Three Siblings Kitchen (TSK)

When life gives you bittermelon, what do you do? It would seem the answer to this question doesn’t involve fermentation. For this is my third attempt at fermenting with bittermelon.

The first attempt was a bittermelon wine. I juiced the melons with lemons. Usually, when I drink fresh bittermelon juice, I cut the bitterness with lemons. Apparently seven lemons is too acidic for a wine. How was I supposed to know?

The second attempt was bittermelon vinegar. Vinegar is inherently acidic and I thought the acetic acid would balance the bitterness in the melons. Well, I attempted to ferment the alcohol and acetic acid at the same time.

This is done by adding the yeast and allowing it to ferment in the open air (container covered with cloth to prevent fruit flies, of course).

Well, this was first time I tried to do both alcohol and vinegar at the same time. The vinegar over-oxidized and became watery. Most likely the yeast didn’t hold up their end of the bargain. Without alcohol, the acetabactor doesn’t have food to make acetic acid with.

Josh says to give up fermenting with bittermelon. I’ve taken it as a challenge. I’m changing the method this time!

To start, I wanted to mix strawberries and bittermelon to make another wine. I’ll use the strawberry to cut the bitter flavor.

Rather than juicing, I decided to boil the components together. This has the added benefit of killing off any bad bacteria on the fruits. Downside is that it produces a “cooked” flavor.

I chopped the bittermelon and put it into a pot with a lid. I dropped half of a bag of frozen strawberries (from earlier this spring). Then poured half a gallon of distilled water in. Everything was brought to a boil (lid closed) and then allowed to return to room temperature.

Once cooled off, I strained it into a half gallon honey jug. There was residual honey on the bottom and I added just enough table sugar to make it taste sweet. I shook the slurry for a few minutes until it was integrated and then added US-05 ale yeast.

To the jug, I added an airlock and placed it in the bath tub. If there was an overflow, the tub is easiest to clean. Usually the first days are when you see the most foam.

The next day, there was no foam but a very vigorous bubbling. Then the next day some minor foam started. Today I decided to rack the wine into a separate container.

Although mason jars aren’t ideal for booze, I wanted to use it instead of the jug. I left a lot of head room in case of foam. Typically a no-no but you aren’t the boss of me.

I’m going to let this ferment until it’s out of sugar. Hopefully less than a month. The juice is pretty foggy. I’m hoping it will clarify a bit. I’ll keep the blog updated as the ferment goes. Hopefully third time is a charm with the bittermelon!