Lemmitor @A_[email protected] in this community tipped that if the process serves and luck is on one's side, fermented birch sap can be better than champagne. Right now is the time when sap can be collected, so I'm giving it a shot!
The tree isn't terribly bothered, the tap hole is only a few millimeters deep. I only do one tap per tree.
Plan is to empty these tap bottles off several trees once a day into an intermediate container, use a Campden tablet per container and keep the intermediates in the fridge until I have enough, five liters maybe? Then one liter yeast starter, possibly with some cane sugar to lend a little extra aroma and colour (the sap is clear). Ferment fingers crossed. Serve force carbonated. Wish mi luck :D
А целиком рецепт можно, хотелось бы тоже попробовать сделать такую штуку
By all means! If you can read my English...:
The nice thing about fermenting birch sap is that it naturally comes with nutrients for yeast to thrive, unlike regular wine juice. So no need to use yeast nutrient. But there is not a huge deal of sugar in it, so that needs to be added.
I gathered about 6 liters of sap over a couple of days. Emptied the bottles from trees into five liter containers every day and put in a Campden tablet to stop wild yeasts from messing with my magic. Stored in a fridge until I had enough to start fermenting.
Then I boiled 2 liters of water to sanitise it; dissolved 1 dl of syrup to provide extra sugar and hence extra alcohol in the finished product; let it cool to room temperature and added yeast to this container and let the yeast start making bubbles.
Then just poured the sap and yeast starter in the fermentation vessel with an airlock on. Let it ferment for the couple of days it bubbled. Then put the fermentation vessel in the fridge for a couple of days to clear out the yeast – it sinks to the bottom and the 'wine' ends up nice and clear (clearer than the photo I took, it eventually got perfectly clear).
To make it bubbly I used a Sodastream thing :D It was good also without carbonation.
Easy and really good stuff! Go for it :)
I heard that birch sap can be concentrated to get more sugar, but it should be low temperature distillation
Yeah - moderate temperature, huge surface area and plenty of air movement across the surface would bring best results. I'm absolutely doing this again next spring, aiming for 20 liters of sap so I can put my fancy fermentation setup to work. Was thinking of using two of those under-the-bed storage boxes to make an evaporating setup, having the lids on and feeding in air with an aquarium pump that has two outputs. I'd still add dark syrup for colour though.