When can I add cinnamon and maybe vanilla?

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akthor

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It not being cider season here yet and store bought cider with no preservatives is unknown of up here till cider season I made this recipe:

I use Whitehouse apple juice. I throw 4.5 gallons in the keg, add yeast (Notty, S-05, Cider Yeast, or Champagne Yeast all work....I perfer Notty or S-05). I connect a blowoff tube to the gas disconnect and ferment at about 64F for 3 weeks.

After three weeks, I cold crash the keg at 38-40F, add the extra 1/2 gallon of juice to backsweeten, let it sit for a few days, then force carb.

That's it! My cider is always GOOD after a few days of conditioning in the 40F kegorator, but GREAT after about 2-3 months of cold conditioning.

Just note that if you bottle, you can't use my process. Sweetening bottled cider is a PITA in my opinion, so I wouldn't even bother.

I found it in this thread:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/good-hard-cider-recipe-297429/

Only differences being I used Great Value juice and fermented in a bucket then transferred to a keg after could crashing then added the juice to backsweeten.

So I have my first batch all carbed up been on the gas a couple weeks now. I have a 2nd batch due to be carbed in 2 days another 5 days after that and I am about to make another batch using yeast harvested from the first batch tomorrow or so.

Now it is quite drinkable as is, very good, similiar to apfelwein with more apple flavor but to me it needs a little spice or something to be really great.

I would like to add some cinnamon sticks and maybe vanilla bean.

So when can I add it? Is it possible to add some to the batch I am about to keg? Or the one still in primary due in a few days or to the new batch?
 
I'm in a similar situation but I'm planning on using vanilla concentrate when I top my cider up and backsweeten for bottling. If you want to use real physical spices, I would think you'd add them in the second ferment, when the yeast is less active and will not just rip them up.

One thing to consider is that flavor leeches out of herbs and spices fast in alcohol. If you've ever infused vodka, it only takes a couple of days with cinnamon sticks and vanilla, and if you wait too long then you get a lot of funkiness as other less flavorful oils are pulled out. I would think cider would tolerate them a bit longer being less alcoholic.

Your best bet might be a mix of both approaches- when bottling, take some juice and simmer it on the stove with your spices until it is thoroughly flavored (if you are back-sweetening/charging for carbonation you could also dissolve your sugar here) then cool that mix with some more juice, strain out your spices, and add the liquid to the cider, then bottle. I've also read posts about people having good luck just tossing stuff in the second ferment though.
 
Hmmmm so I wonder could I throw some cinnamon sticks and some vanilla beans into the fermenter when I put it in the fridge to cold crash? Maybe cold crash it a couple extra days? Maybe every day give it a swirl then close it back up and then leave it for two days to settle then keg? How many cinnamon sticks and how many vanilla beans would be good for a 4 gallon bnatch do you reckon? And is that giving it enough time to infuse or is that not enough or too much?
 
I havnt used cinnamon sticks, but used ground cinnamon. Anyways, this recipe used cinnamon sticks, you could probably steal the way they used them. I also read somewhere on here that when using vanilla beans, you want to split them in two, to release the flavors better. Not sure if in secondary or primary though.
 
Using your half gallon of apple juice to backsweeten and carb, how do you make sure that the both the sweetness and carb is right? I've been thinking of sweetening with apple juice concentrate and carbing as well but i'm not sure how much of the sugar the yeast will eat up to reach my target carb level. I'd probably like to keep mine on the sweet side.
 
I carb with CO2 in the keezer or kegerator. Not worried about adding sugar with the juice since keeping the keg refridgerated stops anymore fermentation pretty much or at least slows it to the point it won't matter (we drink it pretty fast a keg of it won't last more than a month or so)

I had a batch that was due to be cold crashed today, I popped the cover, the cinnamon stick I bought was about 10" long and thick as a hot dog so I broke it in half and smashed it into pieces. I split two vanilla beans and scraped them. Sprayed it all liberally with star San and chucked them in the bucket ( the cider had fermented for 3 weeks so I wasn't overly concerned about infection) gave the bucket a strong stirring up and put the lid back on. Put it in the fridge. I usually let it cold crash a couple of days but I will leave this in the fridge till Friday night. I will open it up then and if it looks like it cleared up all the way ( the cinn and van and everything the got stirred up when I stirred up the bucket) I will keg it and throw it on the gas. I will taste it too, I just did a batch not long ago with no additives so I will notice if there is a difference pretty quick.
 
I like 2 TBS of authentic Mexican vanilla extract (not the imitation crap) per 5 gallons.

I leave the cinammon sticks whole, tie to a piece of monofilament fishing line, and hang in the fermentor. Make sit easy to remove when you reach your desired flavor level. 3 normal sticks (3" long by diameter of a pencil) for a couple weeks is normally pretty tasty. I've never seen cinammon sticks the size you mentioned.
 
The natural food store, the only place that sells the sticks, had no small ones left just the big ones. Hope it works it was $10.49 for one of the big sticks.

Mexican vanilla? Is there a brand name or just any non-imitation vanilla?
 
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