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Date: 19 Sep 2007 23:08:01
From: ant
Subject: alcoholic coca-cola?!
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OK, just trying to wrap my brain around this stuff, and reading the
winemaking site.
So, if you can hurl some yeast into warm juice and get wine, why can't you
do the same with, say, coke?
I'm sure there must be a reason why you can't, but I can't think what it
might be. Other than maybe it'd taste horrible.
--
ant
Don't try to reply to my email addy:
I'm borrowing that of the latest
scammer/spammer
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Date: 20 Sep 2007 01:00:16
From: Dick Adams
Subject: alcoholic coca-cola?!
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> OK, just trying to wrap my brain around this stuff, and
> reading the winemaking site. So, if you can hurl some
> yeast into warm juice and get wine, why can't you do the
> same with, say, coke? I'm sure there must be a reason
> why you can't, but I can't think what it might be. Other
> than maybe it'd taste horrible.
Coke, Pepsi, and other carbonated sodas are loaded with
preservatives. Only thing you can do with them is to
add rum or some other spirits.
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Date: 19 Sep 2007 13:23:42
From: Randall Nortman
Subject: Re: alcoholic coca-cola?!
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On 2007-09-19, ant <claimsagent_directives@yahoo.co.uk > wrote:
> OK, just trying to wrap my brain around this stuff, and reading the
> winemaking site.
> So, if you can hurl some yeast into warm juice and get wine, why can't you
> do the same with, say, coke?
> I'm sure there must be a reason why you can't, but I can't think what it
> might be. Other than maybe it'd taste horrible.
The preservatives would probably inhibit the yeast, and you'd also
have to get some oxygen in there as I suspect there isn't much as it's
bottled.
But in principle, it is not hard to make things alcoholic. Nature is
doing it all around us, all the time. Carbohydrate + yeast = alcohol.
(And there are even organisms other than yeast that make alcohol.) It
happens in bread dough -- also known as solid beer. You could just as
easily ferment plain old sugar water. If you then distilled it, that
would be called rum.
Making fermented things that taste good is where the complexity tends
to come in, but it is actually very hard to go wrong with any fruit
juices if you leave some residual sugars in there. (I.e., refrigerate
and drink it before fermentation runs out.) Making something that
tastes good fermented to dryness is not guaranteed. Making a
well-balanced dry wine that ages well takes some care and planning.
Making a large volume of well-balanced dry wine that ages well and
tolerates crappy storage conditions in warehouses, shipping, store
shelves, and restaurant pantries, while still tasting identical from
one bottle to the next -- that is art and science.
Or you can "hurl yeast into warm juice", wait a few days, put it in
the fridge for a week or two longer ("lagering" of sorts -- optional),
and then drink it, and it will be pretty tasty.
BTW, in one of your previous posts you mentioned trying to find
unpasteurized juice. I don't think that's necessary if you're going
to be adding yeast, only if you wanted the wild yeasts from the fruit
to do the job. What you need is juice without preservatives, which is
more likely to be pasteurized.
--
Randall
Science teachers should really be covering this stuff.
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Date: 19 Sep 2007 23:40:53
From: ant
Subject: Re: alcoholic coca-cola?!
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Randall Nortman wrote:
> On 2007-09-19, ant <claimsagent_directives@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>> OK, just trying to wrap my brain around this stuff, and reading the
>> winemaking site.
>> So, if you can hurl some yeast into warm juice and get wine, why
>> can't you do the same with, say, coke?
>> I'm sure there must be a reason why you can't, but I can't think
>> what it might be. Other than maybe it'd taste horrible.
>
> The preservatives would probably inhibit the yeast, and you'd also
> have to get some oxygen in there as I suspect there isn't much as it's
> bottled.
>
> But in principle, it is not hard to make things alcoholic. Nature is
> doing it all around us, all the time. Carbohydrate + yeast = alcohol.
> (And there are even organisms other than yeast that make alcohol.) It
> happens in bread dough -- also known as solid beer. You could just as
> easily ferment plain old sugar water. If you then distilled it, that
> would be called rum.
>
> Making fermented things that taste good is where the complexity tends
> to come in, but it is actually very hard to go wrong with any fruit
> juices if you leave some residual sugars in there. (I.e., refrigerate
> and drink it before fermentation runs out.) Making something that
> tastes good fermented to dryness is not guaranteed. Making a
> well-balanced dry wine that ages well takes some care and planning.
> Making a large volume of well-balanced dry wine that ages well and
> tolerates crappy storage conditions in warehouses, shipping, store
> shelves, and restaurant pantries, while still tasting identical from
> one bottle to the next -- that is art and science.
>
> Or you can "hurl yeast into warm juice", wait a few days, put it in
> the fridge for a week or two longer ("lagering" of sorts -- optional),
> and then drink it, and it will be pretty tasty.
>
> BTW, in one of your previous posts you mentioned trying to find
> unpasteurized juice. I don't think that's necessary if you're going
> to be adding yeast, only if you wanted the wild yeasts from the fruit
> to do the job. What you need is juice without preservatives, which is
> more likely to be pasteurized.
ah ha. that makes it clearer.
I guess just getting to and putting yeast into a bunch of stuff would teach
me what happens next, but it's useful to find out this way.
The idea of getting stuck into the fermented juice before it's got too old
is interesting... when there's still sugar in it.
Time to give this a go I reckon.
--
ant
Don't try to reply to my email addy:
I'm borrowing that of the latest
scammer/spammer
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