Making Applejack from hard cider?

Hello. So I want to make applejack from some of the hard cider i made a while ago. I have about 3 liters that are ready to be frozen to turn into applejack. Now I understand that making applejack would need us to freeze hard cider till the water freezes then wait for the alcohol to drip through a clothing or whatever. I'm familiar with the way of making applejack, I am just worried if it will not be safe to consume. I understand that the ABV will high and I should measure how much i want to drink with shot measurements. But the thing that is worrying me the most is the methanol and fusel alcohols. I read at some sites that freezing hard cider concentrates alcohol, all of them. Ethanol, methanol and the fusel alcohols. I need to know if that is true or not, and if it will have any effect on me drinking it. And if just simply freezing it and then taking the drippings dangerous and could make me blind, how do u seperate the ethanol from the methanol after you freeze it and let it drip?

Well yes, freeze distillation will not remove methanol and fusels the way heat distillation can. However it also cannot ADD them; the only alcohol there will be the alcohol that would be in cider anyway. And it's important to remember that applejack is basically a brandy, and contains far less in the way of methanol than the potent potato and wheat mash used to distill other spirits. If you exercise the moderation you would with any other liquor, you should be okay.

In terms of the science, I don't know about dripping. In old days they freeze distilled by putting a barrel of cider outside and skimming the ice off with a ladle. Once your applejack is distilled down I suspect there is no way to remove undesirable alcohols as their filtration in heat distillation depends on the way the whole beverage evaporates.

Again though, your applejack won't contain anything cider doesn't already- just follow the "shot of liquor = glass of beer" rule they teach in driver's ed and you should be fine

So "jacking" cider is not similar to brandy in that brandy is fermented fruit juice (traditionally grapes, can be a variety of juices) that is then distilled. With jacking - in the traditional sense - there is no distillation. So all you are doing is condensing your hard cider into an ice wine through cold temperatures.

Typically, commercial examples of ice cider round out <20% so even with the best of efforts you are somewhere below coconut rum and the condensed fusel character of - say - moonshine are not an issue because your final product is not 80%+ alcohol that needs to be cut for consumption.

In the worst case scenario, provided that there were excessive fusels, you would get a nasty hangover. But that would only happen if you had an excessively high ferment. If you created your cider for the initial purpose of consumption (vs. moonshine which is fermented hot to produce as much alcohol as possible in the shortest amount of time) and fermented at celler to room temperature, then this should not be an issue.

Bottom line is that "jacking" is essentially concentrating a product. So if you have a perfectly fine cider then you will have a more concentrated version of it after the jack. You can not, however, fix fermentation flaws through the jacking process as they will just be amplified through concentration.

Drinking 4 oz of jack is no more dangerous than 12 oz of hard cider. All you did is remove 8 oz of water.

I have a similar question, if anyone is listening.

I've made a cyser (mead with cider base instead of water) and it fermented at about 17% alcohol content. If I 'jacked' it, would I need to worry about the bad alcohols, or would I just need to be sure to drink it in moderation? Also, about how much jacked cyser would I get out of regular cyser? I've bottled it into wine bottles, so I'd be popping the cork and then jacking them, and I don't want to open more than I have to get about a bottle of jacked cyser.

I have made a couple of different versions of apple jack so far; the first was with a 1 gallon batch of cider. I froze it in a plastic bottle for a couple of days, and let it drain until the color changed, and collected the rest with very little color at all. Since I collected two different strength solutions, the difference in alcohol strength was very noticeable. Kind of like brandy in one and quite hard cider in the other. I then made three gallons of cider fermented it, froze it, and then drained off all the liquid until it looked like just ice, and had no flavor to speak of. I then refroze what I had collected, separated it one more time and the alcohol level was almost too hot to drink straight. Next time I may use blackberry or some other juice and freeze concentrate that too.

EDIT: The ice that was left still had alcohol in it, so I thawed it and downed it. I was surprised there was much more booze in that "clear" ice than I had imagined.

The simple answer is stop worrying. I have researched this for a while and there is not enough Methanol made during Cider fermentation.

The concern is when idiots take corn and extract the sugars out of it to get a moonshine must and then distill this after fermented.

This happens due to high levels of Pectin in these starting products.

This video should help you. I have followed his instructions and it worked well. He also goes into the dangers....or lack of.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykc5pUw8ugA

archtech88 said:

I have a similar question, if anyone is listening.

I've made a cyser (mead with cider base instead of water) and it fermented at about 17% alcohol content. If I 'jacked' it, would I need to worry about the bad alcohols, or would I just need to be sure to drink it in moderation? Also, about how much jacked cyser would I get out of regular cyser? I've bottled it into wine bottles, so I'd be popping the cork and then jacking them, and I don't want to open more than I have to get about a bottle of jacked cyser.

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If you were to only get the alcohol portion of your cyser, 17% would be pure alcohol. Unless you are going to do multiple freeze concentrations, it's not likely you will get just alcohol. Look at it his way: if you have a 32 oz bottle of high test cyser, 6.4 ounces would be pure jacked. Figure about 12 ounces per bottle at first collection, so it would take 3 liters of cyser to get you one liter of 40 proof hooch. Look at it his way; Schnapps are about 40 proof. YMMV

If u jack 5 gal and get 2 gal. Approx same in 12 oz of cider as 5 oz of jack. So if u usually drink the two 12 oz ciders only drink two 5 oz jacks.

I have been reading and watching videos on Making Applejack, you do this as a hobby. I did a price check and the ingredients (apples,sugar,yeast) cost as much as a bottle of Asbach Uralt (750 ML) please explain.

Can we stop having the methanol question again, and again, and again, and c'mon people, really? Methanol is in beer too but we don't discuss that, do we? Forgive me for being an a$$, will you? A gallon container of apple juice or cider @ 1.050 will generally produce a 6.3% ABV hard cider. so theoretically speaking you have 8.064 oz of pure alcohol in that gallon, and if you don't have a super deep freeze freezer, you will never get that much out of it. What will most likely happen is you will get 1 pint of fairly high proof stuff with a fair amount of alcohol left in the ice. If you ferment your hard cider with a mild yeast, and keep the temperature in the low 60s F, you won't have to worry about fusel alcohols and other nasty **** that brings on horrific hangovers. I am not proud to admit that I drank a 16oz bottle of applejack by accident one night, but I am proud to say I had zero side effects in the morning. No I do not drink like that on any kind of regular basis; I quit at 2 beers or 2oz of applejack.

I made a 1 Liter batch sample but 4 hours later I see nothing going on. 1 Liter Stater brothers brand apple juice, 2 cups brown sugar 1 -1/4 oz fleischmanns active dry yeast. While heating juice and sugar to 110 I mix yeast(at 100° as per instructions on packet) with warm apple juice in a 1 quart jar and the yeast did foam up after 15 minutes . I then placed the juice in my carboy. Am i in a rush and need to give it a day or did i do something wrong.

MarkKF said:

Drinking 4 oz of jack is no more dangerous than 12 oz of hard cider. All you did is remove 8 oz of water.

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A 12oz bottle of "standard" hard cider is around 6% ABV. So mathematically speaking, there is 0.72 oz of alcohol in one 12 bottle of hard cider. Divide 4 by 0.72 and the answer is 5.55555555556. That means you would have to drink 5.5 bottles of hard cider to equal 4 oz of applejack, sort of........

Why sort of you ask, what is the finishing proof of the your applejack? What temperature is your freezer? My freezer is -10*F. Yesterday I pulled a glass bottle of a-jack out of my freezer that had been in there for 3 days, and the entire volume was liquid. According to the laws of physics, my a-jack had to be at least 40% ABV to be liquid at -10*F. That is 80 proof just like Jack Daniels. Does that help to clear things up?:smack:

My jack is made outdoors in the winter. Temps are under 15 deg. F but rarely below zero. I reduce 5 gal. 7% cider down to 2 gal. of Jack so approx. 20%.

There are 44.8 oz of pure alcohol in your 5 gallon batch, do you scoop out the slush as it forms, or do you leave your container outside for days and then pour the alcohol off of the ice block?

I put my jug in the freezer until the alcohol comes to the top, which usually takes 5 or 6 days and then pour off the golden liquid of love. Granted, my ciders are 18-20% ABV before going into the freezer and I generally only collect two quarts or less.

I leave it outside until slush forms then screen out the slush. Several times. I know it's not exact. I loose some alcohol. So what do u think my 5 gal. 7% is at 2.25-1.5 gal.?

Remember, it's not how many times or how long you freeze it...it's how cold you actually get it that determines how much ABV you can get

T_Baggins said:

Remember, it's not how many times or how long you freeze it...it's how cold you actually get it that determines how much ABV you can get

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This is true, but you have to allow it enough time, especially if you're getting down to the max % your temperature will allow.

yeah I just meant that freezing to one temp for 3 days vs the same temp for two weeks won't make a difference

So does very cold result in more loss alcohol than teens and twenties?
Does several strainings result in less loss alcohol that one big freeze?

T_Baggins said:

yeah I just meant that freezing to one temp for 3 days vs the same temp for two weeks won't make a difference

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At -10* F, in three days in my freezer, the applejack is not yet ready to pour off. In six days it is ready. So is two weeks overkill? Once again, well, maybe. Is it a freezer that is opened on a regular basis, is the inside of the freezer iced up? I partially disagree with the 3 days/2 weeks comment, but I would agree with an unlikely difference between 6 days and 2 weeks.

MarkKF said:

So does very cold result in more loss alcohol than teens and twenties?
Does several strainings result in less loss alcohol that one big freeze?

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From my limited experience with making applejack, I have learned that it is best to freeze your batch for several days at -10° F. The freezing vessel that i have found to work the best is the half gallon glass oberweis bottles. All you have to do is make sure you don't overfill them and you wont have broken glass and a mess in your freezer. Take the container out of the freezer for a couple minutes to thaw. By slightly thawing you have more access to the alcohol trapped in the ice, but it will ultimately dilute the applejack to a certain degree. If you do multiple freezings, the slight amount of thawed water in your final product will eventually be refrozen and removed. Use a sanitized sparge bag to filter the ice from the liquid. The sparge bag works great because the closer you get to 40%, the more your product goes from solid ice to the consistency of a slushy. When i do this, i put the container inside of an inverted sparge bag and tightly cover the mouth of the bottle with it. I then flip the container upside down and pour the liquid into a different container with the use of a sanitized funnel. Everything is frozen again for several days before repeating. If the liquid can't freeze, it is now 40% or higher. If you're not sure of the abv, put a small amount in a shot glass. If you take a lighter or match to it, the alcohol should catch on fire if you did everything correctly.

Icarus, you don't know nuthin'. If you hadn't flown so close to the sun your math skills would be better... j/k. If your applejack is liquid at -10*F then 40% ABV should be correct. The same as a shot of Jack Daniels. BUT, if you bottle your applejack and let it age for at least 6 months your patience will be rewarded. If you bottle it @ 1.012 and let it age for a year, you will be amazed. Really amazed.

Maybe answered previously but I might be too daft, around how much 40% abv Applejack is produced out of a batch of hard cider made from fresh pressed cider hardened with ale yeast?

Assuming a cider alcohol content of 6% abv, 15% of your original fluid will be left over to produce a 40% abv Applejack.

So 150 milliliters to every liter.

And that depends on your starting ABV. If it's higher then under ideal conditions (no losses during the process and all alcohol is in the liquid phase after freezing, which doesn't happen IRL) the yield will be higher. For instance if starting at 10%ABV you can expect an ideal yield of 250ml per liter. Or for an ABV of 13% the ideal yield would be 300ml per liter.
As a corollary, if you're planning to make a batch of cider specifically to turn it into applejack at the end, you may want to aim for a higher ABV e.g. by adding extra fermentables and use a yeast with higher alcohol tolerance.

Just use FAJC and add less water for a higher O.G.

Use a wine yeast for higher Alcohol tolerance.

I fortify my hard cider/apple wine that is headed for applejack by using FAJC; I never use any other type of sugar/fortifier and although it may sound odd, the buzz/glow you get when drinking my labors of love are very different than any other source of alcohol that my friends and I have tried. Jim Tom talks about "fighting whiskey and loving whiskey" when he refers to Moonshine referencing the way the fermentations were handled prior to distillation. All I can say is pure apple alcohol is not the kind for fighting. My fermentation process takes months and I wait until at least 9 months in the bottle aging before I will open a bottle to share with friends. Unless you have long aged your applejack, you won't know how amazing it becomes with time in the bottle. Think of making regular hard cider and drinking it the day it finishes fermenting; you know from making hard cider previously that aging in the bottle does great things for the flavor and mouth feel of the cider; the same kind of thing occurs when aging applejack.

MindenMan said:

I fortify my hard cider/apple wine that is headed for applejack by using FAJC; I never use any other type of sugar/fortifier and although it may sound odd, the buzz/glow you get when drinking my labors of love are very different than any other source of alcohol that my friends and I have tried. Jim Tom talks about "fighting whiskey and loving whiskey" when he refers to Moonshine referencing the way the fermentations were handled prior to distillation. All I can say is pure apple alcohol is not the kind for fighting. My fermentation process takes months and I wait until at least 9 months in the bottle aging before I will open a bottle to share with friends. Unless you have long aged your applejack, you won't know how amazing it becomes with time in the bottle. Think of making regular hard cider and drinking it the day it finishes fermenting; you know from making hard cider previously that aging in the bottle does great things for the flavor and mouth feel of the cider; the same kind of thing occurs when aging applejack.

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Sounds very interesting....I haven't tried making applejack yet....just reg cider & "cheaters" ice cider.

Curious what your recipe/methodology is? What ABV cider do you typically start with & what ABV applejack do you obtain? What's your typical yield from 1gal cider? Do you freeze the jacked cider just once or multiple times?

Cheers!

You mention "cheaters" ice cider, are you referring to making it with FAJC? I made "ice cider" based on what I had read on the specifics of IC are; I used a significant amount of FAJC in making my IC and it did not turn out like the store bought IC we tested. In our opinion it was so much more flavorful; if you want to get technical it would have to called Sweet Apple Wine, as the techniques for making Ice Cider are very specific, and not the exact method we used.
To answer your question about applejack: I fortify my cider up to approx. 14% ABV or so, sometimes more, sometimes less. Out of a gallon of hard cider I usually get three 12oz bottles of applejack and some "weak" hard cider I make using the alcohol from the ice. I have learned through experimentation that if I add 3oz of FAJC to a bottle and top off with the "ice water" in a couple of months I have some very drinkable hard cider.
As far as refreezing goes, it differs from batch to batch; sometimes I do, but it really depends on how much alcohol is left in the ice after the color has gone out.

MindenMan said:

You mention "cheaters" ice cider, are you referring to making it with FAJC? I made "ice cider" based on what I had read on the specifics of IC are; I used a significant amount of FAJC in making my IC and it did not turn out like the store bought IC we tested. In our opinion it was so much more flavorful; if you want to get technical it would have to called Sweet Apple Wine, as the techniques for making Ice Cider are very specific, and not the exact method we used.
To answer your question about applejack: I fortify my cider up to approx. 14% ABV or so, sometimes more, sometimes less. Out of a gallon of hard cider I usually get three 12oz bottles of applejack and some "weak" hard cider I make using the alcohol from the ice. I have learned through experimentation that if I add 3oz of FAJC to a bottle and top off with the "ice water" in a couple of months I have some very drinkable hard cider.
As far as refreezing goes, it differs from batch to batch; sometimes I do, but it really depends on how much alcohol is left in the ice after the color has gone out.

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Yes...using just FAJC & 100% AJ....have been very happy with results so far...ABV around 12%...and have used S04 & 71B so far....prefer S04...less work...and better taste/mouth-feel for me. I use that term...only based on what others here on boards have mentioned....and I'm no purist...as I've added both cinnamon sticks & tart cherry concentrate to some. [emoji41]

MindenMan said:

You mention "cheaters" ice cider, are you referring to making it with FAJC? I made "ice cider" based on what I had read on the specifics of IC are; I used a significant amount of FAJC in making my IC and it did not turn out like the store bought IC we tested. In our opinion it was so much more flavorful; if you want to get technical it would have to called Sweet Apple Wine, as the techniques for making Ice Cider are very specific, and not the exact method we used.
To answer your question about applejack: I fortify my cider up to approx. 14% ABV or so, sometimes more, sometimes less. Out of a gallon of hard cider I usually get three 12oz bottles of applejack and some "weak" hard cider I make using the alcohol from the ice. I have learned through experimentation that if I add 3oz of FAJC to a bottle and top off with the "ice water" in a couple of months I have some very drinkable hard cider.
As far as refreezing goes, it differs from batch to batch; sometimes I do, but it really depends on how much alcohol is left in the ice after the color has gone out.

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Thanks for the applejack feedback...plan to give it a shot in the next week or so.

Do you find any benefit in aging ur cider before jacking?

How can ya tell if there's still alcohol in the ice?

Cheers! [emoji111]

1) Aging cider before jacking? I ferment all of my ciders very cold so fermentation can last up to three months before it sees the freezer and there is a definite difference in the way the cider tastes compared to three weeks or a month of fermentation/aging.
2) Alcohol in the ice? You can taste it or more like feel it when you go to swallow it. There will always be alcohol left in the ice so getting creative on how to use/save it is the trick.

I want to throw this out there: if you have a "snobby" whiskey drinker friend or family member, make the strongest/best tasting batch of applejack you can, age it as long as you can, and give them a sample without telling them (exactly) what you just served them. I can almost bet they will be blown away.
Here is a true story: my brewing partner is a former wine merchant with an incredible set of taste buds and when he first tasted my applejack, his eyes got big, he whispered something to his wife, and then he wanted to know how soon I could start making this amazing liquor in large batches and what the ingredients would cost. Since that day I always have a batch of applejack going at one stage or another so we won't run out. My point is this: great applejack is not hard to make but the time spent aging is the most important part of the whole process.

MindenMan said:

I want to throw this out there: if you have a "snobby" whiskey drinker friend or family member, make the strongest/best tasting batch of applejack you can, age it as long as you can, and give them a sample without telling them (exactly) what you just served them. I can almost bet they will be blown away.
Here is a true story: my brewing partner is a former wine merchant with an incredible set of taste buds and when he first tasted my applejack, his eyes got big, he whispered something to his wife, and then he wanted to know how soon I could start making this amazing liquor in large batches and what the ingredients would cost. Since that day I always have a batch of applejack going at one stage or another so we won't run out. My point is this: great applejack is not hard to make but the time spent aging is the most important part of the whole process.

Click to expand...

...what yeast are u using for a 3-month ferment?

...and you age it at what temp range?

MindenMan said:

I want to throw this out there: if you have a "snobby" whiskey drinker friend or family member, make the strongest/best tasting batch of applejack you can, age it as long as you can, and give them a sample without telling them (exactly) what you just served them. I can almost bet they will be blown away.
Here is a true story: my brewing partner is a former wine merchant with an incredible set of taste buds and when he first tasted my applejack, his eyes got big, he whispered something to his wife, and then he wanted to know how soon I could start making this amazing liquor in large batches and what the ingredients would cost. Since that day I always have a batch of applejack going at one stage or another so we won't run out. My point is this: great applejack is not hard to make but the time spent aging is the most important part of the whole process.

Click to expand...

When freezing 1gal of cider is there any preference to orientation of bottle...ie) right side up, upside down or on side....

...when it comes time to thaw?

In some of my older threads I used to use Red Pasteur Wine yeast, but now I use Wyeast 4184 and I ferment my applejack below 55*F. I also use staggered additions of FAJC and this is one of the reasons it takes so long. With the staggered additions and the long cool ferment, this yeast produces great stone fruit flavors in the cider/applejack. I age in a cool 65F-70F-ish dark closet. I transfer my cider into either 1/2 gallon or 1 gallon jugs and I always freeze them in the normal "upright" position. Over the course of a week or so the applejack and the ice seem to naturally separate with the alcohol floating on the top and the lightly colored ice on the bottom and the first few ounces that pour off of the top.

MindenMan said:

In some of my older threads I used to use Red Pasteur Wine yeast, but now I use Wyeast 4184 and I ferment my applejack below 55*F. I also use staggered additions of FAJC and this is one of the reasons it takes so long. With the staggered additions and the long cool ferment, this yeast produces great stone fruit flavors in the cider/applejack. I age in a cool 65F-70F-ish dark closet. I transfer my cider into either 1/2 gallon or 1 gallon jugs and I always freeze them in the normal "upright" position. Over the course of a week or so the applejack and the ice seem to naturally separate with the alcohol floating on the top and the lightly colored ice on the bottom and the first few ounces that pour off of the top.

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Great info....thanks for sharing!

What ABV cider do you typically start with prior to freezing?

Cheers [emoji111]

I usually start with at least 12-14% ABV hard cider (apfelwine) before freezing as I like to leave a bit of residual sweetness, but if I get busy doing other things an ABV of 18-20% may occur due to a longer ferment and I will then add FAJC to each bottle before I cap it.