Man, I love Apfelwein

BoxerDog said:

Ed I have to admit that I didnt really like AW at first, but the aged stuff atleast for me was in a different class. Very smooth and unwine like. I am going to save a bottle and open it at the year mark to see how it will be.

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Yeah, it's an aquired taste if you drink it young, but after a few months, it really comes into it's own. Just take heed of the warnings in my first post.

I had some apfelwein sitting in the fridge as well as in the spare bedroom. The stuff in the bedroom developed a nasty taste and the stuff in the fridge still tastes excellent any ideas as to what happened?

NewAGBrewer said:

I had some apfelwein sitting in the fridge as well as in the spare bedroom. The stuff in the bedroom developed a nasty taste and the stuff in the fridge still tastes excellent any ideas as to what happened?

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In what did you store it? What was the temp in the bedroom? What recipe did you use?

I leave mine in carboys for 1 to 3 months then keg. All my kegs are kept at 39 degrees till it's time to put them in the kegerator.

Well, yesterday I made my second batch of Apfelwein... this time I used dark brown sugar instead!!!
Man, it's damn dark!!!

Quick question. After syphoning a batch to the keg, would the yeast on the bottom of the fermenter still be viable enough to pour the next batch directly onto it and not pitch anymore yeast? I think I have heard you can do this with beer, but is it possible with the apfelwein?

grrr wow on page 30 of 193 so dont smack me if these question have already been answered ......... this sounds like a very lovely drink.

I don't have a kegging system yet so only bottling.
Just purchased 2 - 5gal BB carboys for this

1.) Bottling? Just use 3/4 priming sugar and boil in water and let it sit for a week or 2? Or maybe prime it with sugar and some Apple Juice instead of water?

2.) Cinnamon Stick? Anyone tried putting a stick or 2 into the fermenter? Or maybe doing like a slow cook of some of the AJ with a stick or two and chill and add to the batch. Or maybe do it doing the bottling stage as a late addition (but me as a cooking person I hate late addition to spices and stuff. I love things to absorb the flavors)

3.) Rehydrate? Only dealt with liquid and its 1:30am sooo...... do you use the apple juice to do it with?

4.) For just a small extra kick add an extra half to full pound of M-D?

BTW I am still newish to brewing. Planning to make this mid/late Thursday if I'm not working and after I get the M-D for my brew shop.... closest one I know is about 25-30 min away!

To start off, I followed the recipie to the "T" used motts 100% pure squeezed apple juice only pasturized. It's the dark cloudy stuff that looks like apple cider. And Montrachet yeast with 2 lbs of dextrose.


A few days ago sampled the AW after it was sitting in the carboy for 3.5 weeks at 60 degrees. It was very bubbly in the glass and in the carboy at the time, watery and didnt taste very well.

So I put the bubbler back on and now there are no more bubbles comming up in the AW, and the bubbler stopped. Is everything okay with it? Should i let it sit? What should I do?

I didnt take a before reading, however the after reading was just below 1.000, it my first time using a hydro meter and the temp was at 68. It actually fremented at 68 the entire time and the bubbles always went like mad for the first 2 weeks.

Should I move it to a warmer room?
Should I add more sugar?
Should I stir it up?


This is my first time brewing anything.
Any help would be appreciated since I hope to learn form this and make my first homebrew very shortly.

Thanks!

ArroganceFan said:

Quick question. After syphoning a batch to the keg, would the yeast on the bottom of the fermenter still be viable enough to pour the next batch directly onto it and not pitch anymore yeast? I think I have heard you can do this with beer, but is it possible with the apfelwein?

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I did three batches this way. Only used one packet of yeast. Everything worked out fine.

jdoiv said:

I did three batches this way. Only used one packet of yeast. Everything worked out fine.

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Any taste change, off flavors?

The secret is out:
[ame]http://youtube.com/watch?v=taqcs4RNxTc[/ame]

Mr_Moe said:

To start off, I followed the recipie to the "T" used motts 100% pure squeezed apple juice only pasturized. It's the dark cloudy stuff that looks like apple cider. And Montrachet yeast with 2 lbs of dextrose.


A few days ago sampled the AW after it was sitting in the carboy for 3.5 weeks at 60 degrees. It was very bubbly in the glass and in the carboy at the time, watery and didnt taste very well.

So I put the bubbler back on and now there are no more bubbles comming up in the AW, and the bubbler stopped. Is everything okay with it? Should i let it sit? What should I do?

I didnt take a before reading, however the after reading was just below 1.000, it my first time using a hydro meter and the temp was at 68. It actually fremented at 68 the entire time and the bubbles always went like mad for the first 2 weeks.

Should I move it to a warmer room?
Should I add more sugar?
Should I stir it up?


This is my first time brewing anything.
Any help would be appreciated since I hope to learn form this and make my first homebrew very shortly.

Thanks!

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If you measured a 1.000, its done. Get your bottles sanitized, roughly 40 12oncers, and get 5 oz by weight (~3/4 cup of firmly packed) of corn sugar for carbing. You can also let it sit for clearing up to 2-3 months at 60-85F. (Doing Nothing) 68-72F would be best if possible.

When you are ready to bottle, boil the sugar with 1.5 cup water until its disolved, drop it into your bottling bucket and syphon all but the sediment out to the bucket stir bottle and stir repeat.

If you have questions about bottling and want to read up on it some I recomend this site. http://www.howtobrew.com
The general concept is the same for beer or cider.

Bottling: http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter11.html

Good Luck!!!

Beerrific said:

The secret is out:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=taqcs4RNxTc

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yeah, I added my two cents.

Hey Edwort, I did a search on YouTube.com for Apfelwein. You have great taste in music. (not being fecetious) I wanna be......sledgehammer

SoCalBrewing said:

Hey Edwort, I did a search on YouTube.com for Apfelwein. You have great taste in music. (not being fecetious) I wanna be......sledgehammer

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Thanks.

LOL, I never thought about that. An 8.5% Sledgehammer! Yeah Baby!

Schlenkerla said:

If you measured a 1.000, its done. Get your bottles sanitized, roughly 40 12oncers, and get 5 oz by weight (~3/4 cup of firmly packed) of corn sugar for carbing. You can also let it sit for clearing up to 2-3 months at 60-85F. (Doing Nothing) 68-72F would be best if possible.

When you are ready to bottle, boil the sugar with 1.5 cup water until its disolved, drop it into your bottling bucket and syphon all but the sediment out to the bucket stir bottle and stir repeat.

If you have questions about bottling and want to read up on it some I recomend this site. http://www.howtobrew.com
The general concept is the same for beer or cider.

Bottling: http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter11.html

Good Luck!!!

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Thanks so much for the reply. I will wait for it to clear up then i will definately bottle it so it can age and taste better. Right now theres no flavour.

Started the Apfelwein on Saturday and placed it into my fermenting room (unfortunately this is also my bedroom). Came home yesterday to the wonderful aroma of a healthy brewing apfelwein Of coarse my SWMBO did not share my enthusiasm. So to take care of the smell, I took a 16oz water bottle, filled it with carbon filter and fixed it over the airlock. Worked perfectly. Woke up this morning and could not smell a thing.

Somehow I've managed not to see this thread in the almost year it's been on here. Found it Monday, and made a batch last night. However...this morning there was absolutely no activity. Airlock hadn't even raised off the post. This a common occurance for anyone? Followed Ed's instructions exactly, except I used Red Star Champagne yeast instead of Monacharet because I had some in the fridge and didn't feel like driving 1/2 an hour to the brew store. Same recipe other than that. 5 gals Tree Top AJ, and 2lbs of Dextrose. Any suggestions? Should I pitch another package of yeast if there's still no activity tonight?

Jester4176 said:

Somehow I've managed not to see this thread in the almost year it's been on here. Found it Monday, and made a batch last night. However...this morning there was absolutely no activity.

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I started mine on Saturday and didn't see any activity till Monday. On Tuesday it was going hog wild. Be patient.

EdWort said:

yeah, I added my two cents.

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Good thing! Even with all the edits and fast-motion, it still took me longer to watch that video than it did to make my batch. And they used 2 guys, and 3x the equipment!

Wondering if they "swiped" your recipe, though...awful lot of similarities for that to be a coincidence. (same amount of dexrose, looking for Montrachet yeast, etc)

So I had some people over and had people taste my apfelwein. Everyone loved it!
However, one of the girls wanted to know the caloric content of the drink and I told her I'd ask you guys.
How many calories would you all estimate this at per fluid oz?

swhitt said:

So I had some people over and had people taste my apfelwein. Everyone loved it!
However, one of the girls wanted to know the caloric content of the drink and I told her I'd ask you guys.
How many calories would you all estimate this at per fluid oz?

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Tell her it is -100 calories per glass, then tell her about the Apfelwein diet.

Actually, based on 2 pounds of Dextrose having 3,408 calories, that comes to 5.32 calories per ounce of Apfelwein, plus (using Mott's as an example) 15 calories per ounce of Apple Juice, so you can have about 20 calories per ounce.

That's about 244 calories per 12 ounce serving based on the raw ingredients. I don't know what the fermentation process does to the calorie content though.

EdWort said:

Tell her it is -100 calories per glass, then tell her about the Apfelwein diet.

Actually, based on 2 pounds of Dextrose having 3,408 calories, that comes to 5.32 calories per ounce of Apfelwein, plus (using Mott's as an example) 15 calories per ounce of Apple Juice, so you can have about 20 calories per ounce.

That's about 244 calories per 12 ounce serving based on the raw ingredients. I don't know what the fermentation process does to the calorie content though.

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There 's always this offset.
http://www.c4vct.com/kym/humor/csex.htm

looks like I'm making another batch tomorrow....It's been too hot to brew anything and 1 keg is empty, the other won't be ready for another month or so.

When bottling my first batch, I decided to carb half and leave the rest still. It was my first time using Munton's Carbtabs, and they worked out great.

I just cracked open a chilled bottle of the carbed stuff, and it is really good!

The problem is that now I don't know which one I prefer!

Thanks again for a great recipe Ed!

Thanks Ed, this was my first "brew"... Truth be told, it was my excuse to buy a Better Bottle... I told SWMBO about this one, and she's salivating. "Sure, that sounds good, get what you need... And be prepared to make more." she says.

I just tasted my first apfelwine yesterday and was plesently surprised. I really wasn't sure what to expect. I actually have two batches one with edwort recipe and I used a wyeast `belgian ale yeast for the other version. the belgian yeast one is fg 1.02 and is a bit sweeter. They are both great but in different ways. I probably will add a bit of sugar to sweeten the first batch up a bit.

Still a bit cloudy at 5 weeks but starting to clear nice.



jay

Well just made a batch....
5 gallons of White House 100% apple juice (no additives)
3 lbs M-D
2 Cinnamon Sticks

Boiled about a 1-2 cups of AJ with two cinnamon sticks and ice bathed it. Ended up with almost filling the entire Better Bottle so I left out about a 1/8-1/4 gallon. OG is 1.073.

Didn't have an extra airlock so i used a 3/4" piping I had an ran a blow off. Hopefully 10ft of it wont be too much. Might take a pic or so of my nice little setup in the basement... give my camera some use..... spend 4k on equipment and just kind sits half the year.

Cant wait for the results. Kinda surprised at about how long it took.... sanitizing and cleaning took up the bulk of the time.... about 2 hours total. Then again I had also just racked an old ale to secondary so i had to clean up other things too. Might have to invest in a handle so i can get it back up the stairs.

When this is ready so will my Oktoberfest and my Old Ale.... roughly 15 gallons of alcohol at the same time. Going to have to have some people over to celebrate!

DeadDoc said:

Well just made a batch....
5 gallons of White House 100% apple juice (no additives)
3 lbs M-D
2 Cinnamon Sticks

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Tell me you use dextrose, instead of Malto-dextrine.

M-D doesn't ferment out, but at least, it isn't sweet. But, you're going to have some SERIOUS body!

steve

This weekend was my first experience with using kegged brew, and having kegged apfelwein on hand. One of my friends is cursing its name. He drank four glasses and woke up on my couch the next day hungover.

Good stuff. I have another batch three weeks out. Time to use my empty carboy for batch #3.

skou said:

Tell me you use dextrose, instead of Malto-dextrine.

M-D doesn't ferment out, but at least, it isn't sweet. But, you're going to have some SERIOUS body!

steve

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OK WOW! Well then... ooops. Lets see how this turns out then. Grrr always have issues with those two! Well if the body has some good curves then its all good

efreem01 said:

This weekend was my first experience with using kegged brew, and having kegged apfelwein on hand. One of my friends is cursing its name. He drank four glasses and woke up on my couch the next day hungover.

Good stuff. I have another batch three weeks out. Time to use my empty carboy for batch #3.

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I drank 96oz of it friday night.....Saturday OMG! I woke up in the middle of the night my head hurt so bad. Had to take some medicine and wait for that headache to go away before I could fall back asleep. One of my top 10 worst hangovers...did I screw up something? Is this normal? I expected a hangover but not quite that bad.

Shakz said:

I drank 96oz of it friday night.....Saturday OMG! I woke up in the middle of the night my head hurt so bad. Had to take some medicine and wait for that headache to go away before I could fall back asleep. One of my top 10 worst hangovers...did I screw up something? Is this normal? I expected a hangover but not quite that bad.

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Such is life when one ignores the General Warnings as posted in the first message in this thread. You drank almost 4 wine bottles of 8.5% abv Apfelwein. It wouldn't have mattered what you drank in that quantity, you would be hungover. :cross:

GENERAL WARNINGS

Excessive consumption of Apfelwein WILL get you drunk at warp speed.

Drink a quart of water and take 3 aspirin before going to sleep to help reduce the effects of excessive Apfelwein consumption as well as the urge to call EdWort a M'F**kR the next morning!

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Shakz said:

I drank 96oz of it friday night.....Saturday OMG! I woke up in the middle of the night my head hurt so bad. Had to take some medicine and wait for that headache to go away before I could fall back asleep. One of my top 10 worst hangovers...did I screw up something? Is this normal? I expected a hangover but not quite that bad.

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That's between 12 and 18 commercial beers.

Well I am 6ft 3in 240lbs.....I figured it was proportional.....:rockin:

Shakz said:

Well I am 6ft 3in 240lbs.....I figured it was proportional.....:rockin:

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I'm 6'4" and 270lbs and I won't do that again (been there, done that ).

I know its tough, especially on hot days cause Apfelwein is so crisp & refreshing and easy to drink. It will sneak up on you so fast, you'll wake up and wonder where your pants are. :cross:

EdWort said:

I'm 6'4" and 270lbs and I won't do that again (been there, done that ).

I know its tough, especially on hot days cause Apfelwein is so crisp & refreshing and easy to drink. It will sneak up on you so fast, you'll wake up and wonder where your pants are. :cross:

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Ok Edwort....gimmie a number...how much can us Texans take without feeling like we got beat down with a 10lb sledge hammer?

I just kegged my first batch of this last night. I only drank what was in my gravity test sample, but damn, I wanted to start drinking it all right then. It was freaking great.
Oh I am so going to hurt when this is ready to drink this weekend.

Shakz said:

Ok Edwort....gimmie a number...how much can us Texans take without feeling like we got beat down with a 10lb sledge hammer?

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At home, I drink it out of 25cl Apfelwein glasses (about 8 ounces). Each time I have to get up and make a trip to the kegerator.

If you want to make Apfelwein a session drink, use smaller glasses and drink a glass of water in between. You can also cut it cold club soda or sparkling mineral water (which is what the do in Germany when they don't want to get hammered quickly).

You can also make a batch without any of the Dextrose. That will yield a batch at about 6% depending on the juice.

EdWort said:

At home, I drink it out of 25cl Apfelwein glasses (about 8 ounces). Each time I have to get up and make a trip to the kegerator.

If you want to make Apfelwein a session drink, use smaller glasses and drink a glass of water in between. You can also cut it cold club soda or sparkling mineral water (which is what the do in Germany when they don't want to get hammered quickly).

You can also make a batch without any of the Dextrose. That will yield a batch at about 6% depending on the juice.

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Lived there for 3 years...they call them (phonetically) vinesharla. I loved em. Perhaps thats what I will do next time....nothing like a good ole apfelwine sharla

Come think of it I drank all sorts of stuff mixed with mineral water...apfelsaft sharla....etc. I miss that country.

Thanks for the recipe Edwort!

Yep, I lived there for 5 years, just south of Frankfurt in the middle of Apfelwein country. Drank Apfelweinschorles all the time.

I went to a Weinfest in the Pfalz the first time and drank a bunch of Rieseling in no time and was hammered. They served it in 1/2 liter glasses for about 4 marks. After that headache, I always went for the Weinschoreles (2 thirds wine, 1 third sparkling mineral water). Much better for the long haul.