Saturday, July 28, 2012

Pineapple Coconut Melomel Racking - NOT FUN

So, it was time to rack the melomel off of the coconut as I needed to 6 gallon carboy to brew a Strawberry Wit Beer.

Initially I thought that a section of pantyhose would work well as a filter.  Nope.  The small mesh size just clogged up.  So I abandoned that idea and just went for the racking cane tip.... Nope. That clogged up as well.

By then I was getting a little pissed and decided to sanitize a fruit bag and stuff it down the neck of the destination carboy.  I also sanitized a big funnel and performed what I think may have  been a mistake.  I ended up just pouring the melomel into the funnel and letting the fruit bag filter out the coconut that made it into the pour.

Needless to say, this was quite a rough way to handle the mead and I hope I don't pay for it later.  There was a good deal of SO2 in the mead but I'm not sure what impact today will have.

Also, I ended up not being able to get the bag out of the carboy.  Too much coconut made it in.  I ended up tying off the bad and I'm going to let it sit in there until the mead drops clear and I rack it for the last time.  At least it is in a bag so I shouldn't have any problem with the racking later.

****NOTE***** The next time I do coconut (And I will because my sample taste was AWESOME) I must put the coconut in a bag.  DO NOT ADD COCONUT WITHOUT A FRUIT BAG!!!!




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