Apfelwein gets you drunk at "warp" speeds...
- Thread starter jcam91
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I've not made EdWort's, but I've got a cider going that, if all goes to plan, will clock in at 8% ABV. I'm sure I'll be in your shoes here in a couple weeks or so. Cheers!
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jcam91
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nukebrewer said:
Are you carbonating it? And did y ou push your og up with brown sugar, dextrose, turbinado?
In trying to find a sweet cider for Swmbo.
I just started this recipe yesterday.
2 gallons pasteurized cider
1 gallon apjuice
About a cup of brown
1/4 turbinado
Hopefully this will give me a more cidery texture. Gonna carb with apple juice concentrate. Swmbo looves woodchuck so hopefully it will be sweet like it.
huntingohio
Well-Known Member
I've had this same problem, your main problem will be finding a good cider to start with as a base as most comercail ones are poor in the taste dept.
Oddly enough ALDI's stores sell a cider nationally its called natures nectar brand. The stuff has geat flavor and ferments great.
Ferment as beer and bottle sparkling.
If you wanna get adventuros on it make some graff ala brandon O's recipie, now that stuff will get ya hammered it goes down super easy
jcam91 said:
Yeah, I pushed the OG up with a pound of brown sugar. Put my OG at 1.051 and my FG was .996 for an ABV of 7.2%. It came out pretty dry so I sweetened with a pound of lactose. Primed with table sugar. Tasted pretty good at bottling, so we'll know in a couple weeks whether it worked or not.
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jcam91
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nukebrewer said:
Totally keep us updated on how the lactose tastes. I never thought about sweetening with it because I figured it gives a milk flavor ie. Milk stout. I was just thinking of using a couple cans of aj concentrate as primer and sweetener. Do u think that will work or will it give an odd flavor?
booherbg
Well-Known Member
Hey guys. The problem with making a sweet cider is that there is no sugar left after the yeast get done with it. This leaves you two options:
1. Add sugar, but kill yeast. This makes it uncarbonated and with no guarantee that you've killed all the sugar.
2. Add non-fermentable sugar...
What I ended up doing was this, and it turned out great:
apple juice + 4lb honey, 1lb brown sugar
at bottling, I primed with 6oz of priming sugar, then added 8oz of lactose sugar (non-fermentable) and bottled.
Turned out great, so far no bottle bombs (cross fingers). Well carbonated, lightly semi-sweet, fizzy like champagne. I also spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg which gave it an excellent holiday character to the smell. Overall I'm so happy with it! Only 5 weeks old and 8%, it's delicious.
1. Add sugar, but kill yeast. This makes it uncarbonated and with no guarantee that you've killed all the sugar.
2. Add non-fermentable sugar...
What I ended up doing was this, and it turned out great:
apple juice + 4lb honey, 1lb brown sugar
at bottling, I primed with 6oz of priming sugar, then added 8oz of lactose sugar (non-fermentable) and bottled.
Turned out great, so far no bottle bombs (cross fingers). Well carbonated, lightly semi-sweet, fizzy like champagne. I also spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg which gave it an excellent holiday character to the smell. Overall I'm so happy with it! Only 5 weeks old and 8%, it's delicious.
Come on now, Apfelwine isn't that bad
huntingohio
Well-Known Member
youll find theres alot of hate for cider here, most threads someone will bust in with "prison hooch". Not sure where it comes from because cider can be truly amazing. It in fact was really critical to the founding of this country. The wives tale that the first thing done when the "pilgrims" landed was brew beer is incorrect. What they brewed would be akin to gruit. From record it was thought to have apples as a base fermentable. Cider in fact was find in the cellar of most homes all the way into the begging of the industrial revolution. At that point its thought that advetising campaigns and cheaper beer made it unfashionable.
Cider was even reported to be tha favored drink of Ernest Hemingway. There are several historical accounts of french winemakers visiting american cidery sampling the grog and marveling at how good it was.
In summation cider is good and F@#K livers!!
huntingohio
Well-Known Member
Umm then what is cider?
Cider is litterally apple juice with parts of pulp in suspension. Now if when brewing you cider if you add anything to it say fermentable sugars, malic or lactic acid, really anything but more cider, it is now "fortified juice" with bits of pulp in suspension.It infact has been common practice since cider was made in eroupe to add spices or more fermentables, usally in an attempt to cover up of flavors created by the wild yeast and acetobacter present on many apples.
Its kinda like do you want orange juice with pulp or without. I prefere it with but without it its still orange juice. This is the kinda stuff that reminds me of when I got a rather nasty email from some elitist basically half swear words. The main point of the email was that I was an arsehole for calling anything but the ferment beverage from a grape wine. He even aserted that all but grapes is just simply a ferment juice.
People
If it's clear and yella, you got juice there fella. If it's dark and brown, you're in cider town.
huntingohio
Well-Known Member
Not disagreeing with you, if the choice is cider or juice.. imma take the cider. Reality is though the fda defines the difference as cider having the starch from the fruit flesh in it, juice having it filtered out.
So the extra straches and pectin are the only real difference.
I have made the exact apfelwine recipie with cider and juice, the difference is the cider gives it more "body" the juice is thin
huntingohio
Well-Known Member
It is available here all year, but I also live within a 30 min drive of 5 orchards. I think youll find that most of your stores cider came from the east coast. Theres an exeptional orchard in newcomerstown, ohio if you can find theres get it.
If your worried about price try looking at discount stores like aldis and save alot. It should be quite a bit cheaper.
You can even make decent "cider" from concentrate. I find the key to using juce and concentrate is to
1 use another fruit with it broken down with pectic enzyme. this will replace some of the body. My usual favorite is either strawberrys or crush bing cherries
2 let it sit on the lees for a bit. This increases malolactic fermentation [the breakdown of certain acids]. It will give you a more cidery bite
If your worried about price try looking at discount stores like aldis and save alot. It should be quite a bit cheaper.
You can even make decent "cider" from concentrate. I find the key to using juce and concentrate is to
1 use another fruit with it broken down with pectic enzyme. this will replace some of the body. My usual favorite is either strawberrys or crush bing cherries
2 let it sit on the lees for a bit. This increases malolactic fermentation [the breakdown of certain acids]. It will give you a more cidery bite
BlackDogBrewing
Well-Known Member
I get so F'ed up off EdWort's Alpefein it's not even funny.
meadmazer
Well-Known Member
Just bought 5 gallons of juice to "convert" to apfelwein for the first time. Been using mead for a few years for warp speed blitz. Apfelwein will have to convince me it is better 
, tho I look fwd to the test.
, tho I look fwd to the test.Similar threads
