After like 3 years I was again brewing beer just for fun and not 2000l batch as my job or trying something on this small scale for my job (because I had a time and got the ingredients for free).
It is really experimental brew. I put 3,5l of grape juice (I think it is Veltlín variety) and will add some cherries there too. So let’s see how it will end up.
Nice setup!
My neighbour just got too large grapes crop this year and I took some (about a month ago). Juiced them (never tried this before), the juice was 1040, bumped it with honey to 1120 or so, pitched mead yeast, thus now I’m running a similar experiment!
This brew is only about the fruit. The beer is just simple decoction with Pilsen and Münich malts (~50/50) and just SAAZ hops, I call it leftover ALE just what was left from other brews. After I added the juice it got to 1045 OG so it isn’t even that strong.
It is bit strange right now for me because I got new hydrometer that is calibrated to density, but until now I mainly used °Bx/°P units and even got portable refractometer with both units so something I measured in one and some with other… The juice was ~15°Bx
Edit: I mean infusion not decoction
Refractometers start to be really off once you have fruit juice and ongoing fermentation. I use mine only to see if reading is changing over time, absolute value is easily off by 20-30 g/L
I know, it is really handy for checking OG then it gets skewed by alcohol. For bottling I use my hydrometer to be sure, I just don’t want bombs.
When you measure often you can correct it, but for me it isn’t worth it.