HOME BREWING

[stuhan]

On 6/3/2023 at 7:43 AM, stuhan said:

Just the odd 1 now and again,mainly cider from juice.

Hi,

I could not resist the temptation with the price of wines in Thailand being what they are, i made 5lts of white grape concentrate from 1lt (real grape juice) from lazada  its fermenting now. I also bought 4lts mixed up to 12lts of chardonnay juice from jamago, never again ithey sent me 4lts of completly oxcidized juice dark brown in color almost black, totaly bad service from them and waste of B 1740 complained about but got no result so i told them i will never use them again. I did prepare it and it finished but still almost black instead of a nice gold color, it's still ok to drink but cant serve it to anyone in that condition, i  will try and filter it with a 0,01 micron filter today see if i can save it.The other juice i bought was perfect and half the price per lt than jamago.

[PQBC]

Could you tell me what brand you bought from Lazada? I agree Jamago needs some competition.

A year ago I bought 4 kg (3 litres) Nuboon FCGG red grape concentrate, ordered from Shopee. 360 B / kg = 360x4 + 55 shipping 1495 Baht. (Tintorera, Red Globe, San Giovese ). The condition of the product on arrival was perfect (it came in a foam box with dry ice pack) however the resulting 12 litres of wine was not very satisfactory. Red Globe is supposedly a table grape.

 

[stuhan]

On 8/13/2023 at 8:15 AM, PQBC said:

Could you tell me what brand you bought from Lazada? I agree Jamago needs some competition.

A year ago I bought 4 kg (3 litres) Nuboon FCGG red grape concentrate, ordered from Shopee. 360 B / kg = 360x4 + 55 shipping 1495 Baht. (Tintorera, Red Globe, San Giovese ). The condition of the product on arrival was perfect (it came in a foam box with dry ice pack) however the resulting 12 litres of wine was not very satisfactory. Red Globe is supposedly a table grape.

Hi,

Nuboon was the brand but the white grape juice  {Italian Riestling, Inzolia, Grilloi} i am very happy with, i have gone off reds in this heat i enjoy very chilled whites,its a pity nuboon dont have more of a selection of styles of both red &whites as jamago does, in saying that i will never use jamago again after they sold me 4kg of bad juice,they won't even reply to my emails now so i bad mouthed them on social sites, i hate being ripped off. I will buy from nuboon again,the batch i made should finish fermentation in a few days,its not very cloudy so i will run it through my d.i.y filter, bottle and put it in the fridge.Might try a few of their other juices. By the way this is a photo of both, on the left jamago's white chardonnay which they tried telling me was normal and would clear after filtering, rubbish should not need to filter a wine, you could filter that one through mt everest and it would'nt clear. On the right is the nuboon white grape juice,good color,taste and smell as it should be.

[Marble-eye]

53 minutes ago, stuhan said:

Hi,

Nuboon was the brand but the white grape juice  {Italian Riestling, Inzolia, Grilloi} i am very happy with, i have gone off reds in this heat i enjoy very chilled whites,its a pity nuboon dont have more of a selection of styles of both red &whites as jamago does, in saying that i will never use jamago again after they sold me 4kg of bad juice,they won't even reply to my emails now so i bad mouthed them on social sites, i hate being ripped off. I will buy from nuboon again,the batch i made should finish fermentation in a few days,its not very cloudy so i will run it through my d.i.y filter, bottle and put it in the fridge.Might try a few of their other juices. By the way this is a photo of both, on the left jamago's white chardonnay which they tried telling me was normal and would clear after filtering, rubbish should not need to filter a wine, you could filter that one through mt everest and it would'nt clear. On the right is the nuboon white grape juice,good color,taste and smell as it should be.

Hi Stu, how much water do you add per 1kg bottle of concentrate.

[stuhan]

3 hours ago, Marble-eye said:

Hi Stu, how much water do you add per 1kg bottle of concentrate.

You can use 2.5 to 3 lt per1kg juice for a good body wine 

[stuhan]

I should add that normally wine finings are all thats required to clear wines, using a filter or filters is a personal choice,i do it because i like my wines to be as clear as possible,most people are happy with there wines without  filtering them also i find many finings do not work thats another reason to filter some stubborn wines.Make use of pectic enzymes when you prepare wines it can really aid clearing a wine.

[PQBC]

On 8/14/2023 at 1:26 PM, stuhan said:

Hi,

Nuboon was the brand but the white grape juice  {Italian Riestling, Inzolia, Grilloi} i am very happy with, i have gone off reds in this heat i enjoy very chilled whites,its a pity nuboon dont have more of a selection of styles of both red &whites as jamago does, in saying that i will never use jamago again after they sold me 4kg of bad juice,they won't even reply to my emails now so i bad mouthed them on social sites, i hate being ripped off. I will buy from nuboon again,the batch i made should finish fermentation in a few days,its not very cloudy so i will run it through my d.i.y filter, bottle and put it in the fridge.Might try a few of their other juices. By the way this is a photo of both, on the left jamago's white chardonnay which they tried telling me was normal and would clear after filtering, rubbish should not need to filter a wine, you could filter that one through mt everest and it would'nt clear. On the right is the nuboon white grape juice,good color,taste and smell as it should be.

 

Thank you for the information Stuhan. I purchased some Jamago Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay 1 year ago. They were on sale, nearly half price, so I suppose they were clearing out old stock. The result was certainly not as murky as the stuff in your photo. However I did think mine was a bit too dark (golden would be a nice way to put it). I used pectin in the primary fermentation but no finings at the later stages.
Mine was ok. As for yours, they should have taken that plonk back.

For the reds, I have tried Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Shiraz and Pinot Noir. All were good.

In my opinion, the problem with whites is higher susceptibility to oxidation whilst fermenting. The problem with reds is storing and aging economically in our climate. I usually go with the reds, but I have to drink them young since I cannot run the aircon day and night for years on end.

Thanks for the info on Nuboon FWCG white grape. 5kg is 1800 baht, whereas 14 kg of Jamago's cheaper offerings is 4500 baht. 14/5 x 1800 = 5040, so Nuboon is actually more expensive if buying in larger lots.

 

[stuhan]

14 hours ago, PQBC said:

Thank you for the information Stuhan. I purchased some Jamago Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay 1 year ago. They were on sale, nearly half price, so I suppose they were clearing out old stock. The result was certainly not as murky as the stuff in your photo. However I did think mine was a bit too dark (golden would be a nice way to put it). I used pectin in the primary fermentation but no finings at the later stages.
Mine was ok. As for yours, they should have taken that plonk back.

For the reds, I have tried Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Shiraz and Pinot Noir. All were good.

In my opinion, the problem with whites is higher susceptibility to oxidation whilst fermenting. The problem with reds is storing and aging economically in our climate. I usually go with the reds, but I have to drink them young since I cannot run the aircon day and night for years on end.

Thanks for the info on Nuboon FWCG white grape. 5kg is 1800 baht, whereas 14 kg of Jamago's cheaper offerings is 4500 baht. 14/5 x 1800 = 5040, so Nuboon is actually more expensive if buying in larger lots.

 

Thanks for the info, i did not look at all the prices per kg so yes you are correct jamago does work out cheaper,i only do small batches so i will stick with nuboon 1kg white.I am trying to clear that black chardonnay using filters then cold crashing it, its getting there but very stubborn, if i can manage to clear it more i will post some  pic's. 

Cheers

[WilliamG]

Got some Muscat from Jamago and it too is very dark, and not so good taste. Thier Shiraz however is delightful.

I bought a second hand display fridge enough to hold 60 bottles. Bht 2500 off Facebook Market. All my wine is now stored at about 12C.

[stuhan]

Managed to filter that almost black Chardonnay to a more golden color but still requires more.

[Marble-eye]

In all honesty the best results was from Malee fruit juice bought from Lazada, 599baht x 12 one litre cartons, just checked now 820 baht x 12 plus 40 baht delivery. Always found the Jamago too bitter for my taste.

[PQBC]

6 hours ago, stuhan said:

Thanks for the info, i did not look at all the prices per kg so yes you are correct jamago does work out cheaper,i only do small batches so i will stick with nuboon 1kg white.I am trying to clear that black chardonnay using filters then cold crashing it, its getting there but very stubborn, if i can manage to clear it more i will post some  pic's. 

Cheers

I just remembered a few more things:

The chardonnay I bought had more of an oxidation issue than the savignon blanc. I oaked some of my chardonnay. I read that chardonnay is one of the few whites that is ever treated that way.

The Nuboon juice I got through Shopee took 5 days to arrive. I spoke to Nuboon and they told me that Shopee delivery times were too long; next time order direct or, through Lazada. Perhaps that is why they sent it to me in an insulated box with ice packs.

Jamago responds better to LINE than to email. In fact some of my emails were never answered.

I notice that you said that you used 4 litres Jamago concentrate mixed up to 12 litres. That is 2 parts water added to 1 part concentrate. Could that be part of the reason it is so dark?  You said you used 1 litre Nuboon concentrate mixed up to 5 litres. That is 4 parts water to 1 part concentrate. Quite a difference.  Also, Nuboon sells by the kilogram, which is more like 750 ml.

I normally use 3 parts water to 1 part concentrate with Jamago. This suits my taste and I have noticed that the specific gravity is nearly always right when I do this. No need for added sugar to boost the alcohol content.
 

[stuhan]

With the jamago the juice came to me very dark and i thought well maybe it will change when i dilute it,i expected  a 3 to 1 mix but the gravity was 1.100 with a 2  to 1 mix which made me wonder even more about this juice being bad.With the nuboon i just tried to sqeeze a bit more out of the 1kg of juice, it still has good color and taste though i had to add more sugar to get the gravity up to 1.100 which gives about 13.5% alc. if it finishes about 1.000- 0.999. I know concentrated chardonnay is darker in color but this was almost black.

[PQBC]

18 hours ago, Marble-eye said:

In all honesty the best results was from Malee fruit juice bought from Lazada, 599baht x 12 one litre cartons, just checked now 820 baht x 12 plus 40 baht delivery. Always found the Jamago too bitter for my taste.

It is a matter of taste. I much prefer Jamago or Nuboon to store-bought grape juice like Malee and Tipco. I have made several batches of Malee/Tipco and considered it only so-so.

 

[PQBC]

23 hours ago, WilliamG said:

Got some Muscat from Jamago and it too is very dark, and not so good taste. Thier Shiraz however is delightful.

I bought a second hand display fridge enough to hold 60 bottles. Bht 2500 off Facebook Market. All my wine is now stored at about 12C.

Jamago had the muscat on sale. Now I am beginning to think that they drop the price once the juice is slightly off.  Or that the whites are just more susceptible to oxidation.

The shiraz is good, but I prefer their pinot noir. I drink them when they are quite young. I have read somewhere that pinot noir doesn't need much aging, whereas shiraz benefits from it more.

[aruud]

I also had a terrible experience with whites from Jamago. And now I'm not even sure the company is still in business as the phone number is temporarily disabled. I have done several batches of both Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz and they turn out quite good, but the white wine I bought from them was dark brown for the beginning, and having no experience with it I thought it would be fine but it certainly wasn't. The picture above of the Chardonnay that is quite brown is not anything like Chardonnay should look... In the end I realized that I had a batch that was a half a year expired. Jamago was unwilling to help, and now I see that others have had the same problem. Now that Jamago seems to not be in business, I would love other options??