I'd like to make a nice white wine for summer. I've made good wines from peaches and apricots. Neither of those fruits are in season right now, but bananas are plentiful and cheap.
The following book has been my bible in making fruit wines.
On page 102, it has a recipe for banana wine.
The first thing I like is the description. "Bananas make a full bodied wine. Served over ice with a dash of soda water and a slice of lemon, it makes a great tropical cooler." So far so good for a summer wine. The aging time is just about a year, but maybe we can start consuming it a bit young in order to enjoy it in July or so.
Then I look at the recipe and "sequence".
Step #1, paraphrased: chop 12 pounds of ripe sound bananas with peels and mix with 4 quarts of water. Boil for 30 minutes.
Problem: what does chop mean ? Does it mean slice the bananas into 1/2" sections ? Does it mean pulverize like pieces of tomato for a chunky salsa ?
Problem: will 4 quarts of water cover 12 pounds of chopped bananas ?
Step 2 through 8, paraphrased: strain, add vinacid water, sugar (14 pounds !) oranges, yeast,etc. Ferment it.
Problem: the sum total of all the liquids is much less than the 24 liters I would expect. The recipe states 15 liters of water in total and some of that will be lost boiling and straining the bananas. It doesn't say anything about topping up to 24 liters. It also doesn't say what the starting SG should be.
Just to confuse things, here is the same recipe adapted and it calls for
17.5L of liquids.
So...
a) has anyone made this wine or one like it ? How did it turn out ? Could you share the recipe ?
b) has anyone been able to contact the authors about corrections for the book ? Or are they published somewhere ?
c) how would you adjust this recipe to make a good wine ? Add additional water to bring it up to the 24 liter mark ?
Thanks.