candi sugar in cider?

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goodbyebluesky82

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I've used brown sugar in a cider once and liked the dark buttery taste from the molasses.

What do you think dark candi sugar would do for a cider?

Not worth the money when I can just use brown sugar?
 
A related question: Does the crystalline structure of the belgian candi sugar help it to not fully ferment, thus adding more sweetness to the cider than brown sugar would?
 
A related question: Does the crystalline structure of the belgian candi sugar help it to not fully ferment, thus adding more sweetness to the cider than brown sugar would?


That kinda kints at the heart of my question. Brown sugar leaves behind some unfermentables compared to dextrose or plain white sugar. I assume candi sugar does as well, and was wondering how it compared in its fermentability, and flavor it left behind.

I'm not very familiar with belgian beers so had no idea what flavor was imparted by candi sugar and how it compares to regular brown sugar.
 
all belgian candi sugar is is an inverted cane sugar. your better off just using a straight maple syrup or such natural sugar
 
I'd use plain old brown sugar, it's cheaper & will impart pretty much the same flavour as the candi sugar. If you want more of that dark, molasses flavour, try using some actual molasses, go easy though, a little molasses goes a long way. I used 8oz. in 3 gallons of cyser & it comes through rather nicely, but any more & it would've overpowered the honey & apple. With cider, I'd use even less, maybe try starting with 1oz molasses & see how you like it, then move on to 2oz & see how that works for you, and so on. Regards, GF.
 
all belgian candi sugar is is an inverted cane sugar. your better off just using a straight maple syrup or such natural sugar

Good point, maybe I'll try something like a turbinado sugar or that "sugar in the raw" stuff that hasn't been processed so much. (since regular brown sugar is just heavily processed white cane sugar with molasses added back in)
 
Hm... sugar beet wine?

Interesting red color, I wonder if that gives it antioxident powers?

;-)

I would think that rock sugar would slow the fermentation down considerably, but you're have to kill the yeast to stop it anyway. Your OG and FG would be un-related, because you would have sugars being constantly released -- you would not have a hard reference point for the OG. I think that your ABV would also be lower as you would probably want to quash the yeast so you would bottle it, or you'd wind up having a much longer fermentation to get all of the sugars converted.

Hey, I wonder if that would yield an "aged while fermented" cider? Probably not, as only part of the cider would be aging at any given point in time, and none of it would be aged the same amount at the other parts. I am getting dizzy.

If you're looking for information on final flavor differences, I can't help you there, as I'm still fermenting my first batch(es). :)

If you're looking for sweeter finish, I think the two options are, stop the fermentation sooner (lower ABV and you have a kill off the yeast) or follow through to final ABV where the yeast start to die out naturally, and then back sweeten.

All of this is supposition. :-D
 
Hm... sugar beet wine?

Interesting red color, I wonder if that gives it antioxident powers?

;-)

I would think that rock sugar would slow the fermentation down considerably, but you're have to kill the yeast to stop it anyway. Your OG and FG would be un-related, because you would have sugars being constantly released -- you would not have a hard reference point for the OG. I think that your ABV would also be lower as you would probably want to quash the yeast so you would bottle it, or you'd wind up having a much longer fermentation to get all of the sugars converted.

Hey, I wonder if that would yield an "aged while fermented" cider? Probably not, as only part of the cider would be aging at any given point in time, and none of it would be aged the same amount at the other parts. I am getting dizzy.

If you're looking for information on final flavor differences, I can't help you there, as I'm still fermenting my first batch(es). :)

If you're looking for sweeter finish, I think the two options are, stop the fermentation sooner (lower ABV and you have a kill off the yeast) or follow through to final ABV where the yeast start to die out naturally, and then back sweeten.

All of this is supposition. :-D

I'm not asking because I'm concerned with sweetness. I am curious what the difference is, subjective as it may be to each individual, of what each type of sugar imparts in terms of flavor firstly, and secondly residual sweetness... which isn;t as much of an issue because that can be adjusted by backsweetening.
 
I know this is an ancient thread, but before doing research I bought some D-45 to use in a blackberry cider.

I blended and strained 3lbs of blackberries, mixed that with 2.5 gallons apple juice and 1 lb of the d45, OG was 1.060, added some pectic, yeast nutrient and 1 pack of WLP 720.

Its still fermenting but ill pull a sample sometime in april and update with the flavor profile. My original idea was to add some brandy barrel chips to create a 'blackberry brandy cider. I thought the caramel and vanilla notes would play really nicely with that...but only time will tell
 
Thanks for posting, I'd like to hear how it comes out. 3 lbs of berries for a 2.5 gallon batch isn't a whole lot, so you might not notice much blackberry flavor or aroma, but you could always split the batch and add more to half of it in secondary and see how that works. Note that fruit is mostly water so your actual OG was probably slightly less than 1.060 after adding the fruit.
 
If it wasn't clear the 1.060 hydro reading was taken once the blackberry juice, Apple juice and d-45 was combined and well mixed up. That should account for any water content from the berries correct?
I did a test batch of blackberry juice and realized how subtle those flavors really are. I originally wanted 20% of the juice bill to be blackberry but I had a hell of a time finding pure blackberry juice and decided I'd just see what happens with trying to make my own lol, and at almost $6.00/lb of fresh berries 3 was about all I wanted to buy for an experiment lol.
Anyways, my back up plan will be to buy a few more pounds of frozen blackberries and rack on top of those, (my 3 gallon fermentor is pretty maxed out) depending on where the flavor is at in another 3-4 weeks.
 
I thought beet sugar was a simple sugar and thus 100% fermentable? Did I get confused somewhere?
I will absolutely keep this thread updated with my results and how the flavors blend and work out
 

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