Cyser Racking Additions Questions

In my first venture with mead, I made a Cyser based upon the Fall's Bounty recipe in Schramm's book. The recipe was: 4 gal organic apple cider, 9lb Tamerisk Honey, 1lb organic dark brown sugar, 2 tsp yeast energizer, 1 tsp yeast nutrient, and 10g of Lalvin D47. I added 1 tsp of yeast nutrient extra after 3 days of fermentation to keep the yeast healthy. It fermented really well and I just racked it to the secondary with a gravity of 1.010 (didn't measure O.G because I didn't dissolve the honey with the cider -- just left the honey on the bottom and could watch the level continuously drop as it fermented -- guessing it would have been around 1.10). My question is if I should have added anything like a Camden tablet(s) when I racked it. Or, is it okay to just let it ride and continue to ferment/clear? Any advice will be much appreciated.

Camden is only necessary if you are trying to stop the fermentation where it is. I don't do anything special to try to stabilize my cysers. I just let them ferment dry and condition.

But I also try to stay away from sulfates and sulfites because of my wife's migraines.

High_Desert_Brew said:

In my first venture with mead, I made a Cyser based upon the Fall's Bounty recipe in Schramm's book. The recipe was: 4 gal organic apple cider, 9lb Tamerisk Honey, 1lb organic dark brown sugar, 2 tsp yeast energizer, 1 tsp yeast nutrient, and 10g of Lalvin D47. I added 1 tsp of yeast nutrient extra after 3 days of fermentation to keep the yeast healthy. It fermented really well and I just racked it to the secondary with a gravity of 1.010 (didn't measure O.G because I didn't dissolve the honey with the cider -- just left the honey on the bottom and could watch the level continuously drop as it fermented -- guessing it would have been around 1.10). My question is if I should have added anything like a Camden tablet(s) when I racked it. Or, is it okay to just let it ride and continue to ferment/clear? Any advice will be much appreciated.

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If the ferment was still going, I wouldn't have bothered racking it.

No point trying to guesstimate gravity by looking at it, you'd find that you're likely miles out......

If the ferment is still going, then the racking is likely to have removed some of the yeast colony. If you add sulphites, whether in the form of powder or campden tablets it'll stun the yeast and most likely stall/stick any ferment activity.

You'd only normally add sulphites after the ferment is finished, then it's usually recommended to add sulphites every second racking, as it acts to stun any yeast cells present, but also helps by acting as an anti-oxidant.

If the yeast is likely to have any room in it's alcohol tolerance to referment when/if any more fermentable sugars are added, then you would generally rack a finished mead onto sulphites and sorbate so that it's stabilised and allows you to add further fermentables to back sweeten the batch.......

fatbloke said:

If the ferment was still going, I wouldn't have bothered racking it.

No point trying to guesstimate gravity by looking at it, you'd find that you're likely miles out......

If the ferment is still going, then the racking is likely to have removed some of the yeast colony. If you add sulphites, whether in the form of powder or campden tablets it'll stun the yeast and most likely stall/stick any ferment activity.

You'd only normally add sulphites after the ferment is finished, then it's usually recommended to add sulphites every second racking, as it acts to stun any yeast cells present, but also helps by acting as an anti-oxidant.

If the yeast is likely to have any room in it's alcohol tolerance to referment when/if any more fermentable sugars are added, then you would generally rack a finished mead onto sulphites and sorbate so that it's stabilised and allows you to add further fermentables to back sweeten the batch.......

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Thanks for the feedback. I probably should have left it in primary for another week or two, but I needed to free up my larger carboy. Got more brews to make!

High_Desert_Brew said:

Thanks for the feedback. I probably should have left it in primary for another week or two, but I needed to free up my larger carboy. Got more brews to make!

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Always the case. Too many brews, not enough fermenters or money for extra ones.....

Beernik said:

Camden is only necessary if you are trying to stop the fermentation where it is. I don't do anything special to try to stabilize my cysers. I just let them ferment dry and condition.

But I also try to stay away from sulfates and sulfites because of my wife's migraines.

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Well, that's not how it works. Campden doesn't stop fermentation, and winemakers use it routinely as an antioxidant at racking. Wine yeast strains are amazingly tolerant of sulfites- and they don't impact fermentation at all.

Honey wine (mead) is not as vulnerable to oxidation as wine is, so it is often left out unless the mead will be aged for a long time and so it's added by some mazers for that purpose.

All fermented wines and meads have sulfites naturally, so there is no such thing as a "sulfite free" wine or mead. However, commercial wines and meads usually have sulfites added as a preservative and asthmatics and a few others who are sensitive to sulfites should avoid those. Anybody who can't eat raisins or dried fruit, for example, should avoid wines and meads with added sulfites.

I use 50 ppm of sulfites in my wines and meads when aging them, which is lower than commercial wines and meads, but enough to protect them from oxidation and infection.