Graff (Malty, slightly hopped cider)

I used US-05. I will say that this morning, it is bubbling like crazy, but there isn't a Krausen. Is that normal with Graff?

posting to save....

angrymeat said:

I have seen people post about making spice teas for this but I haven't seen them post about how they turned out I was thinking of doing the same for a nice fall graff but would like to see some feedback on how it worked for everyone.

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I haven't seen any tasting notes yet. I *will* post tasting notes on my spiced test batch, but I still have to bottle and condition, so It'll be at least three weeks.

KCBigDog, I had a huge krausen with my graff using us-05.

onipar said:

KCBigDog, I had a huge krausen with my graff using us-05.

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I did too, but it seemed to take longer to get there than my beers fermented with US-05.

Hopefully it will look better when I get home today. Started bubbling within hours of pitch, and some foam developed, but no Krausen.

IffyG said:

I did too, but it seemed to take longer to get there than my beers fermented with US-05.

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Actually, now that you mention it, it did take a while for the krausen to build up. Fermentation started in less than 10 hours, by the 2nd day I had a thick layer of krausen, and by the end of the week it actually doubled in size.

I also thought the fermentation lasted quite a while compared to beers I've made. And another anomaly was that the krausen took a very long time to fall.

And today we have liftoff!

Can't wait to drink this stuff, but it will probably wait for a slot in the Keezer. I'm a little carried away with my brewing.

On tap: Double Chocolate Milk Stout, SWMBO Slayer, Rye Saison
Keg Conditioning: Braggot (8.63%abv) and Sunset Wheat Clone on Steriods (7.1%abv)
Primary: Belgian Tripel and GRAFF

I just got mine pitched at about 10 pm last night it was bubbling with a thin foam layer this morning used Nottingham ale yeast on mine I cant wait to try it ill have to spice up the next batch/

I've decided to give Graff a go using a cider kit that contains Malt Extract as standard. The ingredients are solely Apple Concentrate and Malt Extract.

Anyway, I added some extra sugar - burnt honey - and boiled a mixture as the recipe suggests, give or take. I used the requested amount of hops, but an awful thought has just struck me...

Hops are there to balance the sweetness. It's not quite finished fermenting, but my guess is that sweetness will be much lower than usual, as I didn't add extra Malt Extract, just that which was contained in the kit. So the possible scenarios are that it's totally fine, or that it's fermented quite dry and the hops will make it bitter as hell. My OG was 1.040 because I topped up with water, as I didn't want the apple taste to be ridiculously strong.

Anyway, IF this has gone wrong, I need to correct it by restarting fermentation with Malt Extract, I'd imagine. Should adding this straight into the brew as it stands (still slightly fermenting) work or will I need to restart?

So i racked off a gallon of this and threw in half a cinnamon stick, some whole all spice, and a little under a 1/4 cup of brown sugar. I was going to let it sit for around 3-4 days and remove the spices. Ive never bottle anything less than 5 gallons so i was wondering how much priming sugar to use. I was thinking about maybe 1oz, does anyone have any input on this?

MrOrange said:

I was thinking about maybe 1oz, does anyone have any input on this?

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That should be fine.
1 oz. per gallon is a good rule of thumb.

MrOrange said:

So i racked off a gallon of this and threw in half a cinnamon stick, some whole all spice, and a little under a 1/4 cup of brown sugar. I was going to let it sit for around 3-4 days and remove the spices. Ive never bottle anything less than 5 gallons so i was wondering how much priming sugar to use. I was thinking about maybe 1oz, does anyone have any input on this?

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I bottled 1 gallon the other day and used .7 oz (assuming .9 gallons after loss, 75 degrees bottle conditioning temp, and 2.25 volumes of Co2).

Today I'm bottling the other 4 gallons and I'm using about 3 oz of sugar, with much of the same from above (2.25 volumes CO2, 3.9 gallons after trub, etc).

Just added some more malt to mine because of a low OG - 1.032 - very different recipe to this one. It's graff now though, through and through! How fast are people generally drinking this when it's ready? I had a sneak taste today and it was fizzy from residual co2 - very peculiar.

RobWalker said:

Just added some more malt to mine because of a low OG - 1.032 - very different recipe to this one. It's graff now though, through and through! How fast are people generally drinking this when it's ready? I had a sneak taste today and it was fizzy from residual co2 - very peculiar.

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I had a 4 oz taster glass of this today when I bottled, and I'll tell you what I told my brother: I'd drink it "still" straight from the bucket.

To me, even before carbonation and bottle conditioning, this stuff tastes awesome. The apple flavor shines bright, it's dry, but somehow still has a touch of sweet. It is ever so slightly tart, but balanced really nice.

I haven't yet tasted it finished, but if it tastes this good before conditioning, I imagine I'll start drinking them after 3 weeks in the bottle.

In fact--if I remember correctly--the whole point of adding the 1 gallon wort is to get a cider that's balanced and ready to drink in "beer aged" times rather than the usual months a cider takes.

Oh, and I think I detected a little fizz as well.

It definitely tasted well balanced thinking about it so I'll give you that one! With an extra 500g Malt Extract in there, it should taste sweeter when it's ready. FG was 1.010 but it might not have finished fermenting, I wait until it's clear every time

RobWalker said:

It definitely tasted well balanced thinking about it so I'll give you that one! With an extra 500g Malt Extract in there, it should taste sweeter when it's ready. FG was 1.010 but it might not have finished fermenting, I wait until it's clear every time

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What yeast are you using? I used safale us-05, and it fermented out to 1.002 (from an OG of 1.060), so yeah, probably a bit more to go.

Made this yesterday with a couple alterations as suggested by the guy at my LHBS. I used 1# Amber DME and 2# Light DME (extra 1# based off his suggestion). Then 15 minutes into the boil, I added 1 whole nutmeg and 1 cinnamon stick. Took my OG and it was at 1.066. Drank the sample I pulled for my reading and it was YUMMY. Can not wait for this one to get into the bottle.

OK- I tried this about a month ago, followed the instructions as best I could, OG 1.063, FG 1.006, it's been kegged for about a month, and it seems pretty harsh to me.... Obviously at 7.3% its going to have some bite, but does anyone think I may have done something else wrong? It's just not as drinkable as I would have imagined.

Ruffhouse, how is it harsh? Hops too prominent, no apple taste, etc. When I have made this, at about 3 wks the apple taste is often subdued, and the hops noticeable. As it hits 4-5 wks the apple shines and the hops have settled in nicely. I presume storage temp and other variables could all influence this though. People just love this stuff that have tried mine.

To me the alcohol is a bit too much and it tastes a bit sour. The other night we tried a trick that one of our friends used to do when drinking cider- salt! Kinda strange, but it seemed to mellow out the sour taste. But that was my first batch of anything cider-like anyway, and I'm kinda a noob, so I didn't know if that's what it was supposed to turn out like.

Well I cracked open a few bottles after 6 weeks and the apple flavor is really starting to come through. It's pretty tart, and any over-spiciness from the hops has now mellowed out. It has definitely gotten a lot better from the initial 2 week taste test.

Unfortunately after 3 bottles, while I had a decent buzz going last night, I woke up with probably one of the worst headaches I've ever experienced. I highly recommend a couple of tylenol or aspirin and a big glass of water before you call it a night to keep from a similar fate.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have a porcelain throne I need to go bow to

Cozmcphish said:

Well I cracked open a few bottles after 6 weeks and the apple flavor is really starting to come through. It's pretty tart, and any over-spiciness from the hops has now mellowed out. It has definitely gotten a lot better from the initial 2 week taste test.

Unfortunately after 3 bottles, while I had a decent buzz going last night, I woke up with probably one of the worst headaches I've ever experienced. I highly recommend a couple of tylenol or aspirin and a big glass of water before you call it a night to keep from a similar fate.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have a porcelain throne I need to go bow to

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Do'h!

Yeah, I've heard apple wine and hard cider can kick your butt if you're not careful.

Just opened a bottle of this last night for a taste test after 2 weeks bottled. Amazing! For some reason the apple nose on this batch is much stronger than my last batch, unfortunately i cant really say much more about the taste until i let it age another month or so.

Silly question: If I were to scale this to a 3G batch, do I just scale all the ingredients the same (60%)?

The only fermenter I have available to make this is a 5G carboy (really seems to hold closer to 4.5G) and would like to try this soon.

Thanks.

BulldogBrewer said:

Silly question: If I were to scale this to a 3G batch, do I just scale all the ingredients the same (60%)?

The only fermenter I have available to make this is a 5G carboy (really seems to hold closer to 4.5G) and would like to try this soon.

Thanks.

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Yes, (except for the yeast). And, I wouldn't bother scaling back the torrified wheat.

It's a good refreshing beverage. It tastes exactly how you would think, a malty apple beer/cider.

Awesome, thanks. Yeah, it sounds great.

well i was planning on bottling this last weekends after two weeks in primary after tasting i racked off to a secondary added a spice tea and am letting it site for another week before I bottle. I must say the tasting was terrible was like really dry tart white wine with a small hint of apple. I have read allot of comments that says it really gets good at 4 week so we shall see I will let set for another week and bottle this weekend there was no sweetness at all anything I can do or am I just rushing it. The one thing I missed in my batch was the torrified wheat lbh was out so i got camden tablets as suggested but then when brewing i noticed i was supposed to let those set in the juice for 24 hour prior so I never added them I thought I would be ok because i heard they were just for head and body should I add them now ?

Any good substitute for the torrified wheat? I was hoping to make this sunday or monday, but it looks like I won't be able to get any wheat for a couple of weeks.

I am making a batch this afternoon. I will report back when it is finished. A friend of mine made a batch a few months ago. He didn't care for it all that much, but I really liked his batch.

The torrified wheat is only for more head retention (foamier.) I have made Graff 5 times now and never used the wheat, because I can't get any and it's still delicious.

Just leave it out.

DoctorWho said:

The torrified wheat is only for more head retention (foamier.) I have made Graff 5 times now and never used the wheat, because I can't get any and it's still delicious.

Just leave it out.

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Really? More head means foamier?

My lhbs sold me heading powder instead of torrified wheat - normal wheat should work if you bash it up and mash the crap out of it. Not a major issue though...

I've got a cream ale thats almost ready to rack. Any thoughts on leaving a gallon and putting the 4 gals of apple juice on that?

What apple juice are you guys using? I've used Mott's on both my Edwort's Apfelwein and this graff (followed the directions exactly) and they've both ended up extremely tart and not very palatable. I've even let the apfelwein sit for 7 months and the graff for 2 months and they haven't balanced out much at all. The graff does have more apple shining through, but still way tart. I'm thinking it's the Mott's juice, what about you guys?

Hey Coz, does the mott's have added vitamin C? that will make it more tart. I made a cherry apple graff with cheepy juice, but after 10 months it was pretty good

CA-LT1 said:

Hey Coz, does the mott's have added vitamin C? that will make it more tart. I made a cherry apple graff with cheepy juice, but after 10 months it was pretty good

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I was thinking the same thing. I got some cheap (Tree Top, I think) juice from shoprite, but it has no added vitamin C. It's cheap concentrate stuff, at least partially from China, but the resulting Graff has tasted pretty good so far.

CA-LT1 said:

Hey Coz, does the mott's have added vitamin C? that will make it more tart. I made a cherry apple graff with cheepy juice, but after 10 months it was pretty good

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I think original Mott's 100% apple juice does contain vitamin c. Is that the culprit? I notice on their website that they sell fresh pressed apple juice that contains no vitamin c, should I switch to that next batch or is there another brand you guys recommend?

So I made this about 5 months ago and just left it to ferment. I have problably just shy of 5 gal in the carboy and and planning on putting 3gal in a keg and putting the rest in 1L swingtops.

A few questions, does this get better with age? Should I carb the keg like a normal beer? Should I bottle some without any prime?

Strawman said:

I've got a cream ale thats almost ready to rack. Any thoughts on leaving a gallon and putting the 4 gals of apple juice on that?

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hey man, I've got that exact same concoction in my primary right now, I'll be racking this into a secondary tonight, where it will sit for another two weeks. the cream ale was pretty strong and on the dry side, but good (7.5abv). I do this with every lighter-colored ale I do. my family and friends love it. I'm a little anxious about this batch not having enough hop presence, as the cream ale isn't the hoppiest brew in the world, but we'll see.

jblizz said:

So I made this about 5 months ago and just left it to ferment. I have problably just shy of 5 gal in the carboy and and planning on putting 3gal in a keg and putting the rest in 1L swingtops.

A few questions, does this get better with age? Should I carb the keg like a normal beer? Should I bottle some without any prime?

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this stuff does get better with age, but 5 months in a primary might be pushing it! I can't wait to hear what it tastes like! please share your tasting notes. I always keep a keg of this on tap.