Click here to read all about it and see the pix.

http://foodsoftheworld.activeb...t/sima_topic171.html

How far do you drive to get your ingredient's ? I don't imagine that you can find much in Chinook.

Where did the Finns get lemons???

After a few glasses of that and you'll understand the meaning of the phrase "crazy Finns ". I wonder how similar it is to limoncello ?

wetdog - we have a grocery in chinook that has a fair selection of staples, but is rather high in price. havre is only 20 miles away and provides almost anything else we need. after that, it's great falls or mail order through the internet!

bill - i wondered about that, but all my research pointed to lemons being "the" component for sima;" having said that, i am not sure how "old" the tradition of sima is. it could be that they were acquired through trade and reserved for special occasions, or it could be that this tradition is relatively young and they simply came from the local grocery.

mete - it is indeed good stuff! not sticky-sweet like mike's hard lemonade, but fizzy and lemony. the first time i made it, i left too much of the white pith on the peel and the lemons - i think this time i took care of that problem.

coming along nicely and the mead should be ready in time for vappu!

I gotta try making this.

it is not only simple, but also very good - perfect on a day where you are outside mowing the lawn or something and want a cold, refreshing drink.

Mine is in jars now, I made it the other day. Can't wait to try it!

Thanks!

Give me a good cold Guinness or a Michelada....
I think it would be sima what better ...

I had added a half cup of dark local honey to mine when I mixed it up. I just tried it and it has a slightly almost spicy flavor in addition to effervescent citrusy taste, I'm going to have fun making more of this and playing around with the ingredients. It is quite good!

excellent job of improvisation, cane - looking forward to hearing some results on this. keep us posted!

Thanks for posting this recipe Tas, this stuff is really good! Now, if I can just stay out of it and let it age a bit I'm guessing it will only get better after a couple of weeks of aging. I'm going to make another batch this week and am thinking of using empty 1 liter plastic bottles (the small ones) from my grocery that club soda comes in as I am out of Mason jars.

Also, forgot to mention that I used bottled drinking water from the grocery instead of tap water for the first batch because our water here in Atlanta has a lot of chlorine in it.

glad you like it - over at the FOTW forum they've tried several variations using different sweeteners and also different citrus fruits. lots of intereesting results.

i agree on the water - in fact i've taken to using spring water for this project since we have a local spring nearby and the water there is quite good. the 1-litre bottles should work very well for this as long as the lids are secure. there will be some pressure during the "secondary" fermentation process - but that's what makes it good and fizzy!

to get the most effect from fruit, do them twice .. you can use them inthe primary, but using them in the racked wines adds tons of flavor

ALL acids degrade in time when brewed ... try adding a pinch of triacid blend or citric acid when racking

its a mel, not a mead, but that's nitpicking

Alright, my Sima for 2014 is made and bottled. For the first time, I tried bottling the sima in beer bottles, rather than using the 1-quart canning jars that I've used in the past - or the 1-litre plastic water bottles that I used last year:



Following the recipe, I made 5 quarts, which amounts to just a little over thirteen 12-ounce bottles. Departing from the recipe, I took my Finnish friend's advice and used all-brown sugar, rather than a combination of white and brown. He also suggested using four lemons rather than two, so I tried that as well.

The little bit left over tasted great, a good balance of sweet, sour and just a little bit of bitter. But the real proof will be revealed n May First, when I sample the bottles to see how the fermentation and carbonisation went....

We'll see how they turn out! Beer

It's listed as a 404 now !

Try it now!

http://foodsoftheworld.activeb...t/sima_topic171.html

Thanks, that works ! I wonder if you could play with amount of the white skin to adjust the bitter/sweet ratio.
The only Finns I know today are rally drivers and they do that very well !! But yes as a kid they were described as " crazy Finns " !!

Well, the sima made it through the night without the bottles exploding; surely that's a good sign!

I've made this several times, but never in 12-oz capped bottles. So far, so good....

quote:

Originally posted by mete:
Thanks, that works ! I wonder if you could play with amount of the white skin to adjust the bitter/sweet ratio.
The only Finns I know today are rally drivers and they do that very well !! But yes as a kid they were described as " crazy Finns " !!

Try replacing lemons with limes to get some bite to the brew?

quote:

Try replacing lemons with limes to get some bite to the brew?

I had the time and the materials, so I figured, "Why not?"

okay, evidently pre-bottling sima in 12-oz beer bottles is something that reqires a little extra attention. monday, while i was at work - 20 miles from home - the beautiful mrs. tas texted me in order to report that 5 bottles exploded. i was unable to do much about it at the time, but asked her to carefully put them in the refrigerator, in order to hopefully lower the potential for internal pressures.

after doing some quick checking, i learned that i should have moved them to the refrigerator as soon as the raisins rose to the top, in order to stop fermentation and carbonation. this step is clearly spelled out in the recipe (although the reasy why is not explained), but i've never really considered this before, because they'd always been bottled in mason jars or screw-top plastic "pop" bottles. in these previous cases, some swelling or bulging pressure became evident, but it was never a critical thing. another option - in addition to refrigerating, is to heat the bottles of sima - pasteurizing them - in order to stop fermentation and carbonisation. I will definitely keep these options in mind for the future.

interestingly, i noticed a few days before the blow-ups that the raisins, which had risen to the top long ago (i should have refrigerated them then, i see now), were on the bottom and fully "re-hydrated" - very plump to nearly bursting. i can only guess that pressure from the carbonation forced them down?

in any case, when i got home, i opened a couple of bottles. carbonation was as you can guess dramatic, even though i opened them very, very slowly. lost a little down the neck, but the sima tasted great. not too sweet, not too sour, a hint of bitterness - very good, and i am looking forward to (carefully) enjoying the rest. very fizzy, of course, and i found myself thinking once again that this is nearly the perfect beverage to enjoy on a hot summer day.