Bin 1 of Rødvin bottled

Yesterday, being Sunday with no shops open, we decided was a good day to bottle our first batch of home made wine. After 4 weeks of wine "yeasting" and brewing (not sure if that is the correct term) our Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot was ready for bottling.

It being the first time we had bottled a brew, we had to plan out the process so we had everything ready at the go. Firstly it involved sterilising the siphon and then the cleaning areas. Once this was sterilised we had to then sterlise and rinse all of the bottles (30 x 0.75 litre bottles) and let them drip dry.

Then came the actual task of bottling which required siphoning the wine into the bottles (using a somewhat awkward siphon) followed by the corking (with the ridiculously stuipid corking device we purchased). It took some time, and after a lot of blood (not quite but nearly with the stupid corking device we had), sweat (a lot of it from force required to use the stupid corking device we had) and tears (I'm sure there will be when we find out the price of a proper and painfree corking device) we had managed to bottle and cork all of the bottles.

We actually had about a glass left over ( coincendentally ;-) ) after bottling so we had to try it out. First impressions were actually a lot better than we had forecast. It certainly has a lot more depth than a lot of the wines we had bought over here (mostly from chile and france) so hopefully as it matures in its bottle over the next couple of months it will be quite 'ballsy' and a nice drop to have with friends.

Anyway that was Bin 1 of our first brew which is yet to be named by the way. If anyone has any naming suggestions please comment below as we can't really think of any suitable name. Bin 1 doesn't seem to do it justice - although if it turns into a sweet vinegar then maybe it is suitable!

We also have Bin 2 in the fermentation stage which is actually a Shiraz. Hopefully we have similar success with this one, but we will certainly get a better corking device to bottle this one. I still have a bruised palm from the force required to push the corks in.

Anyway it is nice to know that we have plenty of wine at our disposal in case of emergencies so please don't be scared off by the price of alcohol in Norway as it is free at Løkkeveien 85. Our container is due to arrive in the next day or two also so that will mean I can then commence my beer brewing.

Fingers crossed I don't get arrested and deported for producing alcohol on a large scale here in Norway.

Ha det.