So, a brief introduction before I begin; My name is Scroto Baggins and I have been trolling for a while now without anything worthy to post. I absolutely love the site and wanted to add something worthy. Within the past year I have become enamored with the the art/science of fermentation and all things boozey.
This is a chronicle of the years work with cider.
So it all started last year when I was lucky enough to be invited to go pick apples on an old abandoned orchard that a friend lived on. My friends and I picked a little over 200 lbs of apples which netted us a total of 14 gallons of juice.
Well, that whole endeavor kinda got my friends and I kick started on the whole homebrewing thing. First it led to us making mead with a friends honey, then purchasing beer kits from the homebrew shop, to setting up our own all-grain brew systems, etc. It's been a very addictive hobby.:cross:
Needless to say when this autumn came around we didn't hesitate at the chance to go pick more apples at the same place. (Sorry I still haven't gotten pictures of this place, it's really something special!)
Judging by the fact that our previous record of just over 200lbs. was obtained through extremely casual picking coupled with copious smoke blowing; we knew there would be no problem doubling or maybe even tripling our haul. We were right, if you put your mind (or in this case elbow grease) to it anything is possible.(Not pictured is another one of those Brute cans full of apples for a grand total of, I kid you not, 666lbs. of apples.)
As an aside, picking these apples made me realize that my place is truly out in the country instead of these here 'burbs. There was a point while picking when I sorta spaced out and looked up to see two of the dogs there humping and right past them the chickens were pecking around in the some grass and I though to myself "man, this is truly livin."
So, with our loot safely in my garage we then set out on the next part of our trip. Since to meet our desired quota we would need to pick some less than prime apples, one of the steps involved is cutting out the bad spots and just general cleaning of all the apples. We found even the ones with no visible blemishes or holes on the outside still needed to be at least cut in half to check the inside because sometimes either a bug or mold will get in through the blossom end. This was accomplished by myself and a number of good friends in a day long marathon. I think I have carpal tunnel syndrome.
After cutting the apples we put them into a water bath containing citric acid so as to prevent browning. They were to wait there until the next day when we could rent the press from the homebrew shop (if we can get our priorities straight, my friend and I would like to build one for next season.) Optimally I would cut and press on the same day but the sheer amount of apples coupled with the fact that we were renting a press for $45 a day made it necessary to cut the day before (and we weren't even able to finish cutting them that day.) is a video that we made which roughly shows the different parts of the press in action.
After all was said and done we were left with approximately 40 gallons of apple juice which was sulphited @ a rate of approximately 65ppm to decrease the natural levels of yeast and bacteria to acceptable amounts for the cultured wine & beer yeasts to thrive. Note: that is apple foam and not yeast scum floating on top.
After 24 hours of the sulfur doing its thing, we made up the different recipes. They go a little something like this.
Three 5.25(the 1/4 is to account for losses to trub) gallon batches of apple wine each with a different yeast. The three yeasts used were Pasteur Champagne, Côte des Blancs, and Lalvin M2. To bring the juice up to an original gravity(OG) high enough to be considered wine, 5lbs. of inverted cane sugar was added thus bringing the OG to 1.100. (The OG of the juice itself was 1.056. Slightly lower than last years 1.060 and slightly higher than the commercial juice I've used in the past, 1.05.)
I inverted the cane sugar (sucrose, a disaccharide) to split it into it's respective monosaccharides, glucose & fructose. This was done because I've read (anecdotally mind you) that breaking down the sugar is helpful for the yeast because they are able to metabolize the simple sugars easier, thus creating less off flavors. With that said, I, nor anyone to my knowledge has done any real empirical testing to see if this is true. I'm sure plain ol' sucrose will work fine to boost the gravity without causing any detrimental effects to the taste.
The next set of batches were two cysers, again with two different yeasts. They were Lalvin EC-1118 and Wyeast 1762 (Belgian Abbey II.) To the juice was added 10lbs of honey bringing the gravity to 1.120 or around there.
The honey we used was a blend of numerous kinds of nectar from many different hives; because of this it's a very heady and bold tasting honey, almost kinda too strong to use as is. However I think it will mesh nice in the cyser; the honey will have no problem shining through the flavor of the apples. It's local stuff too, probably collected within a 50 mile radius of the orchard where we picked the apples. But really the best part about the honey was that it was a gift! A friend of a friend is a beekeeper but also does pro bono work relocating "pest" hives from peoples homes and businesses, etc to safer places where neither man nor bee will be bothered. He is apparently able to salvage enough honey from this to give us roughly 125lbs since the start of the year!!!! :rockin: Fingers crossed that the don't stop!
Last but not least on the recipe roster was two batches of just your common hard apple cider (no additional sugars, just the juciest juice that we juiced.
) Again with these we used two different yeasts; in this case WLP 500 Trappist Ale yeast and Wyeast Sweet Mead.
Also, it should be noted; I supplemented all the batches with additional nutrients (Fermaid K and DAP.) They were added on a staggered time line following this schedule.
I can't really think of anything else that I may have forgotten but I will be sure to keep y'all updated. Also, if you have any questions, please ask!
Cheers,
Scroto
This is a chronicle of the years work with cider.
So it all started last year when I was lucky enough to be invited to go pick apples on an old abandoned orchard that a friend lived on. My friends and I picked a little over 200 lbs of apples which netted us a total of 14 gallons of juice.
Well, that whole endeavor kinda got my friends and I kick started on the whole homebrewing thing. First it led to us making mead with a friends honey, then purchasing beer kits from the homebrew shop, to setting up our own all-grain brew systems, etc. It's been a very addictive hobby.:cross:
Needless to say when this autumn came around we didn't hesitate at the chance to go pick more apples at the same place. (Sorry I still haven't gotten pictures of this place, it's really something special!)
Judging by the fact that our previous record of just over 200lbs. was obtained through extremely casual picking coupled with copious smoke blowing; we knew there would be no problem doubling or maybe even tripling our haul. We were right, if you put your mind (or in this case elbow grease) to it anything is possible.(Not pictured is another one of those Brute cans full of apples for a grand total of, I kid you not, 666lbs. of apples.)
As an aside, picking these apples made me realize that my place is truly out in the country instead of these here 'burbs. There was a point while picking when I sorta spaced out and looked up to see two of the dogs there humping and right past them the chickens were pecking around in the some grass and I though to myself "man, this is truly livin."
So, with our loot safely in my garage we then set out on the next part of our trip. Since to meet our desired quota we would need to pick some less than prime apples, one of the steps involved is cutting out the bad spots and just general cleaning of all the apples. We found even the ones with no visible blemishes or holes on the outside still needed to be at least cut in half to check the inside because sometimes either a bug or mold will get in through the blossom end. This was accomplished by myself and a number of good friends in a day long marathon. I think I have carpal tunnel syndrome.
After cutting the apples we put them into a water bath containing citric acid so as to prevent browning. They were to wait there until the next day when we could rent the press from the homebrew shop (if we can get our priorities straight, my friend and I would like to build one for next season.) Optimally I would cut and press on the same day but the sheer amount of apples coupled with the fact that we were renting a press for $45 a day made it necessary to cut the day before (and we weren't even able to finish cutting them that day.) is a video that we made which roughly shows the different parts of the press in action.
After all was said and done we were left with approximately 40 gallons of apple juice which was sulphited @ a rate of approximately 65ppm to decrease the natural levels of yeast and bacteria to acceptable amounts for the cultured wine & beer yeasts to thrive. Note: that is apple foam and not yeast scum floating on top.
After 24 hours of the sulfur doing its thing, we made up the different recipes. They go a little something like this.
Three 5.25(the 1/4 is to account for losses to trub) gallon batches of apple wine each with a different yeast. The three yeasts used were Pasteur Champagne, Côte des Blancs, and Lalvin M2. To bring the juice up to an original gravity(OG) high enough to be considered wine, 5lbs. of inverted cane sugar was added thus bringing the OG to 1.100. (The OG of the juice itself was 1.056. Slightly lower than last years 1.060 and slightly higher than the commercial juice I've used in the past, 1.05.)
I inverted the cane sugar (sucrose, a disaccharide) to split it into it's respective monosaccharides, glucose & fructose. This was done because I've read (anecdotally mind you) that breaking down the sugar is helpful for the yeast because they are able to metabolize the simple sugars easier, thus creating less off flavors. With that said, I, nor anyone to my knowledge has done any real empirical testing to see if this is true. I'm sure plain ol' sucrose will work fine to boost the gravity without causing any detrimental effects to the taste.
The next set of batches were two cysers, again with two different yeasts. They were Lalvin EC-1118 and Wyeast 1762 (Belgian Abbey II.) To the juice was added 10lbs of honey bringing the gravity to 1.120 or around there.
The honey we used was a blend of numerous kinds of nectar from many different hives; because of this it's a very heady and bold tasting honey, almost kinda too strong to use as is. However I think it will mesh nice in the cyser; the honey will have no problem shining through the flavor of the apples. It's local stuff too, probably collected within a 50 mile radius of the orchard where we picked the apples. But really the best part about the honey was that it was a gift! A friend of a friend is a beekeeper but also does pro bono work relocating "pest" hives from peoples homes and businesses, etc to safer places where neither man nor bee will be bothered. He is apparently able to salvage enough honey from this to give us roughly 125lbs since the start of the year!!!! :rockin: Fingers crossed that the don't stop!
Last but not least on the recipe roster was two batches of just your common hard apple cider (no additional sugars, just the juciest juice that we juiced.
) Again with these we used two different yeasts; in this case WLP 500 Trappist Ale yeast and Wyeast Sweet Mead.Also, it should be noted; I supplemented all the batches with additional nutrients (Fermaid K and DAP.) They were added on a staggered time line following this schedule.
I can't really think of anything else that I may have forgotten but I will be sure to keep y'all updated. Also, if you have any questions, please ask!
Cheers,
Scroto
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