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Cider Digest #0582
Subject: Cider Digest #582, 28 February 1996
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #582 28 February 1996
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
RE: sweet, carbonated cider (HuskerRed@aol.com)
Carbonation (Steve Butts)
RE: Killing the yeast (Charles Castellow)
thanks/aging (lprescot@sover.net)
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Subject: RE: sweet, carbonated cider
From: HuskerRed@aol.com
Date: Fri, 23 Feb 1996 01:20:11 -0500
Hello all -
I'm a real rookie at making hard cider but I brew beer. John, are you
fermenting the cider (all the way out), then priming and bottling?
My first batch, I made just a gallon of hard cider. I pitched a packet of
champagne yeast and racked a week later. Pretty good stuff. My second
batch was five gallons, pitched the slurry. After bout a week, I racked
off to my bottling bucket and added a quart of fresh cider to prime with.
I didn't want to use corn sugar (and, of course, not malt extract). I
bottled and after another week, I had a great sparkling cider.
Charlie Papazian's book The New Complete Joy of Home Brewing has an
appendix (4) on using gyle to prime with. Gyle, in brewing, is
unfermented wort or in this case just more cider. His formula is:
Quarts of gyle = (12 X gallons of wort)/specific gravity
Specific gravity expressed in the form of 48, not 1.048. In my case, I
had a S.G. of 50 and should have primed with 6/5 of a quart but the cider
came in gallons and quarts so I didn't worry about the missing 1/5.
Cheers,
Jason Henning
Sometimes we brew in no particular way but our own.
------------------------------
Subject: Carbonation
From: Steve Butts <Stephen.J.Butts@lawrence.edu>
Date: Fri, 23 Feb 1996 08:36:53 -0600 (CST)
Cider Folks (and particularly first-timers):
I will not subject you all to my "cider-is-not-beer" lecture, but I think one
point needs to be made in light of recent communications, and it is that cider
is much slower in its fermentation process than is beer. I generally begin my
primary in late October, let it go for two or three weeks, rack back into car-
boys and bottle only in late March or April. In fact, last year the one carboy
with ale yeast kept on cooking into the summer.
Because of this slower schedule, carbonation will work more slowly too. I've
had the best success doing fizzy cider by simply bottling a bit early and
waiting a good 6 months; I find that adding processed sugar coarsens the taste
and produces a hard edge to the final result.
Not much help to those of you eager to try out your efforts quickly, but it
helps to think "wine" instead of "beer."
- -- Steve Butts
stephen.j.butts@lawrence.edu
------------------------------
Subject: RE: Killing the yeast
From: Charles Castellow <charlie@halcyon.com>
Date: Sun, 25 Feb 1996 22:35:18 -0800
>but why (and this question is open to anyone) would you want to kill =
the=20
>yeast? The only reason I can come up with is clarity. Which, I mean, =
is fine=20
>but I was just wondering if there was some other reason that killing =
the yeast=20
>in a cider was necessary.
I've probably made more than 75 batches of beer, more than a dozen =
batches of cider (the second batch winning the AHA national =
championship), and at least a half dozen batches of mead. The only =
exploding bottles I've ever had have been with cider. Cider that I'd =
let ferment for 6+ months, until there was no sign of life. Racked many =
times. No signs of yeast. Chilled. Racked. Very clear. Bottled it, =
left it a cellar temperature, then BLAM, a couple of bottles exploded. =20
I can't explain it, but if I can't keep my cider chilled, I prefer to =
filter it.
- -Charlie
------------------------------
Subject: thanks/aging
From: lprescot@sover.net
Date: Tue, 27 Feb 1996 06:11:56 -0500
Thanks to everyone who responded to me with private email about malolactic
fermentation. I really appreciate people taking the time to help me. I racked
my first batch and it tastes great so far.
My only question is how long a cider of 7% alcohol can stay in bottles before
it ages. I had a bottle of Porpom this weekend at a friend's that turned out
to be several years old, and had a very musty smell and taste. I've had IPA's
turn after a year. Does low-alcohol cider have staying power? I would guess
that it has less than beer due to the lack of hops.
Thanks again!
David Prescott, Shaftsbury, Vermont
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End of Cider Digest #582
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