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Cider Digest #0881
Subject: Cider Digest #881, 11 November 2000
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #881 11 November 2000
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
RE: Cider Digest #879, 24 October 2000 ("Luedtke, James [Minn]")
RE: twist-offs ("Brian Lundeen")
artificial sweeteners (Warren Place)
Re: twist off CAPS (GREATFERM@aol.com)
the end ("Brian Black")
Clarity, aftertaste, fortify before bottling (dproksa@anexsys.com)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: RE: Cider Digest #879, 24 October 2000
From: "Luedtke, James [Minn]" <James.Luedtke@cgiusa.com>
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 13:46:53 -0500
A couple of weeks ago I allowed 5 gallons of juice to begin fermenting on
it's own. Varieties were a dessert mix of Sweet Sixteen, Keepsake and
Honeygold (all hardy, northern varieties). Ambient temperatures have been
pretty warm, about 45 to 75 F. I'm afraid some fruit flies got into it
despite my efforts to screen them out. Some vinegary odor is already
noticable, hopefully it only affected the floating pomace. I have siphoned
off the juice, placed it in my freezer, and won't bring it out until I get
some good, active Champagne going to overwhelm the other beasties.
On replicating English cider blends, WindRiver Brewing, a mail order
company, offers a juice concentrate supposedly made from English cider-style
apples. Has anyone tried this approach? WindRiver also has a web site,
http://www.windriverbrew.com/cider.html
Jim Luedtke
------------------------------
Subject: RE: twist-offs
From: "Brian Lundeen" <blundeen@rrc.mb.ca>
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 13:11:01 -0600
Bob Capshew writes:
> Eli,
>
> Whenever we encounter capped twist off bottles in
> homebrew competitions we almost always find some
> oxidation or often flat beer. I would not recommend
> using crown caps on twist off threaded bottles. It isn't
> worth the chance of losing some precious cider.
I'm afraid I must question the conclusions you've drawn from your
competition experiences, at least from the brief description you've provided
here.
First of all, if you are encountering oxidation but not flatness, then one
could reasonably conclude that the seal was not the problem. Oxidation can
be introduced in various stages of the brewing process, including leaving
too much headspace at bottling time. A centimeter of headspace is plenty.
For those worried about the oxygen left in the bottle, there are oxygen
absorbing caps for a slightly higher price than regular caps.
Flatness is often caused by a poor seal, but can also be caused by yeast
fatigue, sanitizer residue, and excessive or insufficient headspace. Even if
the culprit is the seal between the bottle and the cap, one must also
consider that the procedure used in capping can also be to blame. At the
risk of speculating, I would bet (but no more than a quarter) that these
leakers are coming from hand-cappers, not bench cappers. With the increased
risk of bottle breakage, perhaps they are not being capped with sufficient
force to provide a good seal. I would repeat my original advice, do NOT
attempt to use twist-offs without a bench capper.
Cheers,
Brian
------------------------------
Subject: artificial sweeteners
From: Warren Place <wrplace@ucdavis.edu>
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 12:19:58 -0800 (PST)
> From: Shroom <shroom@theriver.com>
> I have to agree, if you're homebrewing, why resort to artificial means. One of
> the attractions of making it yourself (besides the "hey, that's cool, I made
> my own alcohol") is that it doesn't have any potentially harmful chemicals -
> and let's face it, something everyone agrees is harmless today could show up
> as a carcinogen in 20-30 years. If you're making a product you have to get
> out the door to appeal to a large market, then you do what you have to, I
> can understand their using additives, and as long as I like the taste, I
> don't mind buying their product on an occasional basis.
>
> Fred B
> Tucson AZ
Then again, sucralose may never be found to be a health
hazard. If you're really worried about such potential health risks, you
better not venture outdoors and suffer exposure to solar radiation (aka
sunlight). ;) Oh, and ethanol is also a posion! Seriously though, I
mentioned the use of sucralose on this newsgroup so many months ago
because it was an exciting new tool for cidermakers to use in order to
craft a sweet cider at home. The reason to use it is that it is by far
the most simple means of making a sweet cider. No pasteurization,
excessive racking, or artificial carbonation (in the case of sorbate
usage) required. It works for me, good luck to the rest of you.
Warren
------------------------------
Subject: Re: twist off CAPS
From: GREATFERM@aol.com
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2000 15:53:09 EST
Something nobody mentioned...there is a difference between a crown cap and a
TWIST-OFF crown cap. Both look exactly the same, but the twist-off is made of
thinner or softer metal, and I believe the seal is designed differently as
well.
This may explain the inconsistencies you are hearing.
My experience was that the twist-offs work on almost any crown cap bottle,
but not the regular caps, which grip a twist-off bottle too tightly, and may
take part of the bottle with them when opened.
Jay Conner
The Late Great Fermentations
------------------------------
Subject: the end
From: "Brian Black" <b.black@worldnet.att.net>
Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2000 23:08:00 -0500
Black & Fagan Cider Co has closed, but only for personal reasons. I
wanted to write to the Digest and explain our history, encourage others
to make cider commercially, and offer all kinds of help and advice
(free!) to anyone who is interested.
By way of background, Goldfinch Cider was sold in green bottled crown
capped six-packs and kegs throughout West Michigan. I (Brian Black) was
the operations/marketing/money guy and Dan Fagan (my lifelong friend and
cousin) was the cidermaker. We have made cider together since we were
illegal to do so. We're both 40. I was "between" corporate marketing
jobs in 1997, so we decided to try this. It worked. He kept lawyering,
and I ended up with my other dream job (historic building restoration -
that paid money) after we started B&F. We both continued our "day jobs"
throughout B&F's life.
We grew the business to the point of needing major investment (only
$150,000, to break even in year three) through our own meager cash
investments (no more than $10,000 each over three years) and discovered
that it is physically impossible to each operate a business full-time
(we're self-employed in our day jobs), operate a hobby business, raise
investment capital, homeschool 6 kids (each), have a life, and remain
married. Can't be done folks. So we finally cried "uncle". It was easy
in a way because we both love our profit-producing jobs. So that's why
we quit. We would sell the whole thing if we had the time. Looking back
after only two months, I don't know how we did it.
So how was it? Great. We made the best all-fresh "draft" cider in North
American, as far as we can tell (no offense, but you have to believe in
what you do). We had a very loyal local following, and a huge amount of
fun. The best part is selling it. Giving a customer a glass of YOUR
CIDER and watching the response is wonderful. "Hey, this is really good.
This doesn't taste like (insert national brand name here). This tastes
like apples, or champagne or something. What is it called? Can I have
another taste?" Now THAT is fun!
What would we do differently? Knew you'd ask. I'll enumerate.
1. Forget "draft cider" as a 6-pack market. We only chose to enter the
market this way because I thought that people would find cider more
"approachable" in this package. Partly true. AFTER we introduced
Goldfinch, the draft cider thing boomed, and we found ourselves lumped
in with some real swill (Hardcore, Cider Jack, Hornsby's, Woodchuck,
etc.) in a market we, well, detested ("Hardcore"?! Give me a break. Grow
up.) We wanted to sell to adults (as in "adult beverage"), and kept
sliding into the post-pubescence "market segment" (see #2 below). My
fault. We should have packaged Goldfinch in 750 ml bottles with crown
caps. This would have put us in a wine market, where we are personally
comfortable, and where cider as a product belongs. We still would have
offered it in kegs, and this would have added a unique aspect to the
"wine" side of things. And Goldfinch was always better from a keg. Cider
in small bottles in not very good for it. Also, we spent well over half
of our time running a bottling business, not a cidery. They are two
overlapping businesses, believe me. Counterpressure bottle filling in
scale is very complicated, technical, difficult and time consuming. But
I'm not bitter. We had fun. Then there's sterile filtering of cider, the
Final Frontier. Forget it. Don't do it. Can't be done. We know; we have
the bills and the spills to prove it.
2. Don't use a distributor, if you can avoid it. I hope they don't read
this, cause I know they have "connections", but as a group, they should
be avoided. Sell it yourself, deliver it yourself, if your State allows
it. Ours did. We just got tired of hauling full kegs around (they're
very heavy) late at night and on weekends, when we were least welcomed
by our customers. Beer distributors just don't get it, which is what we
went with cuz of the kegs. They see everything as a "segment" which is
their job I suppose. During our last month of operation this adult
beverage was introduced called Mike's Hard Lemonade, made from hard
lemons I guess. This is the strong drink of the drinkable yogurt and
instant latte crowd as far as I can tell. Anyway, this citric swill was
rammed into the market with the usual marketing drivel, and it took off
on the usual "ramp". As I was making a delivery to our local distributor
late one evening, the Sales VP crossed by path and said "Boy that Mike's
is selling like mad. Your market segment is really hot!" My market
segment. Really hot. Uh-huh. And I wondered why we had problems. So
these guys don't get it. We should have at least used a wine
distributor, but that goes back to #1 above.
Now that I think about it, those are the only two! Not bad, really. We
made some dumb "tactical" level mistakes, but these are the two biggies.
But they wouldn't have killed us.
I REALLY want other people to do this. Dan and I will do anything we can
to help. I developed a really nice business plan and investors
prospectus (am I humble or what) that I would be happy to share with
anyone. We know a whole bunch about this now and I want it to keep going
because people need to drink good cider. We walked away owing very
little money, and owning very little equipment (FOR SALE: labeler, Z&N
oxygen tester).
The cider market is waiting to be developed by a True Believer with
money. We had no trouble finding investors; we had four $20,000
commitments after six contacts: but it took six months to make six
contacts! Cider is different enough that it is attractive to investors
if presented well. If you make good cider (which I assume you do),
people want to become part of it somehow.
If you live in a cider state with even the usual varieties (you can make
great cider with them if you know how to blend), there are plenty of
people around to create a market. You only need to be regional to make a
living at this.
The offer stands. Write back.
One more thing. Andrew Lea made this entire thing possible - I mean it.
Dan and I mostly "figured things out" as we went, but we could not have
figured out all of what he already knew, and so eagerly shared with us.
Here's to a Great Man! May we meet soon and drink!
Brian Black
Retired General Manager
Black & Fagan Cider Co.
Grand Rapids, Michigan
------------------------------
Subject: Clarity, aftertaste, fortify before bottling
From: dproksa@anexsys.com
Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2000 08:57:39 -0600
In the middle of Sept. I put together a batch based on the Bill's Basic
Barrel recipe from the 'Art of Cidermaking' book using unpasteurized juice
from a local orchard. I did not add any commercial yeast. The carboy has
been on my basement floor with an ambient temp. of about 65F. I checked
the gravity yesterday, it was .800 . I was expecting that using only the
natural yeast in the juice it would stay above 1.000 and retain some
residual sweetness but none was present and I detected a yeasty, somewhat
acidic aftertaste (based on my untrained palate) plus a hazy appearance.
To remedy the clarity and aftertase issue I'm considering racking off the
spent yeast to a secondary and letting it sit for another 6 weeks. Would
it be best to store it at 65F or colder, say around 40F ? Will a secondary
even help fix these two things ?
To return some sweetness and flavor I'm considering adding some fresh,
unpasteurized, no preservatives juice just prior to bottling.
I'm a little stumped since I made a similar smaller batch last year (same
recipe, same orchard) with much better results (a couple of first and
second place ribbons plus a Best of Show). Can I recover this batch and
turn it into another award winner ?
Darrell Proksa
Downers Grove, IL
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End of Cider Digest #881
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