Back-sweetening questions for cider keggers

My wife really liked the Original Sin hard cider that I bought on a whim. It's not Woodchuck's sweet but it's plenty sweet and has a 6% ABV kick.

I bottled a batch of Brandon O's graff thinking that it might be sweet enough for her but after half a bottle, she wasn't a fan. I like it fine so it wasn't a total loss.

While this was happening, I put together a keezer so back-sweetening has opened up as a possibility for me.

I read up on previous posts about kegging and it seems like some of you use potassium sorbate to inhibit yeast reproduction, back-sweeten, keg, then force carb.

Is potassium sorbate really necessary if the keg is going to be stored at 40 deg or lower? Any further yeast activity will be slow and even if there were some, there's a pressure relief valve on the corny keg.

Excluding splenda and lactose (because I don't like the taste in a hard cider), what do you like to backsweeten with? Honey, brown sugar, apple concentrate?

I would like to take another crack at making a sweet, sparkling hard cider.

Maybe I'll take the Southern Sweet Cider recipe by sceneater and substitute it with Granny Smith apple juice and granulated sugar (instead of brown sugar).

I'll crash cool it before transferring to secondary and crash cool it again before transferring it to the corny keg.

What do you think?

I don't have a keg set up, so I can't answer those questions.

You can back sweeten with:

• honey - like Crispin Honey does
• brown sugar - Spire Mountain Cider does this with & a tiny bit of molasses
• apple concentrate - my favorite, which will boost the "apple" flavor. So many complain you can't taste apples in cider, but you can't taste grapes in wine, either. This fixes that "problem"

My SWMBO is a big fan of simple caramel in her cider (water and sugar brought to a mid caramel) and I like that even though it WAS sugar, it wont ferment at all. Give it a shot.

arxix said:

My SWMBO is a big fan of simple caramel in her cider (water and sugar brought to a mid caramel) and I like that even though it WAS sugar, it wont ferment at all. Give it a shot.

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Thanks for the comment. Might be an interesting experiment but I'm going to try the Granny Smith apple concentrate backsweetening first.

I didn't impress my wife with the Graff attempt. Part of it might have been using Mott's as my apple juice. I kind of recall Brandon mentioning that cheap apple juice can result in a tart cider - and not in a good way.

I work with databases, and we have a saying here when people give me horrible data and then expect me to find them wonderful statistics. "Trash in, trash out."

I think that applies to all brewing and cooking - if you have crummy ingredients, you are going to end up with crummy results even if you were at your best. If you aren't at your best, like you burned toast...

As far as keeping it at 40F, that will stop most ale/cider/wine yeast strains from further fermentation.

CandleWineProject said:

I work with databases, and we have a saying here when people give me horrible data and then expect me to find them wonderful statistics. "Trash in, trash out."

I think that applies to all brewing and cooking - if you have crummy ingredients, you are going to end up with crummy results even if you were at your best. If you aren't at your best, like you burned toast...

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Well, I wouldn't say Mott's apple juice is trash or crummy. Other people have used it with good results for their apfelwein. Having said that, I may try to find something Granny Smith based at Farmer Joe's.

Edit: My mind is going on me. I actually used Costco's Kirkland branded apple juice, not Mott's. :forehead smack:

david_42 said:

As far as keeping it at 40F, that will stop most ale/cider/wine yeast strains from further fermentation.

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That's what I figured also. So why do keggers still use sulfites (and deal with the after taste)?

I have only back sweetened with AJ concentrate. I want to experiment with backsweetening with a little bit of pear or strawberry concentrate next. We'll see how that goes.

I have kegged 6 batches so far without killing the yeast with some sort of additive. Haven't had any ill effects yet. I monitor the pressure gauge on the regulator pretty closely and it never has increased the regulator reading even when the cider has sat for over a week while hooked up to the CO2. Based on that, I don't think the yeast is fermenting once chilled to below 40. Even if it does, you can just add more AJ concentrate to sweeten it back up.

do your cold crashing carefully, and there wont be any fermentation at serving temps. My corny pressure relief hasnt blown off yet.

Backsweetening... I would prefer apple juice. brown sugar is nice, so is Demerara.

juice and Trash-in trash-out comment... I use musslemans. They have one that is all natural, not from concentrate, and doesnt have preservatives. It is the one on it that has an American flag that says "made from US Apples", and I get an excellent Graff and cider from it. What I would refer to 'heirloom' juice from a local mill, which I can get, just hasnt made enough of a difference in quality to make it worth the 30min each way drive.

SpeedracerIndy, how much AJ concentrate do you use?

I know it'll depend on everyone's taste but don't know whether we are talking one or two cans or multiple cans.

tincob said:

SpeedracerIndy, how much AJ concentrate do you use?

I know it'll depend on everyone's taste but don't know whether we are talking one or two cans or multiple cans.

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I like it dry, so I usually only add one container of AJ concentrate. If it's too dry, I'll add another half, but that's the most I've ever added. With 1.5 containers, I'd compare it to Strongbow.

Well, if your kegging and serving from tap. You have a whole new world open to you.
At 40F or lower your not going to burst your kegs with extra pressure from what little fermentation that may occur. It not like bottle bombs or blown corks. And from my personal experience cider on tap will never stay in the keg that long anyway.
It also allows you to back sweeten even more if its too dry. Just bleed the pressure, add concentrate/sugar, bleed the air, and re pressurize, then shake to mix the sweetener.
While it can be very expensive to start up the whole kegging thing, if you brew a good amount I would always say it's the way to go.
Once a keg starts getting low, I'll just bottle what's left.

Kauai_Kahuna said:

Once a keg starts getting low, I'll just bottle what's left.

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Would you prime that? Or would you leave it the way it is, since it's been force carb'd with a CO2 tank?

I have a 5 gallon batch going where I motts brand apple juice and I also used British ale yeast when it is done fermenting I would like to back sweeten is there any way th is there any way that I can bottle condition after back sweetening or I was wondering if I can get and force carbonate it and bottle it would it stay carbonated?

girdwood said:

Would you prime that? Or would you leave it the way it is, since it's been force carb'd with a CO2 tank?

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It would have already been carbonated from the keg.

LakeErieMonster said:

It would have already been carbonated from the keg.

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Thanks! I have been doing this as well, but thank you for the response.