Open or closed fermentation

[Hutch-]

For those of you who've made a pear wash, have you used an open fermentation, or sealed with an airlock? I don't have access to a cider press otherwise I'd do straight pear juice, so I'm going to freeze 4 bushels and add only 5 lb. of sugar per bushel. After inverting the sugar, I'll pour the boiling liquid over the pears to kill of an remaining bacteria, then add 8 oz. lemon juice and yeast.

I frequently make wine from grapes where an open top fermentor is necessary to release gases and add oxygen, but I was told a sealed container works best for pears.

[goose eye]

what you workin it off in. garbage sacks gorcery sacks so forth an so on.
you gotta watch fruit cause of the drunkards flyin around. with corn ole boys
mite put wood an a rock cause it gonna work off so quick.
put the pears in a feed sack cause it aint no fun strainin what gonna be left
when it worked off

so im tole.

[Hutch-]

Using 32 gal. brutes to ferment in, maybe even 6 gal. buckets. good idea about the sack, I have some paint straining bags around some place.

[Fester]

Hutch, if you are able to check the pH of your fruit mash before you add the lemon juice that would be better. Adjust your recipe to "lemon juice as needed". If you drive the pH too low with the citric acid (lemon juice), the ferment can stall on you. I usually add a dab of lemon juice - about an ounce or so per 5 pounds of sugar - to the sugar water when I'm inverting it. I usually do OK with a wash pH of around 5 to 6. It really aint too critical unless it gets under 4. If the ferment starts really slow and then slows down more, that would be the first thing I'd check. If you adjust the pH, wait about 10 minutes or so after you stir it in to check the pH again. Others may disagree but cooking the fruit and all for a half hour would be better than just pouring boiling water on top. The wild critters in fruit can ruin your ferment and your good mood. Some use a few campden tablets a day before pitching the yeast to kill off the stray micro-bugs. Fruit seems to take longer to ferment out so it would be best to clean everything that touches your wash very well with a sanitizer (One Step or the like from the UBrew store or some bleach water - rinse well) and use a clean airlock. I really never take any of these extra steps unless I'm working with a fruit. And thats not typical for me because I like corn.
8 ounces of lemon juice does not sound like too much to me if you are making up about 30 gallons of wash or so. (I think 25 to 30 gallons of wash is the perfect amount to work with. It lets you put away about a case of finished booze -or more since you're also using some sugar- and gives you lots of tasty feints to use later.) Just trying to let you know one of the many ways I've managed to screw things up. Another way I managed that was by putting sanitizer in the airlock. If you push down on the fermenter lid just a little it will suck some liquid from your airlock into your wash and kill the yeast.

Good luck and let us know how this ferment turns out for you,
Fester

[Hutch-]

Thanks for the advice Fester. You hit my main concern, and that's bacteria spoiling the ferment. Since 200 lbs. of fruit is too much to boil for the amount of time I have, I'll go the campden tablet route.

[Hutch-]

I didn't have freezer space, so I ran whole pears through a garden shredder. Ended up with about 40 gal. of pear mush to which I added 30 lbs. of sugar (inverted) and 14 gal. of water. No sulfite or lemon juice. Split into 2 batches, I used baker's yeast in one, and champagne yeast in the other - both are fermenting at 69 F. I didn't get and SG reading to start, so I'll ferment out until the cap falls. I'll strain some juice at that point to see if it fermented to dryness.

Any thoughts on fermenting on or off the pulp, attempting to strain 56 gal. of wash is not appealing. I have a 10 gal. stainless boiler with a removable copper plate on the bottom to help with scorching, but I'm not sure it will be enough as it is an actual "plate" so it does not sit flat on the bottom. Heat source is large banjo burner with good control of the flame.

[goose eye]

you got a mess.
add pectic enzime an let it work off an setle an dip off just the liquid.

so im tole

[The Baker]

Thanks for the advice Fester. You hit my main concern, and that's bacteria spoiling the ferment. Since 200 lbs. of fruit is too much to boil for the amount of time I have, I'll go the campden tablet route.

Or you might try just some of it without all the sanitising and stuff and without adding any yeast.
Let the natural yeasts do the fermenting. That would have been the traditional way and it worked well with the apricot brandy I made.
Though I didn't get the cuts that good.

Of course you take a risk of the natural yeasts not being good ones but it must have usually worked out okay in the old days.

[Fester]

Very good point Mr Baker but that scares me a bit because I'm a control freak. The very thought of trusting unknowned bugs to work my ferment is more than I can take. I know it happens anyway, no mater what I do. But I try to minimize it. That method is for adventurous folks. Definately not for Chicken Hearted Fester.

[Hutch-]

UPDATE - after a few days of fermenting, I scooped the cap of the top leaving mostly juice as the fruit as broken down. I avoided pectic enzyme, reading somewhere on the board that it tends to produce excess methanol. So far so good, should be able to get an accurate hydrometer reading now. After settling, I'll strain and get a fairly clean wash to run.

[Dnderhead]

heres part of it--

The use of commercial pectic enzyme preparations does increase the methanol content of wines, though more so for red varieties. Though the use of these preparations increased the methanol content proportionately more for white varieties, the final methanol content is less than that for similarly treated red varieties. The use of these preparations increased the methanol content of red wines during the early stages of fermentation.

[goose eye]

if you was usein all juice i wouldnt use it but you aint. you tryin to break that mush down. aint no need to be in no hurry you gonna be there awhile.
got a question bout more/less. how much is that to the barel.

so im tole

[Fester]

yeah Hutch, I'm thinking you are in the same pickle I was in with an all-grain when it comes to seperating off the liquid for the still. I know you can do it but it will be lots of work. Like you, I wanted to get all the goodness from the ferment and if I discarded the "bulk" at the beginning then I knew I would lose so much. Maybe a lot more for your fruit than my corn.
But the coin is tossed now and you have decided on your course, fermenting "on the fruit" like I fermented "on the grain". At some time soon you must try to get the liquid, as much as possible, out of the fermenter. I still think that boiling a big burlap sack and pouring your ferment through it into another clean fermenter would be a good idea, as suggested above, to remove the bulk of the solids. Then allow that to finish/settle out. If that is not an option, consider a fining agent as suggested and then rack off into another vessel and allow it to work off for a few days and rack that into your boiler. At some point you must get the liquid into your still without the solids gumming up the guttyworks. Let me know your solution. Ain't nothing easy except a sugar wash in this hobby. Thats why we are so interested in this thread. You are doing what I and others want to do. I just don't have access to low cost fruit.

Fester

[Tater]

I grind apples and pears ferment and run on pulp. Bigger chunks are easier to scorch .I also add lots of copper pieces in still when doing fruit.Heating slower then I do with sugar washes.This works for me .Seem easiest way to get around issue would be to add thumper and put what wont strain out in it.

[Hutch-]

Got lucky on this one, most of the mush did break down to juice without pectic enzyme (will use is next time for sure). Scooped the heavy leaves of the top, got mostly juice now. The remainder should be easy to filter out. I like the burlap sack idea, but might be hard to locate.