Man, I love Apfelwein - Page 39

dibby33 · 12-18-2006, 08:53 PM

going to try and start this tonight. nice warm weather here just now so it would be fantastic to sit out on the desk with this.

todd_k · 12-18-2006, 08:54 PM

anyone bottle this in wine bottles?

I would have bottled this already but I don't have enough bottles to do it. I have 2 batches including this one that need bottling. I think one is destined for the Party Pig.

ill.literate · 12-18-2006, 09:15 PM

Greetings all!

We've officially joined the Apfelwein bandwagon.

We bottled our first ever brew, a bock, last night so while we had all the stuff out, and sanitizer made up, we decided to start the Apfelwein last night.

We tweaked the recipe ever-so-slightly.

Five gallons of apple juice, 1.5 pounds of corn sugar and .5 pounds of dark brown sugar.

For the yeast we used a Wyeast Champagne yeast smack pack, which, I didn't smack hard enough apparently because the inner bag hadn't broken when I opened it (I've never used a smack pack before). So I sanitized a knife and punctured the inner pack, mixed it as best I could and poured it into the juice and sugar mixture.

No real vigorous fermentation yet, but I see a fairly steady stream of small bubbled making their way up the side of the carboy.

Can't wait to try this!

Thanks Ed, as well as everyone else who's made this and posted their tweaks, etc!

oznozz · 12-18-2006, 10:32 PM

I was wondering if I should rack to a secondary, considering my recipe/situation/etc. I've never done that, but at the moment I have insufficient bottle caps, and I'm worried about autolysis.

quick review :
* 3 gallons cider, quick boil, cooled, pitched onto yeast cake from spiced pumpkin (really squash) ale
* 5 days later, added another 3 gallons cider + 1.5 lb sugar + 2 lbs honey (quick boil, cooled, added)
* active fermentation ended about 7-10 days ago
* I'm not going to be able to bottle it for at least another 2 weeks

Thoughts?

**olllllo** · 12-18-2006, 10:35 PM

Ed keeps them in the primary exclusively, some of which have been in there since October.

No worries.

**EdWort** · 12-18-2006, 11:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by todd_k

anyone bottle this in wine bottles?

Here's what I use.

They hold 1 Liter each.

Kevin K · 12-19-2006, 03:03 AM

Might have screwed up here guys.

Yesterday when I grabbed the apple juice cartons to make my starter, I grabbed the wrong ones.

This is what I grabbed:

...and this is what it says for ingredients:

Filtered water, apple juice and/or apple juice from concentrate (filtered water, concentrated apple juice), sugar/glucose-fructose, malic acid, natural flavour, colour, vitamin C.

Didn't realize it until today when I topped up with another 12L of the right stuff (pure) and 3 cups of dextrose.

Am I up **** creek?

Sir Humpsalot · 12-19-2006, 06:15 AM

The only thing I see which might cause a problem is the malic acid. Any scientific folks want to tell me what the heck that is?

brewman ! · 12-19-2006, 08:34 AM

Its an acid. I've used it in beer making. No biggie.

My fermentation is slowing down. Is anyone clarifying their apfelwein ? Anyone racking it to a secondary ? *chuckle... my inlaws are coming next week. I wonder if I should bother bottling or kegging it or if we should just drink it from the carboy ! I'm dying to taste it.

**Orfy** · 12-19-2006, 09:05 AM

Taste it. Use taking a gravity reading as an excuse if you need one. It'll be wonderfull.