Amateur Question

When is it done? My cider has dropped from 1.057 to 1.010 in 5 days. Based on reading the expert thread experiments etc at the top of the page, letting it go any more is going to give it less of a cider "Woodchuck" feel and more of a wine feel, which is what I don't want. The flavor right now is exactly what I want.

It's a 1 gallon batch I was going to bottle to 1 L flip-tops to carbonate and age with some oak for a while.

The age old conundrum... how to stop fermentation early and carbonate without a keg.

The only thing I can think of is to bottle them all as-is, and wait a day or two at a time and keep checking one of the flip-tops until it's carbonated, then keep them in the refrigerator and hope they don't blow up.

Had I used a beer yeast instead of Red Star and EC1118, I'd feel more comfortable with this method. In my experience, these yeasts don't take kindly to assassination attempts, much like hosing down a hornets nest, it really seems to just piss them off.

sweet carbed cider is asking for bottle bombs.

It sounds to me like you know when it is done, but you refuse to listen because you don't want it dry. It tastes so much better when it has had a chance to age instead of making it and drinking it all within a month. You probably added sugar to the batch, too.

Negative, no sugar added. 1.057 was the gravity of the no-additive cider from Earth Fare.

Last time I just used splenda and primed the dry cider, but SWMBO doesn't like that. I thought it was great.

Here's what's going to happen. I'm going to bottle them today and monitor one after 24 hours (based on the speed at which it's fermenting right now, that should be more than enough time) to see it's carbonated, then I'm going to pasteurize the bottles for 5 hours at 130 F (less risk of explosion than at high temps) and then in 6 months with an oak cube in each one, it's going to be fantastic. You'll see... I'll show you... candle man...

and when/if I fail.. it will be SWMBO's fault. Not mine. It's only a gallon, I only got it for the glass jug.. so it's a good opportunity to experiment. yes yes?

You're going to bottle early on purpose, simmer than at 130 degrees, age them on oak for 6 months? Ok. Let us know how that works out. If you don't have bottle bombs or an oaky beverage, I'll be surprised. I hope I'm wrong.

I've aged wine and beer on oak cubes for a couple of weeks, and it took many months for the flavor to age out to something drinkable. I used one ounce for 3 gallons. I'm not sure how many cubes that is. You may wish you put the oak in first, then bottled it after it was removed from the oak.

1 cube per liter bottle, which equates to 4 cubes per gallon. A 3 oz package of oak cubes from Midwest is about 150 cubes. I was thinking about doing something crazy and adding 2 per bottle. Possibly spraying them with WD40 first.

Since we've been talking about it, the sample has already dropped to 1.009.

..........................

WD40? I think I'm missing something here...

If you have to ask, you aren't a level III home brewer.

Fletch78 said:

Since we've been talking about it, the sample has already dropped to 1.009.

Click to expand...

If it's dropping that fast, it's still fermenting pretty hard. I wouldn't be surprised if this cider would finish at .990 if allowed to finish. I really, really think you're heading for bottle bombs. Please keep these somewhere safe, so no one gets hurt. When you pasteurize (a terrible idea), please either put them in a pressure canner or in the dishwasher or somewhere they won't hurt someone when they blow up.

The WD-40 is always a good idea. Either that, or duct tape. I have a tool box with three items. WD40, duct tape, and a hammer. Everything else is just frills.

I took off 1 liter in the previous pic to pasteurize according to plan, letting the rest go dry. It will be stored under the house in the crawlspace.

I left a bottle under cap overnight, at the rate it's been fermenting (almost 10 basis points a day) that should be more than enough to carbonate it. I pasteurized it this morning and repeated the process exactly with a bottle of water with thermometer and it topped out at 135 degrees for about an hour and a half as it trickled back down to 120. It's under the house, so if it explodes, we should be safe.

In all seriousness, do any of you know that 135 won't kill EC-1118/red star p cuvee? There is a water heater under the house, I'd hate to have to replace it.

Fletch78 said:

I left a bottle under cap overnight, at the rate it's been fermenting (almost 10 basis points a day) that should be more than enough to carbonate it. I pasteurized it this morning and repeated the process exactly with a bottle of water with thermometer and it topped out at 135 degrees for about an hour and a half as it trickled back down to 120. It's under the house, so if it explodes, we should be safe.

In all seriousness, do any of you know that 135 won't kill EC-1118/red star p cuvee? There is a water heater under the house, I'd hate to have to replace it.

Click to expand...

I really don't know. I've heard that temps over 140 kill yeast, but I don't know if that's actually true or not. When I make bread, I'm sure that some of my liquid for my bread yeast has gone over 110 degrees, but the bread still rose. I know it's a different strain of yeast, but I would think they'd be similar. The problem would be if even ONE cell survives, it can reproduce and start fermenting again. To be more safe, storing the bottle in the fridge would work better.

I have an email out to Lalvin right now, will report back with any relevant info.

Lalvin hasn't responded. The main batch is at 1.000 now. If my experiment didn't work, would the bottle have blown up by now? Or is it going to wait until I try to pick it up?

From 1.09 to 1.000 I don't think is grenade level, but getting pretty high. Put on some shades, long sleeve shirt, gloves and put it in the fridge, down low in the back. Don't even think of the door, for three days.
Then pop it, and give it a small taste. Now that your at a SG of 1.000 you might as well bottle the rest.
People, once again I have to say stay safe out there. Bottle bombs are not myth or legends. They really can hurt you.
The only way I make "safe" sweet carbonated cider is using splenda, and kegging, then bottling. Everything else is art/science/and a ton of good luck.
BTW, I hate the taste of splenda, so I rarely do it. GET THE HINT.
Learn to love dry cider, really it is the bomb, and the only bomb I trust my self to make.
But there is always that perfect accident that taste just perfect, that I can never recreate.

There was an Aussie around here a few weeks ago talking about pressure-release tops for making "soda". I don't remember why I didn't buy a few of those from his link.

The other three bottles were bottled today. 3 oak cubes in one, 1 cube in another, and no oak in the third. The pastuerized portion has 2 cubes. So far it hasn't exploded. I primed these with 2 Tablespoons white sugar to about 3/4 gallon.