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Holiday Hard Cider
Getting ready for a set and forget holiday cider. The plan right now is to use 5gal of fresh unpasturized cider from the local orchard. Kill the wild yeast and prep the cider with Campden(Potassium Metabisulfite) Tablets.
Also I will prepare a starter with 1 pint of cider and 3-4 tsp mulling spices boiled 20 min. After the starter has cooled I will add WL775 English Cider Yeast.
After pitching I plan to leave it to age clear and settle until December. The only change from setting and forgetting, I may switch it to a secondary after the inital fermintation has almost stopped.
Please if there is something fundamentally wrong with this procedure, give me a hand. I'd hate to wait 3 months to finally taste something bad. BTW midwest lists this as a lager yeast, but the temp is 68-75??? Maybe it is just the catelog. Is there a true lager yeast that can be utilized for cider and lagered around 51 degrees? I want to preserve the apple taste and definately the spices to be a soft background. Last thing, I will keg this in Dec and will lightly force carbonate to about 5psi. Then I may transfer most of it to bottles.
Thanks for any help... looking for Monday 24Sept07 as a start date for this project.
5 gal unpasturized cider
5 tabs campden
3-4 tsp mulling spices
WL775 English Cider Yeast
1 pint cider for starter.
how do you plan to kill the wild yeast?
you have inspired me to start a cider.
I am not a cider brewer.
Do you need to really waste mulling spices on the starter? Why not just use the cider?
I understand that Sodium or Potassium Bisulfite (Campden) will kill wild yeasts & bacteria in wine must.
I'm concerned that it will also kill the good cider yeast. Comments??
You can also pasteurize by heating to a certain temp & letting it cool, but I'd prefer to just throw in the Campden.
Definately doing a cider or two this fall. Blew two in the past by not killing off the evil beasties.
brewchez wrote:
I am not a cider brewer.
Do you need to really waste mulling spices on the starter? Why not just use the cider?
Well juice from the orchard is called cider... the mulling spices will add the flavor. So therefore, the cider is the wert and the spices are the hops. Just wanted a brew that would remind one of the hot cider that is heavily spiced and served around christmas.
Yes the campden tablets are for killing the wild yeasts, new yeast added later will not have to compete to survive.
KyNGmedic wrote:
brewchez wrote:
I am not a cider brewer.
Do you need to really waste mulling spices on the starter? Why not just use the cider?Well juice from the orchard is called cider... the mulling spices will add the flavor. So therefore, the cider is the wert and the spices are the hops. Just wanted a brew that would remind one of the hot cider that is heavily spiced and served around christmas.
Yes the campden tablets are for killing the wild yeasts, new yeast added later will not have to compete to survive.
I understand that I guess. But my point is why are you adding spices to a starter, why not just to the main cider when you pitch the starter into it? Are you trying to sterilize the spices, because by boiling them you'll lose most of their goodness to evaporation. Just soak them in a shot of vodka or something before adding them to the main cider.
I was going to add 1tsp every 10 min... and yes to sterilize. Also I do not want it to be not overpowering. I can add more later via the vodka method, if it is to little. This will sit till Dec. Also this is my 1st cider.
sippi wrote:
how do you plan to kill the wild yeast?
you have inspired me to start a cider.
I recently asked about the wild yeast at my LHBS. Apparently, if you get your yeast going the natural yeasts don't really effect the end product. I've only made 2 ciders but both times I just bought the cider, warmed it to room temp, and then pitched the yeast. Never had a problem with off flavors or anything.
Boiling the cider does two things... it alters some of the sugars available and yes it does destroy the wild yeasts. From my understanding, campden tablets kill wild yeast and preserve all of the sugars. Also if for some reason some wild yeasts are left, and they will compete. Because of the boil that competition was very minimal.
i have a cider that is going on 5 months and it tastes awful. no apple taste or aroma, it tastes very sour. this may be the champagne yeast i used, i do not know.
but i can tell you that i am very discouraged. i don't know if i will brew another cider when this one turned out so bad. it is a heck of an investment, in money and time, just to find out 6 months later it STILL tastes like crap.
there doens't seem to be many experienced cider brewers on this forum, i found it hard to get nay advice or guidance when i was planning my first batch. personally, until i run into or find someone with firsthand experience, and a wealth of it, i am going to sit cider brewing out for a while.
i only get a hankering for it in the autumn anyhow, so i will buy it at the store for two months then go on my merry way with my excellent beer and mead.
by the way, a cider "wort" is called must, like wine or mead.
Krausenator, in regards to;
"i have a cider that is going on 5 months and it tastes awful. no apple taste or aroma, it tastes very sour. this may be the champagne yeast i used, i do not know.
but i can tell you that i am very discouraged. i don't know if i will brew another cider when this one turned out so bad. it is a heck of an investment, in money and time, just to find out 6 months later it STILL tastes like crap."
Here's your problem; it's one of two things
1. Oxidation or reduction, which is a chemical process that happens to first order alcohol functional groups. basically, KMnO4, K2Cr2O7, k2CrO4, or O3, (oxydation) or LiAlH4, NaBH4, or H2 (reduction) get into your brew which is sitting there churning out H3C-CH2-OH (alcohol) very nicely, but the oxidation or reduction via contamination (even just letting a little air in can ruin a good batch sometimeS), and guess what the products of a oxygen or reduction reaction are? You guessed it, Vinegar and an Aldehyde, (okay so maybe you didn't guess it but still...) Which is most likely what you have sitting in your basement. HOWEVER!
2. The much more likely solution is this; Yeast, left to it's own devices in a batch of cider, will actually "evolve" and begin to feast off of not the sugar, but the ALCOHOL! Yes, it is only a VERY VERY small percentage that does this (check out an evolutionary bell curve if you don't believe me...) but if left long enough it's enough to ruin a batch.... This is much more likely what happened to your batch, as if you leave the cider and yeast going long enough, they will produce vinegar and aldehyde all on their own...
AND ONE LAST VERY IMPORTANT HOWEVER!
You're batch is NOT completely wasted! You can still recover all that tasty alcohol... However, i'm officially not telling you that you could recover it by making a still, and boiling the cider (now apple cider vinegar in your case...) off into a condenser coil in order to recover the alcohol, which is known as Apple Jack. I would also officially not tell you that typically the first 200 ml of fluid out of a still is poisonous (fusil oils, what made people go blind in old time moonshine, and the reason it's largely illegal, interestingly enough, it's also what gives you headaches and hangovers in lover quality alcohol). And I would also not tell you that there are many plans and procedures detailing the process of distillation all over the web. I would also not tell you that a 20$ crock pot at wall mart (the one with the biggest hole in the top you can find) and 20$ worth of refrigerator copper tubing (ice maker kit) make an excelent, cheap, and easy to use still (again, i would also not tell you to cool you're condesing coil under the kitchen sink / ice cubes... ) Also, you're producing largely alcohol condensate, which before it condensces is in a VAPOR form, now if i need to tell you alcohol is highly flammable (especially in vapor form) stop reading right now and forget what i haven't said... So be CAREFUL (or don't cause it's illegal) (blow out your pilet light on your stove..) and be safe. RESEARCH it before you try it, what i've (not) said here is barely enough to get the basic concept down... Also a really great book on it is called "Chasing the White Dog" it's basically a history of moonshine in the US, and all about a guy's adventures in it. He (like you) trys a batch of hard cider, ends up with vinegar, and ends up making what he describes as the most delicious alcoholic beverage he's ever tasted.... so it might be worth a shot to pick up...
Anyways, hope that helps, and hope it's "experienced enough for ya.."
What the fed's don't know, won't hurt em right?
(Don't break the law)
I've been brewing for less than a year now and I have made one batch of hard cider and currently have another batch in the fermentor right now.
At first I wanted to be all fancy and natural, but after looking at how much fresh organic apple juice went for per gallon I humbled my self and went to fred myer to pick up 5 gallons of their 100% pure apple juice (which I am afraid does come from concentrate but has no preservatives). (total was less than $25)
I set a medium sauce pot on the stove and boiled some of the apple juice. Added about 2 lbs of brown sugar, a tsp of whole cloves & one stick of cinnimon (both in the boil and I left them in the fermenter)
I also added a few ounces of molasses and a few ounces of honey to the boil as I just had them laying around doing nothing else useful.
I pitched an Ale Yeast instead of a wine or cider yeast.
I left it in the fermenter for about 12 days, then primed with 5oz of priming sugar and bottled. After one week in the bottle the cloves came though (almost alarmingly) strong up front, then mellowed pleasantly in the after taste. After one month in the bottle the cloves mellowed up front. I guess the ABV was about 8% even though I could not say for sure ...forgot to do the hydrometer test before adding the yeast. This turned out better than any hard cider I have purchased from the store, and my friends/family agreed it was quite good.
For my second batch I got a little more creative by replacing one gallon of apple juice with a gallon of cran/raspberry juice (4 gallons apple juice). The rest was pretty much the same. I boiled the cran/raspberry juice and added 2 lbs of light brown sugar (organic) also in the boil I added 1/2 tsp of whole cloves (wanted to make the cloves more subtle per my wife's recommendation) and two sticks of cinnimon this time. Once again I am leaving the cloves and cinnimon sticks in the fermenter. I did add a 3-4 ounces of mollasses to the boil but did not have any honey this time.
I pitched with Nottingham Ale Yeast which I think is the same Ale Yeast I used the first time around.
My hydrometer told me I had a potential 8% ABV and my LHBS keeper said the yeast would fizzle out around the 8%-9% range so I'm expecting 8%abv in the end result.
This seems like a good way for newbies to start. No waiting for months on end, low cost, easy, tasty.
Decided to make the plunge and do ciders as I love pear cider and can't find it available locally. On my 12th batch since SEP as cider fruit harvest here in WA is ending soon. First batch of bartlett pear cider is aging nicely though I was worried because of strong hydrogen sulfide flavor 2 weeks after bottling (also did the prime each bottle thing ... BIG MISTAKE exploded one cheap crown cap 1 L bottle from Ross), now a month later and the pear flavors are coming out nicely. Did a red cactus pear cider that I had to adjust the pH with acid blend, has turned out nicely carbonated with a pleasant tartness (has a deep redish purple color). Coming from SW MO, I made a sasafrass cider that is kinda like a root beer. Working on a couple of habanero ciders (Red Sevina and Bhat Jolokia). But my contribution to the holiday cider is a Red Hot cider (love the candy) and a pumpkin spice cider. In each of these, I used the Mussleman pure cider (pasteurized, no additives) from Wally World (cheaper than what I can juice it and I'm flavoring it after all). The Red Hots have a some effect that killed the yeast twice, finally got cote de blancs to take and it is down from sg=1.055 to fg=1.005. IF there is any interest, I can post the recipe for the pumpkin spice and red hot cider.
Ozarkdoc;
yes please post your recipe, they both sound equally tasty!
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