What should I expect from this?

Hi guys, I was reading over all bajillion pages of the thread on Edwort's Apfelwein recipe and all the subsequent variations people did to it.

I've never brewed anything but beer, but here's what I am trying:

1 gallon premium apple juice, not from concentrate, no additives
1 gallon concentrate (mized with appropriate amount of water)
3/4 pound brown sugar
S-05 ale yeast

I'll probably leave this in the fermenter 3 weeks or so. I plan on sampling it and back sweetening with lactose or splenda if its to dry.

I know the biggest variable in terms of how dry/sweet this is gonna be, and how high the ABV will be; is the yeast choice. I was hoping the ale yeast would leave a little more sweetness behind than the montrachet yeast or champagne yeast others used.

any opinions? criticisms?

I have never tried to mix good juice with concentrate. Maybe you should try doing a 1 gallon experiment with just the concentrate on the side. That way you can compare the two. I use 1 gallon glass growlers for my experiments.

The ale yeast should take it to dry. Did you take an SG reading? It'd be tough to guess what the ABV will be without one, since apple juice varies so much.

I'm not a fan of brown sugar in my fermented wines/ciders, but some people like it.

Hmmm.... how would a growler let off the C02 produced if I used it as a fermenting vessel? Bah, I don't have one anyway.

As for the ale yeast, I wasn't sure if it would take it any drier than what most people use to make cider, like nottingham or the like. When it comes to dry yeast I believe my LHBS sells nottingham, and s-04 & 05. I like the clean taste of s-05 as compared to s-04 in the context of beers, so I thought "why not?"

I guess I'll just post in a week or two when the FG stabilizes how it turned out.

Just treat 1 gal jugs as small carboys, you buy a stopper and airlock just a 3, 5 or 6 gal. I currently have 5 and plan on getting a couple more. While I hate that I only get 10 bottles out of each, you can make as many different brews as you want in space constrictions. I have one cabinet for my big carboy, a 6 gal, and the other 5 li'l boys hide in the kitchen.

goodbyebluesky82 said:

Hmmm.... how would a growler let off the C02 produced if I used it as a fermenting vessel? Bah, I don't have one anyway.

Click to expand...

Yeah i just use the right sized stopper and a fermentation lock. They are also great for making yeast starters and they are pretty cheap.

$4 growler
$1 stopper
$1 fermentation lock
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$6 per gallon.

My LHBS ( found at listermann.com ) has glass 6 gallon carboys for the same price as 6 gallon jugs with fermentation locks. I have considered doing all of my secondary in them. but it was too much cleaning to do 6 or 7.

either way it seemed a good idea to have as many around as i could get.

anyone know if they can hold up to heat? it would be really easy to use one in a still.