How to go about bottle carbonating cider

Just started my first batch of cider, I have a few batches of beer under my belt and hanging over it "hehe"I saw apple juice on sale at the local mart and purchased 5gallons worth. I used Nottingham dry yeast and pasturized apple juice with no perservatives. My OG is 1.49. I want to finish it at 1.010 so its a nice and refreshing 5% alcohol, and carbonate it so I can have a nice refreshing summer drink. Once it reaches 1.010 I need to cold shock..first time carbonating a potentiol bottle bomb. Any tips and techniques...also wont cold shocking it kill the yeast its around 40F in my entry way where i plan to let it sitt over night so i though dead yeast = no carbonatioin. I plan on using dextrose to carbonate but I've also heard people use brown sugar works well but it give it a wine taste..any insights?

Nothing you can do to bottle carbonate with yeast and leave a lot of residual sugars in your cider. You will get bottle bombs. Only safe way to do this is to kill off all the yeast with a Camden tablet and then force carbonate from a keg. If you've got yeast & sugar both still in there and enough warmth to get yeast activity for carbonation, you will get bottle bombs.

tip: don't try and bottle carbonate sweet cider. It's all over these forums, the only SAFE and sure way (IMHO) to make a carbonated sweet cider without having to put the whole batch in the fridge untill you drink it, is to use a kegging setup.

Oops, someone beat me too it.

1.010 fg wont cause bottle bombs. Its the same as any beer. Especially with beer yeast such as notty.

Don't cold crash. It'll clear nicely. Use the same amount of priming sugar you would for beer.

Thats awesome! Thanks! I hope the notty yeast dosn't decide to be an over achiever and give me a high alcohol content.

MGAZ said:

1.010 fg wont cause bottle bombs. Its the same as any beer. Especially with beer yeast such as notty.

Don't cold crash. It'll clear nicely. Use the same amount of priming sugar you would for beer.

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This is just wrong. Apple juice is much more fermentable than malt-based wort; it usually ferments down to 0.994. If you bottle at 1.010 but your yeast wants to ferment down to 0.994, you will be in trouble. Fermenting from 1.010 to 0.994 in a closed bottle will be enough to bust most bottles and will produce massive gushers for any bottles that don't break.

tenchu_11 said:

Thats awesome! Thanks! I hope the notty yeast dosn't decide to be an over achiever and give me a high alcohol content.

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Good luck with that -- I recommend you store them in plastic bags.

Well..then I will just let it finish fermenting and just hope its nice If its a low FG then it will be a nice 4-5% Alcohol hard cider...if not it will be a sparkling wine. Thanks for all the help I tried to make hard cider on a whim. Its always nice to have experience input.

MGAZ said:

1.010 fg wont cause bottle bombs. Its the same as any beer. Especially with beer yeast such as notty.

Don't cold crash. It'll clear nicely. Use the same amount of priming sugar you would for beer.

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Do not follow this advice, it's wrong and dangerous.

mkling said:

This is just wrong. Apple juice is much more fermentable than malt-based wort; it usually ferments down to 0.994. If you bottle at 1.010 but your yeast wants to ferment down to 0.994, you will be in trouble. Fermenting from 1.010 to 0.994 in a closed bottle will be enough to bust most bottles and will produce massive gushers for any bottles that don't break.

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This is correct. Nottingham will ferment the sugars in applejuice up to 14% abv. The only way you can stop it is to kill or remove the yeast. Your OG of 1.049 should end up about 6.77 abv when fermented dry.

As it stands, you can have a sweet still cider by cold crashing at the sweetness you want and racking onto sulfate/sorbate.

You could also let it ferment dry, then back sweeten with unfermentable lactose and bottle with some priming sugar.

Apparently, I should have prefaced my statement with 'In my experience'.

My last two ciders:
OG: 1.052 OG: 1.090
FG: 1.011 FG: 1.009

No bottle bombs, no gushers, no nuclear winter.

Did you have to stop fermentation or did the ale yeast just do what ale yeast does and stops fermenting at the point its designed to do.

Nope, stopped all on its own. When I've used notty for beer it stops between 1.010-1.020.

If it keeps going It will be a strong cider/wine. But I hope i get the same result as you, I would very much like to have a carbonated cider.

Those number were after 42 day total fermenting. 3 days constant final gravity.

one easy and tasty way to have sweet cider without worrying about the bottle bomb problem is to buy a few bottles of martinelli's sparkling... that stuff is super sweet. When you're drinking your cider, add an ounce or two of the sweet sparkling cider, to taste.

I have groslch bottles..wonder if they would explode or the trop would just be pop off

You can do it. I primed my cider before bottling and got it to a semi sweet level, and then bottled it. I also filled a plastic water bottle and gave that a squeeze every day to check the level of pressure building. When it was carbed enough (and I tested a few bottles to make sure), I pasteurized in 160 degree water for 15 minutes. No bombs, they've been sitting at room temperature for months, and are nicely carbonated and not too dry. Search the forums, there's info from people who have done this.

Bluechicken said:

You can do it. I primed my cider before bottling and got it to a semi sweet level, and then bottled it. I also filled a plastic water bottle and gave that a squeeze every day to check the level of pressure building. When it was carbed enough (and I tested a few bottles to make sure), I pasteurized in 160 degree water for 15 minutes. No bombs, they've been sitting at room temperature for months, and are nicely carbonated and not too dry. Search the forums, there's info from people who have done this.

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I'm looking to do a 3 gallon batch of semi sweet cider for the first time. I want it bottled and carb'ed. Can I use this method with a plastic bottle tester, and instead of pasteurizing just throw 30 or so bottles in the fridge to stop fermentation and store there with the carbonation it has? Seems like this option is not talked about, I know its probably because people don't have room to store all their bottles in a fridge. Thanks

Wow this was an old post quick update. My cider tasted bad it tasted like water soaked in apple wood ...just a hint of apple taste to it. I added like 4 cups of splenda since its none fermentable it tasted gross and sweet. not infected just not palletable ..dumped all 5 gallons of it. Thats what i get for buying and using safeway cider. it was carbonated nicely though..one upside of it

tip: don't try and bottle carbonate sweet cider. It's all over these forums, the only SAFE and sure way (IMHO) to make a carbonated sweet cider without having to put the whole batch in the fridge untill you drink it, is to use a kegging setup.

Click to expand...

Nothing you can do to bottle carbonate with yeast and leave a lot of residual sugars in your cider. You will get bottle bombs. Only safe way to do this is to kill off all the yeast with a Camden tablet and then force carbonate from a keg. If you've got yeast & sugar both still in there and enough warmth to get yeast activity for carbonation, you will get bottle bombs

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Or you can heat pasteurize on the stove. The short summary is you let fermentation go until you are at your target gravity and level sweetness, say around 1.010 for a semi-dry sparkling cider. Rack to bottling bucket and bottle as you would a batch of beer. I use priming sugar, because I don't want the cider to get any drier. Put the bottles in a place that is 70+ degrees to bottle condition/carbonate. After a week, start checking bottles for carbonation level by opening one. I check every other day. When they are carbonated to your liking, heat water in a large stock pot to 190 F, take it off the heat, and put the bottles in. Let them sit for 10 minutes and remove. Check temperature of the water, add heat to get back to 190 F, take off heat, add bottles, repeat as needed.

Simplest technique possible, requires a little time, but really is almost foolproof. The best thing is the ingredients are only apple juice/cider, pectic enzyme, and yeast. No campden, no back-sweetening with splenda, no harsh flavors, just the apples and yeast. Maybe I should take some pics and put it in a thread of its own.

I sweetened my cider before bottling, and checked the plastic bottle tester, then pasteurized on the stovetop when they were carbed enough. I'm still drinking from that batch, 6 months later, and not one of the bottles, stored at room temp, has exploded. They're still nicely carbed and taste great.

To answer the fridge question, I imagine that would stop or halt fermentation, so it seems like another option.

Pappers_ said:

Or you can heat pasteurize on the stove. The short summary is you let fermentation go until you are at your target gravity and level sweetness, say around 1.010 for a semi-dry sparkling cider. Rack to bottling bucket and bottle as you would a batch of beer. I use priming sugar, because I don't want the cider to get any drier. Put the bottles in a place that is 70+ degrees to bottle condition/carbonate. After a week, start checking bottles for carbonation level by opening one. I check every other day. When they are carbonated to your liking, heat water in a large stock pot to 190 F, take it off the heat, and put the bottles in. Let them sit for 10 minutes and remove. Check temperature of the water, add heat to get back to 190 F, take off heat, add bottles, repeat as needed.

Simplest technique possible, requires a little time, but really is almost foolproof. The best thing is the ingredients are only apple juice/cider, pectic enzyme, and yeast. No campden, no back-sweetening with splenda, no harsh flavors, just the apples and yeast. Maybe I should take some pics and put it in a thread of its own.

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Can this be done with swing-top bottles?

As long as they make a positive seal. When I did mine I used 4 Grolsh bottles along with my 22oz regular cap bottles so I could.check to see if they were ready.