If juice doesnt say "No preservatives" does that mean it contains them? Slow growth?

I bought a few bottles of Cranberry juice from the $.99 store last week. I carefully read the bottles, they did not say "No preservatives" but the ingredients were only Cranberry juice, H20, and ascorbic acid (Vitamin C).

I added my sugar, nutrient, and acid blend. Waited over night with my yeast culture seperate and added it the next morning.

So today it has been 5 days and I went to rack to the secondary and there was only foam on the top of the juice. I didnt see any yeasty cakes floating.

I racked to secondary and air-locked and nothing. No bubbles.

Did I waste a whole $12 on cranberry juice?

Foam would certainly imply fermentation, but not a guarantee. But ascorbic acid was used as a preservative in this case, but it will not prevent fermentation, so you should be fine.

In this case the ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) is the preservative. It rapidly oxidizes and is considered an anti-oxidant. Ascorbic acid can cause yeast to produce ethyl acetate compounds which smells like turpentine, but other than that it should not interfere with the (re)production of yeast activity.

I am not sure how much fermentable sugar comes from cranberry juice concentrate (I assume it was from concentrate because you said 99 cents - the not from concentrate stuff costs more than a yacht)

If you throw some corn sugar in there, does it bubble?

When I put it all in the primary I boiled a pot of water and mixed in 3lbs of sugar with it so I kicked up the sugar content a bit. Im at work now but when I get home later Ill throw a ballon over the air lock for a hour and see if it starts to inflate.

Thanks for helping to set me at ease

You added acid blend to an already high acid juice. I would guess that your yeast is struggling a bit with the environment.

Why did you move it so soon? The yeast probably barely got started when you moved it.

I couldnt find a set of directions for a cranberry wine. So I used a combo of apfelwein and the welchs wine in the recipe section to be honest.

I only used a half tsp of acid blend. Is that bad? Should I dilute with H20?

Its only my 2nd batch ever lol.

It will probably be fine but I'm concerned there may not be enough yeast left to get through complete fermentation.

Did you check your gravity reading? Most ciders go below 1.000 but it takes several weeks to get there.

The batch started at 1.030.

Should I wait a few days and add a new packet of yeast? Should I hold a ceremony for the fallen yeasties?

Not a single bubble. What now? Rack and re yeast? Should I try to boil the batch and start all over?

GooBrew said:

Not a single bubble. What now? Rack and re yeast? Should I try to boil the batch and start all over?

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No. Never boil juice. It'll set the pectins (think jelly).

What is the SG now?