Bottling, Carbing [Cooper drops], and Pasteurizing - Questions.

[jamrs90]

I want to bottle a cider right off primary to maintain its current flavor/ sweetness. I only started it last Saturday, but it has nice flavor and aftertaste. I would like to carb it using Cooper's drops, and since it will still have some suspended yeast and more than likely some unfermented sugar, I want to stove-top pasteurize. I have searched and can't find anything on stove-top method with cooper's drops in the bottles. Is this possible? I don't see any reason it wouldn't work, I'm just looking for opinions or warnings if anyone has tried this and it didn't work.

But, for now, here is the cider currently at 1.017 with a great apple taste and a hint of honey-like flavor. It's also got that slight warm (what I think of it as) bit (taste/feeling, not bite) right after a sip that lets you know there's alcohol in it. It started at about 1.054 with a small amount of added sugar. I then added more (the proper measurement is known as "whatever was left in the bag") and didn't get another reading.

note: despite what your cat tells you, the purple packet of treats is not advised for a brewing additive

 

[snuesen]

Ok based on my experience, I think if you bottled now you probably wouldn't even need the drops. Bottle at 1.016, pasteurize at 1.012 ish, should give you good carbonation and still maintain a semi sweet profile (assuming you didn't want bone dry). What you gotta still do is bottle 1 or 2 in a plastic bottle and make sure it's not too carbonated.

 

[jamrs90]

Well, fermentaion seems to have stopped or slowed at 1.016/7. It could be that I am using a proper testing tube now versus the container the hydrometer came in. Either way, I racked to secondary, without getting/ disturbing any of the lees like I did last time so I got a nice color and clarity compared to my first cider attempt. I got about 1.75gal after test samples and leaving headspace in primary. and am going to start bottling as soon as I get a stock pot that will hold bottles.

Unfortunately, the cooking set that I got when I moved into my apt doesn't have a pot big enough to hold even one bottle. That will give me time to get the labels off my bottles.

 

[jamrs90]

Pretty excited seeing as how I just got 15 (12oz) bottles. I have some Brewer's Best conditioning tablets and each bottle got 4 of them for a middle of the list carbonation level (hopefully). I ended up putting some more sugar in one of the 1gal secondaries because it was only filled to just over half, and it only sat for a day. That one was put into marked bottles, as well as having the plastic bottle filled with it due to it being more likely to become bottle bombs. I am going to pasteurize probably tomorrow or Sunday and serve on Thanksgiving. Both samples had a nice taste and smell, so it looks like third time's the charm!