Cydermakr

Recipes 

You don't need to add anything to the fresh cider except whatever you plan on feeding the wild yeast like sugar, honey, molasses etc. you can add citrus fruit, nutmeg, cinnamon whatever.
Be sure your 5 gal bucket is sanitized and that can be your primary. Rack it into your sterile glass carboy after the airlock slows down its activity. Be sure to fill the glass carboy up with more apple juice, up into the neck and reapply the airlock. You can keep it in the carboy til you are ready to bottle. Good luck!

roadymi

Recipes 

Why not just harvest it, wash it, and freeze it?

__________________
Reality is an illusion that occurs due to the lack of alcohol.
Give a man a beer, he'll drink for the day.Teach a man to brew, he'll be drunk the rest of his life.
I have 8 carboys, 8 cornies, 5-1 gal jugs, 200 wine bottles, 10 cases of beer bottles and a nice assortment of flip tops....My goal is to keep them at least 50% occupied

Homebrewnewb

Recipes 

Hello home brewers,
I'm not sure if this is the right place to be asking but i have a few questions about wild yeast in cider.

I have some experience with making cider years ago, but it was grandpas old wait and see method. I was going to start a batch, and thought I would do some more research on the science behind brewing, and am finding a ton of good info in this forum.

So here comes my newb question, I know you can help.

Saturday afternoon I visited a local orchard to pick up some fresh unpasteurized preservative free cider. The original plan was to treat it with K-metabisulphite before mixing everything and starting fermentation by adding yeast. The cider was left in the trunk overnight(was late when I got home, and was near freezing overnight) I was planning on sanitizing everything and starting this batch Sunday, but didn't have the time.

When I brought in the cider on Sunday morning I noticed one of the gallon jugs had a bit of foam in it, but thought it may have just got shook up a bit (was very little, but enough to notice). Now this (Monday)morning it is clear to see that this jug is actively fermenting.

I have heard many times that wild yeast make the best cider but can be hard to start, not a problem here.. My question is about the chances of a bacterial infection if I just go ahead with this untreated cider. Obviously treating the fermenting gallon will stop fermentation, but should I treat the other 3 gallons before mixing? Should I treat all 4, and just restart it with yeast? Also I just cracked the lid briefly on this fermenting gallon in hopes it would survive until I return from work, was this a bad idea? possibly allowing more contaminants into the mix?

Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Ian