Man, I love Apfelwein

Is a hydrometer reading on this going to give a good measure of ABV? I took one after pitching and it was 1.060, which seemed way too low considering what I assume will be a high abv with this. Does a hydrometer not work on apfelwein?

Headache seems much more likely if you use pectic enzyme. Not really sure why. A friend of mine thinks it's higher methanol byproduct production but I can't say that I really know.

Hydrometer will work fine with this. You can test your hydrometer with some tap water at the appropriate temp. As a sidenote you could get about 8% ABV if it completely dried out starting at 1.06. Most of mine have finished around 1.000 +/- .003.

RunnerDude said:

Is a hydrometer reading on this going to give a good measure of ABV? I took one after pitching and it was 1.060, which seemed way too low considering what I assume will be a high abv with this. Does a hydrometer not work on apfelwein?

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My OG's tend to be between 1.061 and 1.064 so you probably aren't too far off.
I usually use half dextrose and half brown sugar, but it shouldn't make much difference.

It will ferment to dryness or beyond (0.996-1.00) so your ABV will still be relatively high: 7.9 - 8.4 depending on FG.

Ok. Thanks. I guess based on the original post and the two pounds of corn sugar, I was expecting a higher abv. But 8ish is just fine with me.

Accidic said:

Headache seems much more likely if you use pectic enzyme. Not really sure why. A friend of mine thinks it's higher methanol byproduct production but I can't say that I really know.

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That's interesting!! I just used some pectic enzyme in the latest batch as the pear juice I used had quite a bit of pulp in it. I've used it before and never noticed any greater incidence of headaches, but I can't say I did an side by side comparisons.

It isn't part of the recipe. What would be he benefit of adding it?

Thanks!

Just made my first batch of this. To start things off, this is extremly simple to make, I was shocked at how little actually goes into the process. I'm used to 5+ hour All Grain brew days, so this was a welcome change to be done in 30 mins!

Followed the above exactly, 5 gallons of Apple Juice, (from Costco), 2 LB of corn sugar. Let it sit in the fermenter for 5 weeks at 69 degrees, gravity reading was right on the money, 0.098. I racked to my keg and put it on Co2.

Having never tried an Apfelwien I was curious what this tasted like. The best way to describe the taste: It tastes like a white wine, very dry, with a good hint of apples in the back. I'm going to back sweeten it with some concentrate, but overall it came out great. Very simple to brew and makes a good addition to the regular beers on tap at the house. My only concern is that it won't be around 5+ months to age, as I'm sure it will be gone within 3.

*Edit*

I added 1 can of Tree Top concentrate directly into the keg yesterday. BAM! This is what I'm talking about, delicious. It now definitly has the flavor profile I was looking for, more of an apple cider than a wine taste. 'Ba Da dat dat daaaa I'm lovin' it.

chevs15 said:

I don't think anyone has answered this yet.... Does Apfelwein need to be stabilized like with wine kits?

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I do not stabilize mine. I end up carbonating half of the batch and bottle some still. I have at least 1 fermenter going at a time with Apfelwein ( 2 right now). It is usually close to 3 months by the time I bottle so it is clear on its own by then. You can stabilize and backsweeten, but I like it dry.

chevs15 said:

It isn't part of the recipe. What would be he benefit of adding it?

Thanks!

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I assume this is in reference to the Pectic Enzyme. If you are using clear apple juice, as the recipe calls for, there is no need for it at all. If you use "Natural" Apple Juice or Apple Cider with a lot of solids, pulp etc. there is a chance that the fruit pectin can set and give you a cloudy finished product. The Pectinase breaks down the pectin to allow you a clearer product. No change in taste, so, if you don't mind a cloudy drink, you don't need it even if using the 'fruitier' juices.

My currently fermenting batch as 3 gal Clear Apple Juice and 1/2 Gallon of Looza Pear Nectar which has a lot of pear pulp in it, so I added some pectinase.

Recluse said:

I assume this is in reference to the Pectic Enzyme. If you are using clear apple juice, as the recipe calls for, there is no need for it at all. If you use "Natural" Apple Juice or Apple Cider with a lot of solids, pulp etc. there is a chance that the fruit pectin can set and give you a cloudy finished product. The Pectinase breaks down the pectin to allow you a clearer product. No change in taste, so, if you don't mind a cloudy drink, you don't need it even if using the 'fruitier' juices.

My currently fermenting batch as 3 gal Clear Apple Juice and 1/2 Gallon of Looza Pear Nectar which has a lot of pear pulp in it, so I added some pectinase.

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Hmm. I used unfiltered apple juice without giving it any thought. It's been fermenting for about 4 days. Is it too late to add pectic enzyme now?

Would using unfiltered juice account for the blowoff I experienced?

My first full batch is done fermenting (took a hydrometer reading today after 5 weeks, and it read .998), and is still pretty cloudy. Since my base ingredient was 5 gal. of the local orchard's late season blend of 13 apples, pretty much straight cider from the press with only flash pasteurization for a preservative, I have to imagine the cloudiness isn't going anywhere. Since fermentation is done, I also have to imagine that pectinase isn't going to help the situation any....but I might try it in any case.

I figure on just leaving it in the primary for 3 months or so and then go straight to bottle.

You could try a fining agent, but I wouldn't expect it to get anywhere near crystal clear. If it tastes good, I wouldn't worry about it and bottle or keg like normal.

Ok been reading this thread for like 50 page. Just broke down and made a batch as my second brew ever.
Went mainly with Ed's formula few changes

5 gallons Mott's
1.025 lbs Dextrose
1.001 lbs light brown sugar
White Lab English Cider

I dissolved the sugar in 1 gallon of the juice at about 160 and steeped it with 4 cinnamon sticks for about 15 minutes. I'm also going to keep it in a bucket instead of a Carboy just because I do not have an extra one laying around.

OG: 1.65
Expected ABV: 8.51%

Hope all goes well.

Is there any reason why people use sugar over cans of frozen apple concentrate to raise their OG?

Athos56

aacampora said:

Ok been reading this thread for like 50 page. Just broke down and made a batch as my second brew ever.
Went mainly with Ed's formula few changes

5 gallons Mott's
1.025 lbs Dextrose
1.001 lbs light brown sugar
White Lab English Cider

I dissolved the sugar in 1 gallon of the juice at about 160 and steeped it with 4 cinnamon sticks for about 15 minutes. I'm also going to keep it in a bucket instead of a Carboy just because I do not have an extra one laying around.

OG: 1.65
Expected ABV: 8.51%

Hope all goes well.

Click to expand...

I'm a total noob too, but isn't leaving it in a bucket for months a problem due to their permeability? I've heard they're fine for a week or two of primary, but that's about it. Then again, I don't know myself one way or the other. Just what came to mind when I read that.

The guys at my supply store said I should be ok at 4 weeks. But I am open to other suggestions I can always rack it after 2 weeks.

rico567 said:

My first full batch is done fermenting (took a hydrometer reading today after 5 weeks, and it read .998), and is still pretty cloudy. Since my base ingredient was 5 gal. of the local orchard's late season blend of 13 apples, pretty much straight cider from the press with only flash pasteurization for a preservative, I have to imagine the cloudiness isn't going anywhere. Since fermentation is done, I also have to imagine that pectinase isn't going to help the situation any....but I might try it in any case.

I figure on just leaving it in the primary for 3 months or so and then go straight to bottle.

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It may clear some more, but it's probably not going anywhere.

RunnerDude said:

I'm a total noob too, but isn't leaving it in a bucket for months a problem due to their permeability? I've heard they're fine for a week or two of primary, but that's about it. Then again, I don't know myself one way or the other. Just what came to mind when I read that.

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There is absolutely no issue with leaving it in the ale pale.

Athos56 said:

Is there any reason why people use sugar over cans of frozen apple concentrate to raise their OG?

Athos56

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I can't speak for everyone, but in my case, because concentrate is way more expensive than a couple pounds of basic sugar. That said, if I find a good sale, I use the concentrate instead.

I'm a total noob too, but isn't leaving it in a bucket for months a problem due to their permeability? I've heard they're fine for a week or two of primary, but that's about it. Then again, I don't know myself one way or the other. Just what came to mind when I read that.

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Various topics in the forum go back and forth on the permeability issue, but it's been effectively debunked. I routinely leave my batches in primary for 4-6 months with no issues at all.

smagee said:

Various topics in the forum go back and forth on the permeability issue, but it's been effectively debunked. I routinely leave my batches in primary for 4-6 months with no issues at all.

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I will happily stand corrected on this one. Looks like you're fine and that's a tasty sounding recipe.

RunnerDude said:

Hmm. I used unfiltered apple juice without giving it any thought. It's been fermenting for about 4 days. Is it too late to add pectic enzyme now?

Would using unfiltered juice account for the blowoff I experienced?

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All hope is not lost. I took a lot of idea's from this website. If they can turn Cider into Hard Cider that is pretty clear, I know you can too.
Making Homemade Hard Cider - Let's get making up some Hard Cider!

Cool article thanks. But again, will adding pectic enzyme this late in the game still do anything?

You can add it at any point. The other option is to cold crash after fermentation and let all of the "gunk" settle, then rack into secondary before bottling.

For a while there, mine looked like it wasn't going to clear how I wanted it to. I had several people tell me to add pectic enzyme if it didn't clear on up. FWIW, cloudy or clear, it'll taste the same.

KWKSLVR said:

You can add it at any point. The other option is to cold crash after fermentation and let all of the "gunk" settle, then rack into secondary before bottling.

For a while there, mine looked like it wasn't going to clear how I wanted it to. I had several people tell me to add pectic enzyme if it didn't clear on up. FWIW, cloudy or clear, it'll taste the same.

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Thanks. That's good to know. I don't know if the cloudiness will really bother me. I will research cold crashing. If I don't do that, the current plan is to leave it in the carboy for 3-6 (maybe even 8) months. Is that long enough for it to settle on it's own or if the pectin sets will it never clear without intervention?

RunnerDude said:

Thanks. That's good to know. I don't know if the cloudiness will really bother me. I will research cold crashing. If I don't do that, the current plan is to leave it in the carboy for 3-6 (maybe even 8) months. Is that long enough for it to settle on it's own or if the pectin sets will it never clear without intervention?

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Cold crashing is just sticking it in a frige or freezer and taking the temp down as close as you can get to 32 degrees. Let this sit for a couple of days. A week works very well, and you can even go a couple of degrees colder. With alcohol present, the freezing point is lower than water!

D_Ranged_Eskimo said:

Cold crashing is just sticking it in a frige or freezer and taking the temp down as close as you can get to 32 degrees. Let this sit for a couple of days. A week works very well, and you can even go a couple of degrees colder. With alcohol present, the freezing point is lower than water!

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Cool. Thanks. I don't have an extra fridge, but at least I know how to do it if I want to make an investment.

I've crashed in ice water with decent success. Use a little salt if it's a glass carboy and it'll speed it along. Requires a lot of ice tho unfortunately.

Accidic said:

I've crashed in ice water with decent success. Use a little salt if it's a glass carboy and it'll speed it along. Requires a lot of ice tho unfortunately.

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Thanks. But for this batch I think I'll just let it be cloudy. Maybe next time I'll include visual aesthetics in my goals, but for my first batch I'll just go for taste.

The best thing is to use AJ and not AC for Apfelwein

nukinfuts29 said:

The best thing is to use AJ and not AC for Apfelwein

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It was apple Juice, so I didn't think about it (or that's what the bottle said). But it's unfiltered. As I think about it I'm not sure I've ever seen filtered organic apple juice. And I do like it to be organic, but maybe next batch I'll compromise for the sake of clarity.

oooooh my mistake, ya that will do it.

Well to be fair, given that one can get unfiltered apple juice, I'm not even sure what the difference between juice and cider is.

RunnerDude said:

Well to be fair, given that one can get unfiltered apple juice, I'm not even sure what the difference between juice and cider is.

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Cider is always unfiltered juice, usually from the first pressings of the apples. It can be pasteurized or not.

Apple Juice can be unfiltered but most times is not.†

So basically all cider is aple juice, not all AJ is cider. Except in you are in the UK I do believe all cider is fermented?

Ramitt said:

So basically all cider is aple juice, not all AJ is cider. Except in you are in the UK I do believe all cider is fermented?

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Alcohol is either distilled (hard liquor) or fermented (beer/wine/cider/graff/mead etc). So all cider is fermented to one extent or another.

At least here in the US in the apple juice vs apple cider discussion it's usually simple to tell which is which in the un-fermented versions.

Ciders are unfiltered first pressings from the apples, are cloudy, can be pulpy and may or may not have been pasteurized. Cider's also traditionally have nothing, or vitamin C added as a preservative.

Apple juice traditionally is always filtered, though some are labeled apple juice and are unfiltered. Apple juice may or may not be from concentrate and may have additives for preservation.

Further, Cider's sometimes are sourced from specialty apples, vs the more commonly grown mass produced apples and can have a very different taste.

For example I live in Sonoma County, CA near Sebastopol, CA a region that was famous for growing Gravenstein apples in the 19th and early 20th century. The Gravenstein apple is a tart apple that is used primarily in cooking & ciders, has a small picking window (July - Aug) and doesn't preserve well so it must be used in that season. Sadly most of Sebastopol has caught the "wine country" bug and have removed orchards to vineyards as the $ per ton is higher. There is less than 5 growers and only 1 comerical processor left in Sonoma County and less than 20k tons are produced annually.

Tying that back in to taste is this. I could have a glass of tree top, a glass of motts and a glass of generic brand apple juice and notice very little difference except they're all overly sweet. But a good cider (especially a gravenstein based cider) has a very distinctive taste, and while almost $7/gal is what I choose to use as a hard cider base if I'm not worried about a crystal clear cider.

Hard Cider's further murky the issues. I don't know how commercial brewers do it, though I may ask next time I'm in the local cider pub. Homebrewers however make a hard cider out of both cider and apple juice and seem to make the decision based on material cost and desired clarity.

Well based upon that definition, the juice I bought for my apfelwein sounds an awfully lot like cider. I wonder if the organic juice manufacturers are going for a less processed, more "natural" approach that is really closer to cider? I don't believe I've seen an organic apple juice that was clear like tree top, at least not at the stores I've been shopping at. I have no doubt that they exist. I just haven't seen them. FWIW, the apple juice that I bought says "no additives, preservatives or concentrates." And the ingredient (yes singular) is: "pasteurized, unfiltered juice, from select, certified organic, whole, ripe, fresh pressed apples." Moreover, the store does offer some varietals, Gravenstein being one. But they are all labelled as juice. I wonder if these producers are using the term juice more for marketing purposes than accuracy? Perhaps this really is closer to cider. The only question from your definition that I see is that it is pasteurized, could be a generic mix of apples (though as I noted, they do sell varietals) and may not be the first pressing.

This is perhaps no longer relevant to this thread other than to say people should probably be more aware than I was when buying apple "juice" for apfelwein, rather than just blindly buying anything with the word "juice" on the label.

As an aside, my stepfather grew up in Santa Rosa and he and his father both worked at an apple cannery in Sebastapol.

RunnerDude said:

I don't believe I've seen an organic apple juice that was clear like tree top, at least not at the stores I've been shopping at. I have no doubt that they exist. I just haven't seen them. FWIW, the apple juice that I bought says "no additives, preservatives or concentrates." And the ingredient (yes singular) is: "pasteurized, unfiltered juice, from select, certified organic, whole, ripe, fresh pressed apples." Moreover, the store does offer some varietals, Gravenstein being one. But they are all labelled as juice. I wonder if these producers are using the term juice more for marketing purposes than accuracy?

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Sounds like Marketing jargon. In the end though even "purist" cider is still Apple Juice

RunnerDude said:

This is perhaps no longer relevant to this thread other than to say people should probably be more aware than I was when buying apple "juice" for apfelwein, rather than just blindly buying anything with the word "juice" on the label.

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Common consensus seems to be to use the cheapest apple juice possible for Apfelwein as the nuances of more expensive oraganic juice or cider are lost.

I used Tree Top for my 2 1 gal test batches and save the expensive local cider for hard ciders.

RunnerDude said:

As an aside, my stepfather grew up in Santa Rosa and he and his father both worked at an apple cannery in Sebastapol.

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Then I have no doubt he's very familiar with Mom's Apple pies! Those things are amazing, and are sweetened only with the juice of the gravenstein apples. They've had the unfortunate side effect of ruining pretty much any other apple pie for me though, which sucks as they're almost $18 each.

I wish I knew who the existing canner was in Sebastopol. I'd love to buy the cider in 5-10 gallon barrels direct and cut out the middle man.

Kozlowski Farms in Sebastopol makes awesome fruit & berry pies also.

Jukas said:

Common consensus seems to be to use the cheapest apple juice possible for Apfelwein as the nuances of more expensive oraganic juice or cider are lost.

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I probably should have done that. I like to buy organic, not just for the flavor. But for a small amount like this it probably doesn't matter much. Oh well. We'll see how it comes out. Perhaps it will be a happy mistake.

After 4 weeks, there should not be any sediment on the bottom, correct? Mine has been going for a week now and there is some yeast or sediment at the bottom.

Thanks!

Mine had a very very thin, hard layer of yeast after about a month and it came out nicely. I guess it really depends on the yeast strain.

Why wouldn't it have sediment? Every batch I've made gets a nice layer of detritus at the bottom of the carboy as the yeast settles out.