My Banana Cider Recipe, what do you think?

So, for my next cider I'll be making a test 1 gallon batch. Recipe as follows:

80 fl oz cider
33.8 oz Looza Banana Nectar
.6lbs light brown sugar
Safale S-04 Yeast
1 Tsp Yeast Nutrient

Let ferment out, then rack to 2nd carboy and cold crash.

Anything not look right?

I personally would use fresh bananas. one of the best wines I ever made was banana and brown sugar. I would do the bananas and brow sugar in a primary with just enough apple to cover them then rack them off and add the rest of the cider and let it ferment out. just a thought

Daze said:

I personally would use fresh bananas. one of the best wines I ever made was banana and brown sugar. I would do the bananas and brow sugar in a primary with just enough apple to cover them then rack them off and add the rest of the cider and let it ferment out. just a thought

Click to expand...

I appreciate the suggestion, Daze. I've thought about it, but I want to attempt this with the nectar. I was under the impression that if I used the bananas (whatever form) in the primary that much of the banana flavor would be fermented out. Is this untrue?

I also prefer fresh fruit. I've never had Looza banana nectar, but I'd guess that it's more sugar and water, than it is banana.

fermenting is fermenting primary or secondary. if you are back sweetening with it that would be something different but remember when back sweetening a concentrate will work better than a juice because juice will dilute everything including the ABV and only add a minimal amount of sweetness. concentrate on the other hand will deliver maximum flavor and sugar with a minimum of dilution.

a) Putting bananas into a less vigorous fermentation (eg secondary) will mean that less aroma and flavour compounds escape with the CO2. But I wouldn't worry too much about it. I'm sure you'll get a pleasing result whatever you do.

b) The banana wine recipes I've seen have suggested that you slice fresh banana without removing the skin at all. Do some research into that method, I think Yooper made the Banana wine thread.

c) Another option to consider would be to use a "Hefeweizen" beer yeast. Hefeweizen is a style of wheat beer that is known for having banana esters and clove phenols, so that might be either a replacement of or a complement to the banana in your recipe. Ferment as warm as you can, ie warmer than room temperature. Not sure if that's going to be possible up there in your American January winter, but if you ferment in the room that you keep your fireplace or furnace, you might be okay. I did a 24C/75F fermentation of a wheat wort with Safbrew WB-06 and got lots of banana. Just ask your LHBS store for a hefeweizen (heh-feh-vai-tsen) yeast. The only thing to consider is that it's a very stubborn flocculator, and you'll have to crash cool for a long time to get it to flocc.

Please keep us up to date with the process and outcome. I have always wondered what banana cider would taste like!!!

Thanks again guys, for the information and suggestions. Since this is a test batch I think I'm still going to try it with the Nectar, and if I don't like the outcome I'll try using fresh fruit.

As for the suggestion of Hefeweizen yeast, unfortunately there is little chance of keeping temperatures within 10 degrees of the optimal number. I live in a 100+ year old drafty house. However, thanks for the suggestion, as I should have thought of using a Hefe yeast, myself.

I will keep this thread updated, don't worry!

Just edited my recipe to show what I ended up doing, I'll also include a picture for reference:



We'll see how it goes.

Update:

The air-lock began bubbling 5hrs after the yeast was pitched. Seems quick.

What are the ingredients on the "nectar"? The fact that it's called a juice "drink" feels ominous.

I looked it up on line before I made my original comment on this post and it is banana water and sugar.

Pith said:

What are the ingredients on the "nectar"? The fact that it's called a juice "drink" feels ominous.

Click to expand...

In order (from my bottle):

Water, Banana puree concentrate, natural flavor citric acid & sugar.

Here is the label:

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Looza-Banana-Nectar-Juice-1-qt/10412588

when reading a label "natural flavor" is code for MSG just thought you might want to know.

Daze said:

when reading a label "natural flavor" is code for MSG just thought you might want to know.

Click to expand...

Perhaps, but I've found different ingredient listings on several websites, none of which mentions MSG. I doubt there is MSG in this beverage, but it's possible I suppose.

When I click the link that you posted from walmart it shows the ingredients listed as: Water, Banana Puree, Sugar, Lemon Juice. (contains 25% banana juice)

I also saw another one that is Hero brand that says all natural, not from concentrate, no high fructose corn syrup (but doesn't list ingredients) and kosher also.

Let us know how it goes with your experiment. Good or bad, it sounds interesting.

That is my point, they don't have to say MSG because "natural flavors" IS MSG. There are enough crazy people like me out there that read labels on ALL their store bought food that manufactures have changed what things are called to hide it. MSG is a flavor enhancer that comes from kelp and the listing of "natural flavors" always means MSG

Daze said:

That is my point, they don't have to say MSG because "natural flavors" IS MSG. There are enough crazy people like me out there that read labels on ALL their store bought food that manufactures have changed what things are called to hide it. MSG is a flavor enhancer that comes from kelp and the listing of "natural flavors" always means MSG

Click to expand...

I think it might be more apt to say that MSG can be put under the umbrella term of "Natural Flavor" than to say that all "Natural Flavor" ingredients are disguised MSG.

At least from what I've gleaned from various sources on the web.

johnsnownw said:

I think it might be more apt to say that MSG can be put under the umbrella term of "Natural Flavor" than to say that all "Natural Flavor" ingredients are disguised MSG.

Click to expand...

yes that is a true statement however 99% of the time "natural flavors" means MSG and the 1% of the time when it doesn't than the label will say "no MSG added" right after the "natural flavors". Take it from some one who has a family member that is alergic to MSG. Not trying to be a jerk or put down what you did. I am sure it will turn out great MSG is something that makes flavors stronger thats why it is so popular in processed foods of all kinds from sweet to savory. I was just trying to point out something you may not already know.

Daze said:

yes that is a true statement however 99% of the time "natural flavors" means MSG and the 1% of the time when it doesn't than the label will say "no MSG added" right after the "natural flavors". Take it from some one who has a family member that is alergic to MSG. Not trying to be a jerk or put down what you did. I am sure it will turn out great MSG is something that makes flavors stronger thats why it is so popular in processed foods of all kinds from sweet to savory. I was just trying to point out something you may not already know.

Click to expand...

No worries, I wasn't taking it that way. I appreciate your heads up, and it led me to do more research on the matter. I cannot see how being informed could ever be a bad thing.

Good call daze. I always just thought MSG was some salt derivative. On wikipedia it says:

"However, the term "natural flavor" is now used by the food industry when using glutamic acid (MSG without the sodium salt attached). Due to lack of FDA regulation, it is impossible to determine what percentage of "natural flavor" is actually glutamic acid."

and that is the kicker. To change the name all have to do is slightly change the chemical composition and then the consumer is unaware of what they are actually ingesting. Like I said before it is a "natural flavor" as it comes from kombu which is an edible kelp.

Kind of scary how the food industry can get away with that. With all the public outcry against high fructose corn syrup they modified the process slightly and started calling it "high maltose corn syrup" still the same basic thing as far as our bodies are concerned.

I digress back to the issue at hand it is important to know what is going in to your wine when using store bought juices. I have no idea how "natural flavors" effects yeast or what affect yeast have on it. If it was a sugar, like high fructose corn syrup at least we know what will happen to it, the yeast will break it down just like they would any other sugar so the end result is basically the same, but not being a sugar it may or may not be ingestable by yeast, they may or may not like it, and they may or may not turn it in to something else.

Whether or not MSG is involved, you're only getting approximately 8 ounces (25% of 33 ounces) of actual banana in the final product, plus a bunch of water and sugar. So, I would say you will have a slightly more watery cider with a hint of banana flavour MAYBE.

Daze said:

I personally would use fresh bananas. one of the best wines I ever made was banana and brown sugar. I would do the bananas and brow sugar in a primary with just enough apple to cover them then rack them off and add the rest of the cider and let it ferment out. just a thought

Click to expand...

Do you have you recipe from this batch? I would like to try it.

Pith said:

Whether or not MSG is involved, you're only getting approximately 8 ounces (25% of 33 ounces) of actual banana in the final product, plus a bunch of water and sugar. So, I would say you will have a slightly more watery cider with a hint of banana flavour MAYBE.

Click to expand...

It's possible, the whole point of this was to see what would happen.

Update:

So, I racked it to a 2nd carboy today and threw it in the fridge. It is very murky and I'm hoping cold crashing will clear it up a bit. It measured at 1.002.

Smell: It smells like yest and alcohol...that's it...nothing else there...really.

Taste: It tastes sour and tart, with no hint of apple or banana. Mostly a strong flavor of alcohol prevails.

Yeah, the sharp aroma/taste from all that extra sucrose from the nectar will take a while to age out. Also the water from the nectar will dilute the flavour. You could age it for a bit, but I'm not sure whether there are enough alcohol/tannins to keep it aging well. Make sure you expose it to as little oxygen as you can so that you get the most out of the aging you do do.

You could also just pour the beer into a glass with a bit of sweet syrup or something in the bottom to balance the sour taste, like they do with Berliner Weisse.

Daze said:

I personally would use fresh bananas. one of the best wines I ever made was banana and brown sugar. I would do the bananas and brow sugar in a primary with just enough apple to cover them then rack them off and add the rest of the cider and let it ferment out. just a thought

Click to expand...

Chuckabrewski said:

Do you have you recipe from this batch? I would like to try it.

Click to expand...

here is what I did... as best as I can remember, it was 10 years ago

makes 2 gallons

6# bananas washed and sliced but still in the skins
5# brown sugar
2 gallons boiling water
2 TSP acid blend
2 TSP pectic enzyme
1 pac Montrachet yeast

put bananas in a straining bag in a sterilized primary. dissolve sugar in to water and bring to a rolling boil. Pore the boiling liquid over the bananas add acid blend and cover until the side of the fermenter is warm to the touch but not hot. Add pectic enzyme and recover. Weight 12 hours then pitch yeast. Give the yeast 5-7 days to do there thing than rack to a secondary fermenter, bottle when clear and age at least 1 month.

Final product kind of reminded me of cream soda with out the bubbles. You could taste the banana if you knew it was in there but if you had some one try it and didn't tell them there was banana in it they couldn't quite tell until you told them it was banana and they they would always say "I totally taste that"

As a side note YOU MUST USE the pectic enzyme. First time I made this I didn't and I had clear banana jelly floating on the top of the primary fermenter.

Pith said:

Yeah, the sharp aroma/taste from all that extra sucrose from the nectar will take a while to age out. Also the water from the nectar will dilute the flavour. You could age it for a bit, but I'm not sure whether there are enough alcohol/tannins to keep it aging well. Make sure you expose it to as little oxygen as you can so that you get the most out of the aging you do do.

You could also just pour the beer into a glass with a bit of sweet syrup or something in the bottom to balance the sour taste, like they do with Berliner Weisse.

Click to expand...

I'll most likely age it, but I think if I had caught it earlier it would have turned out much better. It still seemed to be fermenting away, but I should have checked it earlier. Oh well, we shall see.

Cool, well let us know.

Update:

Well, interesting. I just bottled after letting it cold crash. It is still sour/tart, but mellowed out a bit. There is a small amount of banana flavor, but it's more like the flavor of the smell of ripe bananas (if that makes sense)..still no apple. The smell is still mostly of alcohol but also ripe banana.

I've decided not to pasteurize (last gravity reading was 1.002), and I'm just going to let it bottle age for a few months in the basement. We'll see what the end result happens to be, but I'm slightly more optimistic.

Hmm. Good luck. 1.002 is fairly dry. I don't know if there will be enough sweetness to counteract the sourness; maybe you can dilute with lemonade or that fizzy apple drink if it's too sour.

UPDATE:

I decided to crack one open a few weeks ago (Forgot to update). The sour flavor has mellowed a bit, but not a lot. Still pretty sour, still tastes like over-ripe banana without much apple.

At this point I would not recommend this method.

What is the idea behind leaving the bananas in the peels?

stormyday said:

What is the idea behind leaving the bananas in the peels?

Click to expand...

If you use uber ripe bananas, to the point peel is 75% dark, fruit is soft and getting translucent but not brown you impart so much banana flavor. Plus the peels are loaded with nutrients. I also think the peels expedite clearing, just from watching my batch. If you do opt for a wine, be prepared to age a minimum of one year, 2-3 even better.