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Salty taste in a banana wine

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TheGiantGinger

TheGiantGinger

NewBee
Registered Member
Mar 17, 2013
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Melbourne, Australia
This has just about finished fermenting and I've sampled some of it to find a somewhat salty taste in the brew and I'm not sure why.

5L batch
2kg of Bananas and peels
1.3kg white sugar
Juice of 1 lemon and 1 orange
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1 tsp Lavlin D47

Didn't manage to get the original gravity... the calculator estimates it at around 1.1-1.11 depending on how much sugar got taken out of the bananas. Eitherway it hit 0.995 the other day which is when I noticed the salty taste. I let the bananas sit in the fermenting must for half a week. I regularly swirled the demijohn... though I only properly stirred it a few times. Any ideas?

Thanks
 
Just an idea. Bananas are loaded with potassium which can taste salty. Does it go away when you backsweeten?
 
loveofrose said:
Just an idea. Bananas are loaded with potassium which can taste salty. Does it go away when you backsweeten?
Click to expand...

I am making a gallon of banana wine (not a mead) but it has no salty taste. I wonder if the taste might come from the skins that were used. I decided to make my wine without skins and used only very, very ripe bananas. My concern was/is how the fruit might be chemically treated for traveling and for storage.
 
I made five gallons of banana wine years and years ago (I'll even bottle it if it ever deigns to clear) and I don't think it's great (of course I hate bananas, don't know why I made it), but it's definitely not salty...
 
Kudapucat, it's still in a demijohn right now... Though there's a number of other bottles open to discussion...

So other than that... It may be a natural part of the fruit... And time and potassium based stabilising chemicals may be beneficial. Awesome, Thanks!
 
Chevette Girl said:
I made five gallons of banana wine years and years ago (I'll even bottle it if it ever deigns to clear) and I don't think it's great (of course I hate bananas, don't know why I made it), but it's definitely not salty...
Click to expand...

My wine cleared very quickly. No problem and it tastes (even while only a few months old ) really good. Not sure why yours would not clear unless perhaps you boiled the fruit and so set the pectin. I boil fruit when I want jam.
 
Just an update, the banana wine has cleared and been racked again. Now it's a few months older, the salty taste seems to be gone which is good. However, the taste is now BAM BANANAS!!! Comments I've seen on youtube from other people about banana wine in general is that it commonly tastes like white wine, but with some slight variation. I've clearly got 10x the amount of banana flavour than everybody else. Potentially too much.

Any suggestions what a good blending wine could be?
 
TheGiantGinger said:
Just an update, the banana wine has cleared and been racked again. Now it's a few months older, the salty taste seems to be gone which is good. However, the taste is now BAM BANANAS!!! Comments I've seen on youtube from other people about banana wine in general is that it commonly tastes like white wine, but with some slight variation. I've clearly got 10x the amount of banana flavour than everybody else. Potentially too much
Click to expand...

I'm wondering if it's the skins that carry the flavour. From memory the youtube recipies where it tastes like white wine with just a hint of banana don't use the skins. I've got 3 batches of banana mead with skins, 2 are nearly 6 months old and are just turning a corner where I can see they may get drinkable, and one about 2 months that is just horrid - one part burnt tyre, one part banana skins. They are all extremely bananary.

I'd like to try without the skins, or just a couple thrown in - next time I see some cheap bananas!
 
Maeloch said:
I'm wondering if it's the skins that carry the flavour. From memory the youtube recipies where it tastes like white wine with just a hint of banana don't use the skins. I've got 3 batches of banana mead with skins, 2 are nearly 6 months old and are just turning a corner where I can see they may get drinkable, and one about 2 months that is just horrid - one part burnt tyre, one part banana skins. They are all extremely bananary.

I'd like to try without the skins, or just a couple thrown in - next time I see some cheap bananas!
Click to expand...

I just bottled my banana wine and it does not taste "banana-y" at all. I never used the skins - concerned about pesticides and how they might be sprayed to slow ripening but I did keep the fruit until it was VERY over-ripe and then just gently heated the fruit with some water and then added pectic enzyme
 
I Finally have something to do with all the bananas this guy gives me once a year.
uhybymu2.jpg



Sent from my galafreyan transdimensional communicator 100 years from now. G
 
Banana. It's the 12th generation. Each year the plant blooms, gives me one large stalk of incredibly sweet small bananas (about 1/3 the size of a Cavendish) then a new plant sprouts and the "mother" is cut at the base. It yields about 7-10 pounds.


Sent from my galafreyan transdimensional communicator 100 years from now. G
 
Maeloch said:
I'm wondering if it's the skins that carry the flavour. From memory the youtube recipies where it tastes like white wine with just a hint of banana don't use the skins. I've got 3 batches of banana mead with skins, 2 are nearly 6 months old and are just turning a corner where I can see they may get drinkable, and one about 2 months that is just horrid - one part burnt tyre, one part banana skins. They are all extremely bananary.

I'd like to try without the skins, or just a couple thrown in - next time I see some cheap bananas!
Click to expand...

Everything I've read on the subject does suggest that most of the flavour is indeed in the skins... guess it's like oranges, not much flavour in the juice but plenty in the zest.
 
Nice looking tree Mannye... I'm very cautious going into the produce aisle after an incident with my part time job in a produce department. I was stocking bananas late one evening and pretty much running on auto pilot. Luckily I caught a glimpse out of the corner of my eye as I was reaching towards a clump. My hand froze and my eyes focused in on what was the most disgusting looking tarantula... I have no idea what kind of spider it was but instinctively I let out an earth shattering scream. At that moment the meat dept lady heard my cry for help and came over to investigate. Next, without batting an eye, she grabbed a towel and crushed that hairy SOB. Never heard of that happening to any of the other coworkers but it made me hesitant with grabbing another banana box.

Anyhoom, I had a similar problem with my banana wine and yes I think everyone is right about the skins. Although, you don't have to peel them completely. Cut your bananas in half and then peel half of them before throwing the bunch into your primary. Leave it in only for a week at most. I used Jack Keller's website as a reference.

http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/request177.asp
 
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