Apple Cider Racked Onto yeastcake (WLP320)

So, I'm a relative newb to this whole brewing thing and I have a whopping half dozen partial mash/extract beers to my name and i've gotta admit, i'm ridiculously addicted and looking to experiment!

Last night I racked a honey wheat over to one of my secondaries, but instead of dumping out all that perfectly good yeast (wlp320) from the primary I decided I wanted to either "wash" it (i've never done it before) or try dumping some perfectly good apple cider on top of it (I've never made cider before either)....
30 Minutes and 35 bucks worth of beautiful apple cider goodness later, i'm home pouring it all into a bucket. Did I read somewhere that white labs 320 yeast was the perfect yeast for hard cider? nope.... Apparently everyone used wine or champagne yeast.

Maybe I should be picked up by a short yellow bus for work every morning, but what do you guys think about trying to make hard cider with an American Hefeweizen Ale Yeast?

PS- 24 hours later it's chugging right along with an airlock making that bubbly sound we all love. something must be working...

You have the right idea! Economical, variety and just plain smart! I typically will rack off the cake/lees once and add more right on top. At most, the cake is only 2-3 weeks old before I rack. And as far as the Hefe yeast, I had good results. It's one of many ale yeasts I've had success with brewing cider. Good call doing what you did! I'm sorry if you get addicted

Thanks for the vote of confidence! I didn't even think about about the economical aspect of reusing yeast when I made the cider. I guess at 3-6 bucks per vial it adds up over time! definitely gonna experiment more often.

The only thing with that yeast is that you will have cloudy cider. Not a big deal if you don't mind it.

The only other thing I could think of would be to avoid reusing yeast from a high gravity beer. If you brewed an imperial stout that finished at 10% abv...I'd say it's better to start fresh. Otherwise its a great money-saving technique.

As for cloudy cider, can't I as some pectin to clear that up? I made no energizer, nutrient or pectin additions... Only additions were lime juice and chai tea.

It's a wheat strain right? I think it might just be cloudy. There's probably still residual cloudy funk from the heffy beer. Cloudy doesn't mean bad. The heffy was good right?

Just racked the hefe to a keg( from secondary, Only left it a few days) today to stop fermentation (og 1048 fg 1007 @ about 5.3 abv) tasted a small sample and it was pretty good! Cold crashing in a corny now and ill force carb in a day or two. As for the cider I'm not really worried about how it looks right now. I'm more concerned about tadte.

As

Any thoughts on finishing this cider out with champagne yeast? Besides drying it out will it impart any other flavors that the hefe yeast doesn't?

alegrador said:

Any thoughts on finishing this cider out with champagne yeast? Besides drying it out will it impart any other flavors that the hefe yeast doesn't?

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If you already stopped fermentation with the wlp320, why would you want to start it up again? Champagne yeast will bring it down to under 1.000. If you like it the way it is just leave it.

I'm about 4 days into fermentation. I haven't checked the gravity since OG and I'd like to keep FG around 1005-1010 for a little sweetness. Understandably the champagne yeast would dry it out, but would it give it any new flavors that the hefe yeast alone couldn't bring out?

I've used champagne yeast on cider only once and it took a while for the unpleasant yeast flavors to subside.

Champaign yeast is very energetic and may blow some of your flavor out the airlock. It is also robust stuff and you'll get a bone dry cider.

I'll leave the champagne yeast out of the picture this time and see what happens then. just checked the gravity and it's already at 1011 and still chugging right along. Also took tasted the sample and it's pretty damn good but maybe a little sweet.. 5 points lower and i'll crash it. since it's a Hefe yeast i'm guessing it would be a pain in the buttocks to clear. Any idea what I can use to help clarity? pectin? or is it too late...

PS-Just a real quick thanks to everyone who contributed to this thread. I really appreciate it!

I've never used it but gelatin might work.

I use betonite for mead, not sure if it will work for cider though. Heard of people using gelatine

I racked to secondary a few days ago, took a reading etc.. and dissolved a packet of gelatin in about a cup of water. Overall it has cleared up a bit but by no means is it crystal clear. Given that it's only 12 days old at this point, I'm pretty happy with the results. :rockin:

Cold crashing will help as well, if you have the means to do so.

I've been thinking about building a chamber on top of my mini fridge that holds my kegs. It would be similar to the build where you would use gallon jugs and fans to lower temperatures except I wouldn't need the water jugs.. Just a fan, temp controller, a 3-4" hole cut into the top of my fridge and some sort of trap door that would close the hole and keep continuous cold from entering.

21 days later MY first hard cider has fermented completely and has a FG 1.000 and an abv of 6.95

Smells like a wine, no off smells. Taste is dry, a little tart and has a little bite (from the alcohol?). The color is a light yellow and relatively clear for such a young cider ( used a wine glass to sample. In the carboy it had a nice light honey amber color like most ciders). Given a few weeks to lose the bite I imagine I could back sweeten with apple juice and it would be pretty frikin spectacular!

If I could change anything id cold crash around 1.010 to retain some sweetness and to keep the abv around 5ish. Granted, back sweeting with apple juice will cut the alcohol.