rightwingnut

Recipes 

Just a thought, and probably nasty, but how does hops in cider sound?

Janx

Recipes 

They're pretty quiet unless you listen real carefully...

__________________
Oh don't give me none more of that Old Janx Spirit
No, don't you give me none more of that Old Janx Spirit
For my head will fly, my tongue will lie, my eyes will fry and I may die
Won't you pour me one more of that sinful Old Janx Spirit

smoothak

Recipes 

I have never made cider before. Lets say I have a one gallon jug of unpasteurized cider. How much yeast do I put it? What type of yeast do I buy? Can I just open the top, dump it in, and put the top back on, or do I need a special container? How long do I let it sit? Is there a certain location (out of sunlight, etc.) that matters? Temperature?

Thanks for your help.

thorgrimnr

Recipes 

1- 5 gram pouch of champagne yeast.
1- rubber bung
1-air lock assembly

Total Cost excluding juice $3.00 maybe

Take the lid off the juice, to decompress the bottle. Put the lid on. Shake the juice jug for about a minute to oxygenate the juice. Take the lid off and pour your dry yeast on the juice. It will form a tiny floating island and sink into the juice in about 3 minutes. Put air lock on. Let sit at 78 F or 22 C for:

2 weeks for super dry 9% dead 'ard cider. Less time fermenting will yield a sweeter cider if that is your preference.

Providing you selected the 2 week option. You can now bottle the stuff.

You like sparkling or still cider?

For sparkling, add 1/2 teaspoon of corn sugar or white sugar if none other is available to each bottle. Add about 1/2 ounce of cool boiled water to each bottle and swirl it around to dissolve the sugar. Syphon the juice out of the little carboy into each bottle filling it about an inch an a half from the neck.
Shake each bottle and let stand for 2-3 weeks untill plastic bottles are hard and cannot be squeezed. After about 6 weeks the cider will drop clear or just go for it now, like traditional English farmhouse cider.

Still cider is just a matter of bottling it without the sugar primer.

This is the dead basics.

At any rate you will want to move the cider off the "lees".Lees is the finished yeast cake you see sitting at the bottom of your jug.

Doing this will ensure your finished cider doesn't get polluted from the spent yeast, but you could leave it sit there for about 3 1/2 weeks before you need to worry too much about it.

Moving cider off the lees and letting it sit in another glass car boy is called putting your cider into secondary....if you already brew you know all this and I'm just being annoying....SO.....

let us know how it goes and if you have any more questions.

smoothak

Recipes 

Thanks. Much help. I'll let you know how it turns out.

lacopa

Recipes 

I'm trying to make my first batch.

This quote was very helpful to me. I'm following it as closely as I can except that I already started before I found this forum. Next batch will be as per these instructions.

So far I've gotten a bottle of juice and dumped bakers' yeast into it. Then I let it sit with the cap on loosely for a long time. I tasted it and it seems to be fermenting slowly, and carbonating. Any suggestions now that I've skipped all the important stuff? Will it kill me to drink it?

Where can I get a rubber bung and airlock? I live in the hicks, so a mail or internet order is ideal.

thorgrimnr

Recipes 

Well if you haven't yet found an online supplier of an air lock or rubber bung, I have heard of people using a clean bit of cotton wool sort of propped in the opening of the jug. What you really want to do is allow gasses out and not have any free floating nonsense getting in. The cotton wool will work because the force of the gas leaving the bottle can pass through the air in the cotton fibres and stuff can't fall in. It's not ideal, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

You will want to watch( taste ) your cider fairly closely. As feremntation slows and it's open to the atmosphere, it will eventually become apple vinegar. So if you're cider tastes very sour, like vinegar, well I'm afraid it's vinegar.

I've also not used brewers yeast so don't know much about the results, but others in this forum have some experience...

Look under the link called BREWING ACCESORIES. I've not ordered from these folks but it will give you some idea.

http://www.homebrewheaven.com/

kid mode

Recipes 

Hi, I'm new here. I only brew cider and though pasteurized juice might not be as good, you're gonna have an impossible time finding unpasteurized juice in the store. As long as there are no preservatives, it will ferment and make a nice beverage.
Also, in responce to the earlier thread of carbonating with just apples. I just fnished a batch where I primed the bottles with fresh juice and it turned out just right. I was very pleased. I never got consistent results with added sugar.

kilroy

Recipes 

Hmmm Fresh apples to prime the Carbonation - very interesting idea. will have to try that in my next batch.

Thanks

Also - an online reseller that I have had decent luck with is www.homebrewit.com , also just ordered some stuff from wineandbeerfactory.com

Try them.

Andrew

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Primary:
Nothing - Out of room - have to bottle something before I can fit more on the aging shelf.

Secondary:
Lost count, too many damn carboys