5/2/25 (Day 1)
1 Gallon Spring Water
32 oz Knudsen Black Cherry juice
32 oz Knudsen Tart Cherry juice
12 oz frozen raspberries
24 oz Frozen Sweet Cherries
2 Black Tea bags
1 oz Mexican Hibiscus
1 oz TeaJitsu Cherry Tea
2 lbs honey (I forget what I used)
Mangrove Jacks Mead yeast
Brewed the black tea, hibiscus and cherry tea in coffee pot with 6 cups of water. Then I poured it back in and ran it through again so it’s double brewed tea. I was strong.
Thawed the fruit and added to mesh bag for easy removal. NOT DOWN THE DRAIN!!!!
Mixed the ingredients in bucket and pitched dry yeast.
Somehow I failed to get a starting gravity reading. I think it was 1.080 so it won’t be super strong.
5/10/24 (Day 8)
S.G. = 1.002. It’s thin but very tasty. Not hot at all. This one isn’t going to last long at all.
5/24/24 (Day 23)
Racked off berries and yeast to 2 gallon carboy.
1/2 tsp metabisulphite
1/2 tsp sorbate
It’s stable!!!
6/19/24 (Day 49)
Racked into single gallon carboys. I got just a little over 1 1/2 gallons. Added 6oz (weight) of honey to back sweeten to 1.018. It’s perfect!! I mean really really good. I added 1 campden tablet per gallon. Gonna let that set for a week then bottle this bad boy!!! This will be about a 10.6% ABV.
7/5/24
Bottled this beast today and already can’t wait to start drinking it.