannins like those found in tea we added oak.  Chips or cubes is how I have used them.

T Blankinship wrote:

Hester Winterbourne wrote:
The recipe called for 2.3kg of rhubarb, 1.4kg of sugar, and a couple of inches of ginger root.  We had to work out how much sugar there is in honey.  It was steeped for three days.  We added water until the specific gravity was 85.

So you make a good point about not disturbing the lees, I think we will prepare two demijohns when the time comes and siphon everything off rather than just filling one and then adding apple juice into the remaining liquid in the bucket.   It smells wonderful at the moment - no one flavour dominating.  The recipe also called for adding a mug of strong black tea at some point but having consulted with someone who makes very good mead, he said not to bother.

1.085 starting gravity? I have a program called Beer Smith and it has a lot of tools. One of the tools is attenuation and percent alcohol. If your mead has a final gravity of 1.000 it would be about 11% alcohol by volume. My father and I have made mead in the past. If we wanted to add tannins like those found in tea we added oak.  Chips or cubes is how I have used them.

Yes, my hydrometer tells me the potential alcohol as well as the starting gravity, and that was about what it said.  So the latest update is that the brew has finally started working strongly in the bucket.  Nail biting times since Monday wondering if it was ever going to take off or if it would be spoiled.  We added a second starter of yeast, we were so worried, by starting it in a some warm apple juice first.  But we now have a frothy bubbling scum on top.  Interstingly, I found the instruction sheet to the hydrometer which was talking about sweet wines and said something about adding sugar gradually or it would be too strong for the new yeast colony.  You couldn't do that with the recipe I was working on, and it would take some maths to work out who much sugar you needed to add overall instead of getting it just right to start with and then letting it get on with it.

Still smells lovely!