And to be perfectly honest with you, if I were Trousers, I wouldn't be proposing an Arm Wrestling Match this evening.?!
Long gone are the days when someone gave you a bottle of homemade wine, and you dreaded the day when you had to open it in front of them and pretend to enjoy it......
I never EVER imagined in my wildest dreams that one day I would ever attempt to make wine. I thought it would be way too difficult, and far too complicated for my Pooh Bear Brain, (I sometimes do myself down?) and here I am, courage in my own hands, perfectly achieving that, understanding how it works, and that's exactly why I'm here telling you about it. If you're a little shy of trying it yourself, please, stick with me, and I promise you that I'll improve your confidence so that you feel as able to do this as I do, because these kits now SO emulate the real deal, and if you love wine, you'll profit to your hearts' content..
No disrespect to Miss Piggy or Kermie, but you'd have to be a complete MUPPET these days not to succeed.
Today, in Wellie's Kitchen, I'm bottling my very first attempt at Pinot Grigio, from a dead easy wine kit. Getting myself used to the process, procedure and equipment. And to be perfectly honest, I was setting myself up to 'cock it up' on a grand scale - just in cases....?
Allegedly, you'd want to be fermenting at 'above ambient room temperature'. I'm not sure what yours' would be, but our room temperature didn't even top 18c when I started, with no central heating, so I left it to ferment twice as long as was specified, testing the gravity until it fell below 1,000 and eventually tasted it with a spoon and it was gorgeously dry!
Once I'd got the confidence of the Pinot Grigio (Cantina 5-day 21 litre - http://www.hambletonbard.com/), and the 135 freebie bottles & screwtops from the lovely Ragmans Lane Farm peeps washed and sterilised within an inch of their lives, if you look beyond Wellie in the first photo, you'll spy 23 litres of Yarrawanga Creek Australian Blend Cabernet Sauvignon (http://www.vinland.se/) fermenting like a good'un with the heat from the Rayburn now at 23c.
I'm wanting to draw your attention to the wine rack that Trousers rather reluctantly put together for me this afternoon Children, because I bought it in 'kit form' for him today, and all he had to do was put it together with the help of the Destruction Manual. Well..... I'm here to tell you that the array of swear-words, the foul language and cussing, was quite alarming. Such that I wished I'd covered the cat's ears, and put it together myself.
Trousers will hate me for drawing your attention to this, but I'd just like to show you one of my Wellie Workshops: Can YOU spot Wellie's homemade Herb & Spice Rack in a previous blog Kids?
Put together with a well thought out and measured approach: measure the height and width of the jars PLUS room to grab the jar off the shelf with your pinkies. Make the shelves level and the whole thing attractive, in a cool, dark corner of the kitchen, but prom enough to be enjoyed visually to want to use.
Marks out of ten Gordon?!
With Trousers and I having 'pushed each other to the limit' today, and each of us having thrown each others' teddies out of a number of prams Children, I chose to do something special for him this evening, because I adore him, and I've been threatening to do this for years just because I love him: and that's to make him some homemade Ginger Beer.
He absolutely ADORES Ginger Beer.
If I can get it to explode in the same room as him in the next week Children, I shall be a very proud woman..? But don't quote me on that, right?
Keep Safe, Keep Warm, and I'll see you next time.X.
No comments:
Post a Comment