jslot38

Recipes 

Read through the first twenty or so results of searching, "cider bottling" and still have a question. Sorry if this has been discussed numerous times here.

Made our first cider: Process was to take 4 gallons of unpasteurized cider, boil for 15 or so minutes. Took an additional gallon and boiled it down to 1/5 of a gallon and added back into the 4 gallons. This gave us an OG of around 1.072 if I remember correctly.

Then let if ferment out completely to around .998 using a cider yeast bought at a lhbs. Transfered to secondary and its been sitting around for a couple months.

Now ready to bottle it. Will the yeast have gone dormant with nothing to eat for so long? Do I need to re-add yeast? Looking for a sparkling cider, whats the best sugar to add - have plenty of corn sugar from bottling beer. Considering the original boiling do I need to use the pasteurization method from the sticky post?

Thanks for the help.

slowbie

Recipes 

Did you add pectic enzyme? By boiling, you allowed the pectins to 'set' and if you don't add pectic enzyme your cider will be permanently hazy. If that doesn't bother you, then you can ignore this paragraph.

Anyways, your yeast will probably be okay, but if you wanted to add some yeast at bottling it might carbonate faster. Just like with beer, you can prime with whatever sugar you want. I personally plan on priming my cider with more unfermented cider. Corn sugar will also work great though.

You do not need to pasteurize because your cider is dry, so there will be no need to kill the yeast after carbonation.