Specific question on Cold-Crashing and Carbonation

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ViperMan

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Okay - my apologies if this is a redundant post to something someone has already asked or commented on...

I've been reading a lot on this forum, been googling, been all over the place, and though I've certainly learned a lot, I haven't found the answer to my specific question.

I am currently brewing a cider - started at 1.067 og and is down to 1.035'ish. I used a champagne yeast, so it'll probably keep dropping.

I've decided - after reading some smart threads on this forum - that I want to STOP it at about 1.02 - I've decided that's where I want to be. I like woodchuck which is at 1.03 (I bought some just to measure it) but want something a bit dryer.

SO, I'm going to cold-crash the primary - probably some time this week. BUT, I still want a bubbly cider!!

So the question is this: how do I go about knocking out most of the yeast, but still leaving enough to bottle so that I carbonate nicely in the bottle?

Specifically:
Should I still go to a secondary after cold crashing, before bottling?
How long should I cold-crash?
Should I use a priming sugar? I'd think I don't need one since there's still fermentables in the primary (I'm learning such big words, momma!!)
How long should I leave to carbonate in the bottle before refrigerating (to continue the clearing?

I hope that covers the questions I need to ask.

Your help is greatly appreciated. I'm really glad I found this site.

Jeff the ViperMan
 
Stopping an active fermentation is like stopping a freight train. IF you do it, by cold crashing, make sure you don't let the bottles warm back up to carbonate, because they will explode.

Some people have had luck with bottle pasteurizing after some carbonation for a sweet bubbly cider (Pappers has a sticky on it) but I've never tried it. Heat + carbonation together scare me.
 
i think the reason nobody replied is because it is just plain difficult to get sweet sparkling cider in a bottle. there are a posts almost daily of people asking how it can be done simply, and it can't. this is the thread yooper refers to for pasteurizing:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f32/easy-stove-top-pasteurizing-pics-193295/
read the whole thing before you try it; it does work, and it is dangerous.

dry cider is also nice
good luck!
 
If you want sweet+carbonated I personally feel as though there are two options.

1.Buy a keg.
2.Ferment until dry. Add proper priming sugar. Then add lactose or Splenda to taste.

I am sure the heat pasteurizing works, but I too fear that. I personally would probably forget about it and have exploding bottles. So I generally feel as though one of the two above options are best.
 
Yeup - I've been doing even more reading today... Damn - what have I gotten myself in to...

I really just don't like the back-sweetening idea - I've read that the apple flavor just doesn't come through - at least until several months later. Plus artificial sweeteners usually have their own after-tastes that I don't care for (at all...)

I think what I need is an at-home UV-light pasteurization method - that would work perfectly.
 
ViperMan said:
I really just don't like the back-sweetening idea - I've read that the apple flavor just doesn't come through - at least until several months later.
Click to expand...

I think that depends somewhat on what you back sweeten with. If you use apple juice concentrate for example (either store bought or home made) you are probably going to be tasting a lot more "appley" straight away that if you just used table sugar.

Cheers

HW
 
The stove-top pasturizing worked for me.

I had a similar question, decided to bottle carb and pasturize, and it worked.

Added 3/4 a cup of sugar to enough water to dissolve it, racked my fermented dry cider onto this mixture, bottled in 4 22oz beer bottles right away, capped, let sit in a dark cupboard for 2 weeks, opened a bottle that was where I wanted carbonation, but the 3 other bottles in a water bath, have been sitting at room temperature for over 3 weeks and no bottle bombs.

It is scary to do the first time, but so is home brewing. The best way to learn is to just try it and hope it works.
 
I think what I need is an at-home UV-light pasteurization method - that would work perfectly.
Click to expand...

That might work but would probably be expensive for a unit that is strong enough to be effective through a glass bottle.

If you have the space, having a keg or two is a good way to go. Otherwise bottle carbonation / pasteurization is a little more work but effective. The sticky on this has a lot of good info. Cold crashing does not usually stop Champagne yeast, although you could do this to clear it up the cider before bottling.

If I didnt have kegs, I'd be seriously thinking about getting a commercial dishwasher. A standard rack holds 36 bottles and most units can be programmed for a short wash followed by a temp hold cycle that is long enough pasteurize. commercial dishwashers are pricey compared to kegs tho.

If you have good juice to start then I'd recommend not back sweetening unless you have to. The natural apple sugar will taste better. OTOH, back sweetening is easier because you can do it on your own time. Depending on the juice you are starting with and how it fermented out, AJC usually works fine. Sometimes original juice works well, agave is good when the cider has a decent finish but needs some more sweetness up front.

Bottle carbonation of a sweet cider can be done with nitrogen reduction. Several commercial cider makers do this. It requires a consistent source of low nitrogen juice (ie an organic or mostly organic orchard), the right yeast, and multiple trial runs to determine where to stop the yeast. Not easy but definitely possible for average skills brewer if you have a good source of juice.
 
bhambrewer said:
The stove-top pasturizing worked for me.

I had a similar question, decided to bottle carb and pasturize, and it worked.

Added 3/4 a cup of sugar to enough water to dissolve it, racked my fermented dry cider onto this mixture, bottled in 4 22oz beer bottles right away, capped, let sit in a dark cupboard for 2 weeks, opened a bottle that was where I wanted carbonation, but the 3 other bottles in a water bath, have been sitting at room temperature for over 3 weeks and no bottle bombs.

It is scary to do the first time, but so is home brewing. The best way to learn is to just try it and hope it works.
Click to expand...

Why did you bother with heat pasteurizing if what you basically added was priming sugar? If you add a calculated amount of sugar when completely dry then there is no need to stop it when in bottles.

What this person wants to do is stop fermentation at 1.020, which is a sweet drink, but still carbonate his beverage. That is a big difference from bottle carbing.
 
I use raw local honey as my priming sugar, and backsweeten with stevia. Stevia is not an artificial sweetener, it is all natural, but it is non-fermentable.
 
Any idea how much to Stevia use to bring the taste up to what a 1.02'ish drink would be?

I put honey in the primary, so if I were to backsweeten, I'd use the apple juice concentrate.

Space in my house isn't an issue - $300+ for a home-kegging system just to make my own woodchuck isn't really a priority right now.
 
Quick update - refrigerating has shut down the fermentation completely, and rather quickly, too. A quick taste of the cider is quite good, though still very acidic - perhaps next time, more fermentable sugar.

Tonight I'm going to grab some store-bought apple juice, add that to the bucket to get back to 5 gallons (after racking a few times I'm a little low) and probably toss in a smidge of cane sugar. I'm going to bottle tonight, let it come to room temp, carbonate, and when it feels right, toss it back in the fridge.

I have to go out of town next week for a few days, so I don't want any bottle bombs while I'm gone. When I get back, I'll decide whether I want to try bottle-pasteurizing. I'm going to be sure to leave some extra head space at the top of each bottle - something like an inch and a half...

Thanks for all the help.
 
Could you not lay the bottles in a home dishwasher? Both bottom and top racks should give you close to a case of bottles?
 
From what I've read, most home dishwashers don't hit the magical 140-degree mark, and I have no way of knowing what temp my dishwasher truly hits.

I'm only a little worried now because I bottled these last night, and already by this morning my coke-bottle filled with cider is a smidge more firm than a regular coke-filled coke bottle. Not much, and I don't get any ferocious bubbling when I give 'em a little shake.

I've tossed 'em all in the fridge, tonight I'm gonna let 'em come to room temp and then probably try bottle-pasteurizing them, but at a lower temperature. I'm going to take an empty bottle with just roomtemp water in it, heat my pot to 160/170 and put the bottle, un-capped, with a therometer in it, into the pot. I'll see how hot it gets inside and how long it holds.

Gonna be a long night tonight...
 
hi, for what it's worth, i always bottle a 500ml soda bottle along with beer bottles, and when it's rock hard it means that the beer bottles will all be gushers. and heating these up is asking for trouble. it's a very unscientific way of doing things but i now know from many bottlings that the plastic bottle should be a tiny bit softer than an unopened mineral water bottle for my cider to be perfectly carbed for 1. my taste and 2. it not to be excessively dangerous pasteurizing. i, furthermore, agree that stovetop pasteurizing is somewhat dangerous business. but sometimes i want it sweet + fizzy so i'm willing to risk it, and i also use a lower temp than recommended, don't know what it is in F(for funny) degrees but i use 70-75C (for Come on and use the same scale as the rest of the world!!) or 373-378K (my Hilarious tirade against non-metric measurement ends here thank you very much), like you suggested along with an open bottle with thermometer. and with the bottles mostly submerged in water so that if they do pop the energy is absorbed by the water.
good luck
 
Gosh... 70-75C..That's CRAZY!!!........ Oh, Wait.. Carry the 2.... darn metric system..... That's 158 - 167F.... Hey look - that's my 160F pasteurization schedule.... ;)

Anyway... If you are going to stove top pasteurize - make sure that you have a good stand-off in the bottom of the pot.... You don't want the bottom of the bottles running at 400F against the stove eye.... If you aren't using a canning pot with a standoff piece in the bottom - use a double or triple thickness of thick, fuzzy kitchen towels in the bottom of your pot.... A triple thickness of cheese cloth or paper towel isn't enough....

Thanks
 
I was actually thinking of putting down a silicon baking sheet on the bottom of the pan for insulation. And yeah I'm thinking of around 170 degrees for water.

I dunno - I'm going to take it cautiously: safety goggles, gloves, etc, and the moment they start poppin', that's it - no more.
 
ViperMan said:
Space in my house isn't an issue - $300+ for a home-kegging system just to make my own woodchuck isn't really a priority right now.
Click to expand...

I hear ya on this I do... I used to fumble around and waste a ton of time doing all the things that you have been describing in this thread. $300 still seem like a lot? :)

To me - the bottle pasterizing isn't worth the potential trip to the emergency room. $300 is a small investement against that.

You can do better - more like $150-200 if you buy a single keg system with co2, one keg and a party tap (and you have a refridge or freezer).

But I hear you, you want to see if you will do this more than a few times. Can't help but laugh with the goggles, etc comment. Good luck!
 
Mission accomplished.

I let the water get to about 160/165, and left them for 15 minutes. Bottle temp reaches approximately 145/150 inside, according to my first test. The interesting thing to see was how much the liquid level rises inside the bottles, but as I left ample head-room, I had no problems. Each bottle has a surprising amount of sediment on the bottom, and they got shaken up a good bit before going in, so I'm rather confident all the yeasties are dead. Still, I'm watching them to make sure no more pressure is building up.

In all honesty, I've worked in the Auto Industry and construction industries - this ISN'T the most dangerous stuff I've ever done :)
 
I use 1 tbsp per quart of "Stevia in the Raw" to backsweeten. This gives me a cider very similar to "Original Sin." That's not quite as sweet as "Woodchuck", but I find "Woodchuck" too sweet to begin with. That's just me. SWMBO likes "Hornesby's", and she loves my cider with stevia.;)
 
Hey Viperman, from when you bottled the cider until you pasteurized it, how much time was there? Looks like you bottled on the 17th and then pasteurized on the 18th or 20th. What was the state of your plastic bottle? And have you tried one since?

Sorry for the barrage of questions, but I will be attempting something very similar tonight with my cider and want to grab all the extra stats I can beforehand to make sure I do it correctly.

Thanks.
 
For the "plastic bottle" trick, I left a bottle (20oz) of Coca Cola sitting on my kitchen counter. Next to it, filled to the same level, was an identical bottle filled with my cider, capped tightly.

Within 24 hours - possibly even less - the bottle of cider was slightly more firm to the grasp than the Coke bottle. It was morning time and I had to go to work, so I tossed the entire two cases of beer into the fridge. (Coke bottle, too!) This was to stop further fermentation and thus more pressure from building up.

I don't remember if I pasteurized that night - maybe I did. I brought my water to 160-165, lined the bottom of the pot with a silicon baking sheet for insulation. (According to my thermometer, the surface at the bottom of the pot had LESS heat than the water itself.

I'd take the bottles from the fridge while a batch was already in the pot, run some hot water over them just to quickly bring the temp up a few degrees, then immerse them into the pot. (DON'T go from fridge to pot right away.) I let them sit for 15-16 minutes, then pulled them out (gently) with salad tongs, and set them on a towel (so as not to put a hot bottle on a cold counter top.)

This past weekend I took the pasteurized cider back out of the fridge and have left it out under close supervision to watch for signs of any additional fermentation. I haven't seen anything.

By the way I only pasteurized half the batch - that's all time allowed. I tasted some the next day, and found that to my taste, the pasteurized seemed less carbonated then the non-pasteurized. That wasn't to say it went flat - not at all! But I used a Champagne yeast, so my carbonation was really strong to begin with. My wife like's the pasteurized better, I like the non-pasteurized (which has stayed in the fridge) myself.

Hope this helps. Whatever you do, exercise extreme caution and don't assume anything is safe. Even after several batches of bottles, I kept safety glasses on, and kept my wife and pets out of the kitchen.

Jeff
 
Wow, great thanks Jeff!

I just bottled mine today and had very similar starting points as you. I started with some unpasteurized, unfiltered juice and fermented with Champagne yeast. It has been 8 weeks sitting in my primary and went from 1.050 to 1.002. So quite dry.

To backsweeten I used the same juice and added until it had a little sweetness, but mostly dry as we like it. Then bottled it as normal in 750ml Champagne bottles along with two .5liter plastic bottles. I figured in case the first wasn't carbed enough to my liking, I would have a second one to make sure.

I started out with ~8.5liters of juice, lost about .5liter in the primary and added 2liters to backsweeten. Let's hope it works out!

Thanks again for the write-up. :mug:
 
ViperMan said:
For the "plastic bottle" trick, I left a bottle (20oz) of Coca Cola sitting on my kitchen counter. Next to it, filled to the same level, was an identical bottle filled with my cider, capped tightly.

Within 24 hours - possibly even less - the bottle of cider was slightly more firm to the grasp than the Coke bottle. It was morning time and I had to go to work, so I tossed the entire two cases of beer into the fridge. (Coke bottle, too!) This was to stop further fermentation and thus more pressure from building up.

I don't remember if I pasteurized that night - maybe I did. I brought my water to 160-165, lined the bottom of the pot with a silicon baking sheet for insulation. (According to my thermometer, the surface at the bottom of the pot had LESS heat than the water itself.

I'd take the bottles from the fridge while a batch was already in the pot, run some hot water over them just to quickly bring the temp up a few degrees, then immerse them into the pot. (DON'T go from fridge to pot right away.) I let them sit for 15-16 minutes, then pulled them out (gently) with salad tongs, and set them on a towel (so as not to put a hot bottle on a cold counter top.)

This past weekend I took the pasteurized cider back out of the fridge and have left it out under close supervision to watch for signs of any additional fermentation. I haven't seen anything.

By the way I only pasteurized half the batch - that's all time allowed. I tasted some the next day, and found that to my taste, the pasteurized seemed less carbonated then the non-pasteurized. That wasn't to say it went flat - not at all! But I used a Champagne yeast, so my carbonation was really strong to begin with. My wife like's the pasteurized better, I like the non-pasteurized (which has stayed in the fridge) myself.

Hope this helps. Whatever you do, exercise extreme caution and don't assume anything is safe. Even after several batches of bottles, I kept safety glasses on, and kept my wife and pets out of the kitchen.

Jeff
Click to expand...

Jeff are you saying you pasteurized the plastic bottles in the hot water?
 
Sorry - just getting around to responding to this.

Absolutely NO - did NOT pasteurize the plastic bottle. The singular plastic bottle was just a "variable" to measure against the "control" of the Coke bottle. In fact, I accidentally later dumped out the plastic bottle, mistaking it for my satellite fermenter. I could have drank it like any of the other, glass, unpasteurized ciders.
 
Late to the game...as usual.

i too am trying for bottle-carbonated slightly sweet cider. I made some using xylitol and it was good. but i can't leave well enough alone.

what about taking clear dry cider and adding two measures of sugar. one measure for the desired sweetness and the second measure for the desired carbonation. bottle in champagne bottles but also put some in hydrometer tube. watch the hydrometer, and once the gravity indicates the measure of sugar added for carbonation has been consummed, cold-crash the bottles. theoretically, you should be left with a sweet sparkling cider that won't turn into a bottle bomb.
 

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