The folks at got mead reckon I messed this one up, any thoughts?

I was wondering if anyone had any sujestions or comments on my current batch of cider. Recipie as follows:

5 gallons of murray cider.
10 cans of apple juice concentrate
2 pound brown sugar
5 tsp. yeast nutrient
1 package lavalin ec-1118

what do yall think?

well, if the yeast can take it, that thing is gonna kick you in the face

I doubt your recipe is going to produce what you intend. It's got WAY too much sugar/concentrate for the batch size.

EC-1118 has an alchohol tolerance up to 18%. I'd kill the yeast when it got to around 15% then age it for a year or two. It will probably be pretty sweet, but it might be good.

thats definately like asking chuck norris to open your teeth up with the chapped side of his hand.

Its already fermented out dry. Its not really that much kick. I calculated it out (i dont have an OG reading on it) and its only around 11% abv. That could be wrong I guess. The Cans of AJ concentrate were meant to make 1 and 1/2 quarts of juice. Ive tasted it and it is certainly alcoholic, but it wasn't at all unpleasent even a day after I racked it to the secondary. once it clears i am going to age it in the gallon jugs that the cider came in to begin with. Im going to oak at least some of it. May backsweeten some of it too. Not sure yet.

So, if you're happy with the end product, why are you asking if you screwed it up?

Your calculation seems a bit low. Do you have OG and FG readings?

Orangevango said:

Its already fermented out dry. Its not really that much kick. I calculated it out (i dont have an OG reading on it) and its only around 11% abv.

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How did you manage that? You need both Original and final gravity readings to calculate the abv. If you are floating a triple scale hydrometer and it is still at the 11% mark, you are still just a hint shy of Pancake Syrup.

I used the "mead calculator" I added all the grams of sugar from the nutritional facts labels of the ingredients and gave the calculator that number and the volume. The current gravity reading is steady at slightly less than 1.000

so, when this batch drops clear, I am going to split it up into 5 one gallon jugs and see the effects of different aging practices. Each jug will be aged differently.

1 gallon on oak (cubes)
1 gallon straight
1 gallon backsweetened a little bit
1 gallon backsweetened a bit and on oak
1 gallon on oak to save for a year or more

im excited to see what will happen.