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Cider Digest #0555
Subject: Cider Digest #555, 22 September 1995
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #555 22 September 1995
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Re: wild yeast cultivation (Sean Cox)
Brewing techniques (Michael S Ferdinando)
Apple Jack (Mark Janello)
Re: Apple Jack? (Gordon Pellegrinetti)
salicylic acid? (Rolland Everitt)
yeast results (Ray Ownby)
Pumpkin mead (Ray Ownby)
Dabinett again (Dick Dunn)
bounced submissions? OK to re-send (Cider Digest)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: wild yeast cultivation
From: scox@factset.com (Sean Cox)
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 09:10:56 -0400 (EDT)
>From: ericg@iquest.net
>
>In the past, though, when I have tried to cultivate out of the air, I
>have gotten molds growing on top of the "starter". I can see how if you
>crush your own apples, you would get a high concentration of wild yeasts
>from the skins to start the fermentation before anything else could take
>hold. I don't have a press, though, and generally just buy juice, and
>when it is in season, "apple cider" in jugs.
>
>What can I do to cultivate my own wild yeast? Any tips from those that
>have done this before?
You should be able to find wild "apple" yeast in the jug cider
marked "Keep Refrigerated". I always take a couple of those and toss them in
the back of the fridge for a few weeks and they come out nicely effervescent
(i.e. slightly fermented). This year I plan to try tossing the stuff into a
carboy (well, 1gal jug at least) with an airlock & see what happens.
I've done this successfully :-9 with meads, just dilute the honey with
warm (blood temp) water and stick on a airlock.. Yummy!! Better than some of
my innoculated meads! I've also been left with a nice lump of yeast in the
bottom of the jug for the next round I try!
Mother Nature is cool.
--Sean
=== Sean Cox, Systems Engineer ==================== FactSet Data Systems ===
=== scox@factset.com ==================== Greenwich, CT ===
------------------------------
Subject: Brewing techniques
From: msf2@cornell.edu (Michael S Ferdinando)
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 09:54:01 -0400
Hi, all.
I'm a newbie to this list, although I've been brewing cider and beer for
about five years now. From perusing the on-line cider information lists, I
think I might be the only person who uses the following technique:
To concentrate the sugars in my must, I boil seven gallons of unpreserved
cider down to five. I run that through my beer wort chiller into my
primary fermenter. I add a few drops of pectic enzyme, and I then pitch my
yeast. I've had the most success with Red Star ale yeast, of all things.
I ferment one week in a primary fermenter (6-gal plastic bucket), then two
to four weeks in a secondary fermenter (5-gal glass carboy), racking it off
two or three times.
Everyone who has tried it loves the stuff. I have found that this process
concentrates not only the sugars, but also the apple flavor. The resulting
cider is very crisp, tart, and "apple-y". Do I have a really "out-there"
technique? Am I the only person who brews cider this way?
Comments on this technique would be appreciated.
Michael S Ferdinando, Production Control Assistant--Cornellcard
Cornell University Office of the Bursar, 260 Day Hall, Ithaca NY 14853
607-255-5980 // msf2@cornell.edu
PROGRAM 1) n. A magical spell cast upon a computer which transforms input
data into error messages.
2) v. t. To engage in an activity similar to repeatedly banging one's
head against a wall, but with fewer opportunities for reward.
------------------------------
Subject: Apple Jack
From: Mark Janello <mjanello@umich.edu>
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 10:00:51 -0400 (EDT)
Roger Lee asked about Apple Jack. It's a distilled spirit,
like brandy, made out of hard cider. Usually it's made
by evaporative distilling (think moonshine), but sometimes it was
made by letting a barrel of hard cider freeze, thaw, refreeze,
etc. (a New England winter tradition) until you have a
shell of mostly water ice surrounding a concentrated
alcohol core. Tap into that and voila! an outrageous
headache because of the concentrated higher alcohols and
nasty impurities.
By the way, don't try this at home. You don't want the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms after you. Distilling
is pretty illegal. The Proulx and Nichols book (Sweet
and Hard Cider) has a section (For Informational Purposes Only)
on various applejack methods.
Mark
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Apple Jack?
From: Gordon Pellegrinetti <gordon@joseph.me.uiuc.edu>
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 10:32:43 -0500
Roger Rabbit asked about Hard Cider:
Apple jack is hard cider that is concentrated by freezing and then removing
the ice crystals. The official name is Fractional Crystallization
Distillation, I think, and as such, it is as illegal as any other
distillation in the States. Of course it is much safer.
The way I`ve seen it done, is to take two bottles of still, sweet hard cider,
put it in a two liter bottle and put it in the freezer, which ideally should
be at about 25-28 F (-4 C). When the ice crystals form, they form crystals of
just water molecules, one at a time, which leaves the sugar, alcohol and flavors
behind. When the jug is about half frozen and slushy, pour off the liquid
through a strainer. Starting with fairly strong cider 12% alcohol, you end up
with two bottles: one of apple cordial at 20+% alcohol, and one of a very
light cider at about 3% from the melted ice. To my brewing friends who have
tried them, both ciders are even better than the original!
Definitly worth the experiment! Good luck.
gordon@joe.me.uiuc.edu
------------------------------
Subject: salicylic acid?
From: af509@osfn.rhilinet.gov (Rolland Everitt)
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 12:00:32 -0400
I am an experienced winemaker and brewer who is new to this list.
I hope the following question is not too naive, and I appreciate
any comments, either posted or private.
I recently visited a friend who treated me to some homemade cider.
It was great. I asked for the recipe, which is reproduced below.
I was really surprised at the last ingerdient.
50 gallons cider
50 pounds cane sugar
2 quarts orange juice concentrate
2 ounces salicylic acid
When he told me, I was sure he meant citric acid, or malic, or
something, but it was salicylic. He mixed this in a big plastic
barrel and transferred it to a wooden rum barrel to ferment. He
pitched 10 packets of Red Star Champagne yeast. By now it has aged
for about nine or ten months, and it is yummy.
I have never heard of salicylic acid being used in this way. Can
anybody enlighten me?
Rolland Everitt
------------------------------
Subject: yeast results
From: rownby@televar.com (Ray Ownby)
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 16:39:45 -0700
Thanks to Greg Appleyard <gappleyard@EM.AGR.CA> for sharing his yeast
experimentation with us all; I too have found the yeast to make a
significant difference to the flavor profile. One note of my own I might
add; my wild yeast fermented batch had some AWFUL smells during and after
fermentation, but now 10 monthe or so later, it is in the top 2 of the 7 or
8 different batches I made last fall, YMMV. I personally find the
Nottingham dry yeast to be my favorite, but I also like a sweeter rather
than a dry cider.
- -Ray-
"Aye, aye, Bessy, never brew wi' bad malt upo' Michaelmas day, else you'll
have a poor tap."
-Mr. Tulliver From "The Mill on the Floss"
by George Eliot
rownby@televar.com
- -Ray Ownby-
Moses Lake, WA
------------------------------
Subject: Pumpkin mead
From: rownby@televar.com (Ray Ownby)
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 1995 16:39:56 -0700
>Steve Hollander writes:
>I have about 100 pounds of French homegrown pumpkins and want to make a
>big batch(say 50 gallons) of mead and not have to mess with the strainer
>bag.
>How do you make mead from pumpkins?? Inquiring minds want to know.
>Peter Hoover
>prh4@cornell.edu
I don't know how everyone else does it, but last year I made some that
turned out great. What I did was peel the pumpkin and grind up the meat.
Then I mashed it overnight in 170 deg water, strained as well as possible
and added the remaining fluid to my boiled honey and water. If I remember
right, I did add some acid to balance it out. Turned out great; but it was
VERY cloudy and would not clear, but a little gelatin solved that. 9 months
later I have a very good drink. This is taking us a bit off of the subjest,
so if anyone wants to continue this discussion we should move it to the Mead
Lovers Digest.
- -Ray-
"Aye, aye, Bessy, never brew wi' bad malt upo' Michaelmas day, else you'll
have a poor tap."
-Mr. Tulliver From "The Mill on the Floss"
by George Eliot
rownby@televar.com
- -Ray Ownby-
Moses Lake, WA
------------------------------
Subject: Dabinett again
From: rcd@raven.eklektix.com (Dick Dunn)
Date: 21 Sep 95 08:20:41 MDT (Thu)
Sitting here watching the first snow fall (&#@%**!...while just over on the
western slope the weather is still late-summery), I found myself wondering
once again what sort of cider apples would have a chance in our freakish
weather. (Apples do grow well here for the most part; it's just that you
can count on losing the entire crop about one year out of every five.)
With several recent mentions of Dabinett, I went to _The_Book_of_Apples_ to
see what it had to say. "Full bittersweet" is a good thing, esp. since in
the US we can find sweet, tart, aromatic, but rarely bitter. Someone
already mentioned that Dabinett is self-fertile, which is a good thing for
those of us who can only have a few trees total. BUT the book also claims
that Dabinett is not a vigorous tree, and that you'd expect to harvest it
in November. OK, so it's out for me, but I'm wondering if people here on
the digest in the US have been growing it successfully, and if so, where?
[I can see how it fits with England's cider country--which is farther north
than any place in the US you'd attempt to grow apples, but is moderated by
nearby ocean.]
Still seeking good choices of cider apples for an area with crazy weather.
- ---
Dick Dunn rcd@talisman.com -or- raven!rcd Boulder, Colorado USA
...Simpler is better.
------------------------------
Subject: bounced submissions? OK to re-send
From: cider@raven.eklektix.com (Cider Digest)
Date: 22 Sep 95 20:26:20 MDT (Fri)
If you tried to submit something to the digest earlier this week and it
bounced, try re-sending it now. There were several transient problems at
Colorado SuperNet (csn.net in the headers) on Wednesday and Thursday, with
odd messages like "MX record points to itself" (when they broke things) or
"cannot write...[blah]...fopen failed" (as they tried to fix it).
Sorry for the inconvenience; I wish I had more control over this stuff.
- ---
Cider Digest cider-request@talisman.com
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor Boulder, Colorado USA
------------------------------
End of Cider Digest #555
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