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Then add the yeast, yeast nutrient, and tea. Cover again and put somewhere warm (airing cupboard, space under the stairs).
It should start fermenting within a day or two—you’ll be able to see bubbles of gas being produced.
In the early stages of fermentation, some of the yeast and flowers may gather near the surface, forming a crust. If this happens, stir it back into the mixture with a sanitised spoon and reseal the bucket.
Basically, leave everything alone until the vigorous stage of fermentation has passed. This can take a week.[Or two.]
Strain the liquid into the sterilised bottle.[Or demijohn.]
Top up to the shoulder with cooled boiled water and seal. A cling-film covered cotton wool plug will suffice.[Or you could just buy an airlock bung.]
Put the bottle back in a warm place.
When fermentation stops and the wine begins to clear, sediment will accumulate at the bottom of the bottle. This could take anything from two weeks to two months.
Once the wine begins to look clear, you’ll need to rack it. Set the bottle of clearing wine on a chair or table, and place the second (empty and sanitised) bottle lower down. Put one end of the sanitised tube into the wine, stopping about 5 cm above the sediment. You may need to clamp this in place.[Or get your boyfriend to hold it for hours.]Bring the other end of the tube to a position below the bottle of wine and suck on it (carefully) until the liquid begins to flow. Put the lower end of the tube into the new container and wait as the contents of the old bottle flow into the new, leaving the sediment behind. This does not take hours, whatever else you may have heard.
Leave the wine for another week or so to clear the rest of the sediment.
Rack it a second time, and then decant into sanitised bottles.
Store the wine somewhere cool and let it rest, ideally for a year or eighteen months.[If it smells weirdly of semen or cat wee, something has gone wrong.]One time. That was one time.[<3]
MARIUS’S FAMILY PIEROGIS
My paczek,
How are you? And Leo, of course. We miss him so much. Almost as much as we miss you, although honestly I’ve always thought it’s important to be in the position of missing your child. If you don’t miss your child, they’re not out living their life. And your father and I are so happy you’re living yours again. Edwin is a dear, dear man but…well. He seems at peace with Adam in a way he never quite did with you. Of course we always wanted the best for both of you, but I’m not sure you’ve ever really liked peace?
I’m so excited that you’re going to Wales when the weather is a little warmer. Imagine being able to go all that way just by water. What a wonderful adventure. Your father is right that we probably shouldn’t attempt to live on a boat ourselves, but maybe we can take a narrowboat holiday this summer. I think we could hire one in Ellesmere or Whitchurch and then we could boat (is that the correct word? Your father says it’s cruise, but isn’t cruising what gay men do for sex?) up to Chirk and over the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct to Llangollen and then back again. I think it would take about seven days and our boat could meet your boat in the middle lol.
Gosh, darling, I do hope you and Leo are prepared. Do you have enough towels? Shall we send you some more? Your father and I have great faith in you but given you once broke your toe putting some socks on, we’re concerned you might fall in the river quite a bit. And do you think maybe you should go on a course or something before you leave for Wales? Leo seems to know what he’s doing, but boats probably require a fair bit of care and maintenance, and you were so bad with Lego. We didn’t think it was physically possible for a child to be bad with Lego. Of course you’re also a beautiful, sensitive, artistic soul who has so much to give to the universe. We just thought it would also be good if you didn’t accidentally break Leo’s boat?
Oh, I almost forgot! Our family pierogi recipe. Well, it’s our best guess at a family pierogi recipe because your father didn’t think to learn when he was at home, although I suppose now we’re passing it officially onto you it IS a family pierogi recipe. Yay!
So, this should make about four dozen, and before you say there’s only two of you, you have no idea how quickly four dozen pierogi can disappear. Or you can share them with friends or something. Wouldn’t that be a lovely thing to do? Prepare your filling in advance and have it chillin like a villain (as the young people say) in the fridge. I’ll include some of your favourite fillings below.
In any case, for the pierogi themselves you need500 g of plain flour(what the Americans call all-purpose flour the weirdos lol),300 g of sour cream,120 g butter(softened),2 eggs,andwater.
And what you do is, you fold the sour cream and butter into the flour (you do know what folding is, don’t you? Watch a YouTube video if you don’t) until the flour has an even consistencylike shaggy pastry dough (if you don’t know what shaggy pastry dough looks like you might have to watch another YouTube video or Google it. It means lumpy but cohesive, like Cousin Andrei lol).
Then beat the eggs in one of those American measuring cups and add enough water to measure 1 cup total (if you don’t have a measuring cup, and only a measuring jug, the internet tells me this is about equivalent to 236.59 ml so good luck with that lol). Now you want to fold in the egg mixture until the dough is thoroughly moistened.
Once the egg/water mixture is mostly incorporated, sprinkle some flour onto your work surface and dump everything out onto the counter. You’ll need something to scrape and lift the dough with—a dough scraper or a thin spatula. Work the dough with your hands, kneading and folding. It will be a very wet dough, so be careful not to add too much flour. You just want consistent hydration throughout the dough. And be gentle with it, Marius. Don’t get impatient and go slapping it about or beating it up. Watch another YouTube video if you have to.
Once the dough is ready, place it in a deep bowl (do you have a deep bowl? I’m going to send you one) and cover it with a wet tea towel. And I do mean a wet towel, darling. Not a lightly sprinkled with water tea towel. I am talking about a fully soaked and wrung out tea towel. Use the dough immediately, but keep the rest covered while you’re working.
Now, add another light sprinkling of flour to your work surface, cut off a piece of the dough, roll it out flat (until it’s around 3–5mm thick, so a bit thicker than pasta, but I have no idea if you know how thick pasta is) and then use the edge of a glass to cutcircles. To shape the pierogi, flip over the disk and fill it with a dollop of filling. If the edges need a bit more moisture you can brush the edge of the circle with a finger dipped in water before pinching shut and sealing in a half-circle.
To cook immediately, which I assume you will because Leo doesn’t seem to have a freezer, drop them into boiling water and boil until they float. Remove them about a minute later with a slotted spoon. Place into a lightly buttered dish and toss them in the butter so they don’t stick together.
To serve, cover the baking dish with foil and pop in the oven for about 10 minutes (about 180°C no fan /350°F) or sauté with enough butter that they don’t stick to the pan.
FILLINGS HERE (remember to make these FIRST).
For potato & cheese:you want about300 g twaróg,ser bialy(or cottage cheese, I suppose, will do),500 g of starchy potatoes,a large onion,2 tbsp butter,½ tsp ground pepper,½ tsp salt. Peel the potatoes, rinse, put in a pan, add salt, cover with cold water, and bring to a boil. Cook until tender, drain the water, put the potatoes back in the pot and mash the “AF” out of them while still hot. Make sure to get all the lumps out: do not cut corners re: lumps. Leave to cool completely, crush the cheese with a fork, mix in with the potatoes and season with salt and pepper.
For Christmas: 1 kg of sauerkraut, coarsely chopped, rinsed, and drained,2 tbsp unsalted butter,1 small onionfinely chopped,8 oz button mushroomsfinely chopped,saltto taste,¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper,1 large finely chopped hard-boiled egg,2 tbsp sour cream. In a pan (sauce, not frying), add the sauerkraut, cover with water, boil, reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Drain. Sauté the onion in butter until golden, then add the mushrooms for another 3 minutes, stir in the sauerkraut, salt, and pepper. Sauté again until the sauerkraut also turns golden (this should take about 20 minutes). Remove the pan from the heat and let it cool. Then add the chopped egg and sour cream (you might need a bit less of this depending on how big your egg is) and mix until you have a paste.
