Ale AND Champagne yeast

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Nerro

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That's right, 2 yeasts in 1 cider!

The idea being that beer yeast are fast and apparently do ok in high OG brews and that champagne yeast can make it into the 19% - 20% ABV Apfelwein that I want to make.

I ground apples (Braeburn apples) into a pulp and strained to yield a reasonable quantity of juice. I added enough sugar to raise the OG to 1.142 (approx. 19% expected ABV) on the assumption that the FG will be ~0.995 to yield an Apfelwein of approx. 20% ABV. To effect the fermentation I added Ale yeast and champagne yeast. Right now after six days the SG records as being 1.060 which means I have 11% ABV in 6 days and also means that the ale yeast ought to be crapping out about now.

I did a 14% ABV a while ago and it's awesome, hence the high ABV experimentation :)

I'll post updates in another week.
 
Are you kidding? It's racing like no tomorrow, I actually added the champagne yeast a day later because I'd used the wrong tube the first time around. It was already belching CO2 by then.
 
damn 11 in 6 days? is it possible just add enough sugar for this abv and have a week long brew? how long did the 14 take? If you guys can suggest something sensible i will try it
 
What's your juice-to-sugar ratio? I mean, yeah, you can get alcohol from combining yeast and sugar, but that doesn't mean it'll taste any good.
 
remember, 28g = 1 oz.

The fresh juice had a sugar content of 110g/L, (which roughly corresponds to an SG of 1.060) I added 275g/L to bump up the SG to 1.142.

With the 14% Apfelwein I did something similar with a smaller amount of added sugar and ít tastes great.
 
have you tried using just straight Ale yeast? I was thinking of trying this for a quick brew
 
Are you kidding? It's racing like no tomorrow, I actually added the champagne yeast a day later because I'd used the wrong tube the first time around. It was already belching CO2 by then.

Not really surprising as this original gravity is similar to a 14% ABV beer, which many ale yeasts will do.

Hopefully the champagne yeasts will get a foothold and take the cider as dry as you want. I'd worry a little that they didn't get the chance to build up the population needed due to being pitched in a active fermentation. However the champagne yeast are pretty hardy stuff and should do the job.

I still think you would be better off with the champagne yeast only in your ferment unless you are trying to get some yeast esters from the ale yeasts. To push a yeast to this high of an ABV it needs to be very healthy. And if the ale yeast are competing with the champagne yeast the population will not be as healthy as they could be.

Do not be surprised if this one ends a little sweet.

Craig
 
Pitching two yeasts (without waiting for one to fully attenuate, then adding the other) is also problematic from a repeatability/consistency standpoint. You can't count on the yeast maintaining the same population balance batch-to-batch, so any flavour contributions will be inconsistent.
 
Champagne yeast also produces a compound that kills most (if not all) beer yeasts, there is an episode of the Jamil show about it... SO, what has happened is the ale yeast worked for a day, then you pitched the champagne yeast and once it got rolling it killed all the ale yeast, so now its just champagne yeast.
 
BUMP!

It fermented out completely. Tastes fiery but good right now. I'll lager it for a few months now.

Ill keep you posted.
 
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