Monday, July 14 - Paul is not a great fan of sitting around doing nothing. So with time on his hands, he decided to re-visit a former hobby – wine making. He used to make quite a bit of wine, but traveling in an RV isn't exactly the best environment for making wine. He has about a six-week window of opportunity to make wine from a wine kit. That way, he can bottle it before we hit the road.
We went to Akron to a very good wine making supply company, The Grape and Granary. They have just about anything a wine or beer maker needs. They even have a nice tasting room. We tasted various choices before deciding on our wine making kits.
We went “all in” and chose three kits. Two semi-dry Rieslings (Columbia Valley Riesling and Green Apple Riesling) and a very nice semi-dry red wine (Luna Rossa).
Lucky for the wallet, Paul has been receiving gift cards for the wine store, and other wine making supplies for Christmas and his birthday. So he was able to get back in to wine making without breaking the bank. Like all hobbies, it cost money to have fun.... :-)
The first order of business is to prepare the ingredients for fermenting. Following the directions provided in the kit makes this a fool proof undertaking. After adding the contents to the fermenting tank, Paul added some water and then the yeast. Ahhh...that sure made the basement smell good!
The wine fermented for seven days in the tanks, and then Paul transferred it to an air-tight carboy (a 5-gallon glass jug) where it will remain until the fermentation is complete. He will need to “rack it” (transfer it to a clean carboy) several times to eliminate any solids that have settled to the bottom.
It is working already.
Once the wine stops working, he can bottle it and store it until we fly home for the Christmas holidays. Should be a fun holiday!
We will make our apologies ahead of time. We might not be leaving as many comments as we usually do. Why? you ask….This is Wedding Week. Marsha and Kelly finished up all the planning for the week on Sunday. They both have a list for each day. Carrie will be flying in on Wednesday. A few things still on their list are buying flip-flops for when their feet are killing them (around 9 p.m.) they can keep dancing, food for the “after” wedding party on Sunday, double checking with all those involved in the decorating, and church ceremony, etc., etc., etc. Wedding photos in the next blog.
Thanks for stopping by. Hope you to see y’all back real soon. Have a great day!
