Bottling Cider

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

danielofthedale

Well-Known Member
Joined
Oct 8, 2011
Messages
296
Reaction score
24
Location
Monticello
Hello all, I have brewed a few batches of beer and would like to expand my boundaries and make some hard cider. I have a few friends that really like cider have asked me to make one. In looking around I have noticed a lot of warnings about the dangers of bottle bombs, much more than I have seen in then in the beer brewing forums.

So is this something that I should legitimately worry about or am I making a mountain out of a mole hill? Any advice on the bottling process?
 
You should definitely worry if you're trying to make conventional semi-sweet cider (i.e. you don't plan on letting it ferment all the way down or you don't plan to back-sweeten it if you do). If you're OK with a very dry cider then you should be OK bottling so long as you are careful to let it ferment all the way out (could take a month or more to do so).

But if you're hoping to have any sweetness to the cider that's just fuel for the yeast and you will have bottle bombs. Might be worth giving the thread on bottle pasteurization a read if you want a sweeter cider.

[EDIT: adding link to the bottle pasteurization thread.]
 
+1 to read Pappers sticky on stovetop pasteurizing.

+1 to this.
I was worried about making a sparkling cider at first, but than I did some reading and found that filling up a plastic soda bottle with cider I could tell when the pressure was building and knew when it was time to pasteurize vs just guessing. Some ciders carb up in a few days, mine took about two weeks.

Don't leave it up to guessing or it could get ugly quick.
 
Back
Top