First Post! :rockin:
What's up brewers! I've been lingering and borrowing recipes from this form for a while, but I am still a beginner, especially to cider. I currently have a couple 5 gallon primaries going, one of which will be a nice caramel apple cider I found on this forum. The other I'm unsure of how I want to use the finished primary. These are my first runs of carboys, previously I used EZ caps to tinker with making grape, apple and pineapple ciders.
While the 5 gallons were doing their thing I also put together (3) growlers (64 fl ounces) consisting of the same ingredients as the carboys (I experimented with different yeasts), which have finished fermenting and I want to tinker with some flavoring and sweetening. I normally keg and force carb everything so I'm rather inexperienced at botting.
The growlers pretty much fermented right out and finished right about 1.00, so along with flavor a little sweetness would be just fine. So, I'd like to flavor with some pear flavored syrup I picked up and I'm not sure how to tackle it.
I'd like to:
1. Add pear flavor
2. Carbonate
3. Sweetening is fine but not essential. If I do a large batch I will backsweeten in secondary and keg to force carb. This could probably be accomplished with the pear syrup alone. That said I would like a reasonably similar sample result from the growler.
Should I:
1. Use the syrup for flavor and carb and either forget sweetenin/use artificial sweeteners.
2. Use the syrup for flavor and sweetener, then stovetop pasteurize.
I'm looking for some input from you gurus, any advice or suggestions are welcome. Thank you in advance
EDIT: I just noticed after posting that the syrup has preservatives in it. I'm not exactly sure how this will effect my options. Will the syrup fail to ferment resulting in the syrup adding flavor and sweetness? If so, will this prevent any other added sugars from fermenting for carbing?