You can take a bottle, poke a hole in the cap and put in a meat thermometer and monitor the temp. I cant remember the temp/times but there is a chart. You have to hit temp x and stay above for y min. The higher the x the shorter the y.
Easy Stove-Top Pasteurizing - With Pics
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cpnegrad07
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Exploded bottle. Hope that got your attention---it got mine. I was 3 feet away, had a lid on a light canning kettle (one of those Graniteware thin metal pots with a lid). I had 10 different kinds of bottles in there; all were used before. The one that blew was oblong around---maybe that is a weak design. Anyway, the SG was about 1.010 2 days ago and when i opened one before the pasteurization, it foamed out big time. So, yes, i had some pressure in there. How much do you have? I started at a temp of 180 and put the bottles in and turned off the heat for 10 min. The bottle blew at 8 min. I had on safety glasses and a heavy coat; several pieces came out and about the kitchen. So, take the safety part seriously.
How accurate/reliable would it be to keep a test jar/narrow bottle (say 100ml) for some time after bottling, with a hydrometer in it to monitor the "right time" to pasteurise. For example, bottle at 1.007 and pasteurise at 1.005 in order to get a slightly sweet, carbonated cider.
Just trying to dream up some way than opening test bottles. Any thoughts?
Just trying to dream up some way than opening test bottles. Any thoughts?
cpnegrad07
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seems reasonable. Let us know.
datagreier
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In theory, 150f should be enough to kill the yeast. My dishwasher goes to 150, and heats the water gradually, minimising the chance of explosion. Also, a bottle explosion inside the dishwasher wouldn't make a mess.. I have a batch of barberry pear cider bubbling at the moment, and will try the pasteurisation-by-dishwasher and post the results if the results are successful or interesting.
Ike
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To what degree will the alcohol volatilize (evaporate) out of solution? ...assuming the test bottle isn't capped, of course.
NateBodnar
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Any luck with this method?
Kees
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At what temparature do you keel your pasturized ciders?
Kees
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keel must be keep
FYI:
I've been using a sous vide machine for cooking for years, and I also use it to bottle-pasteurize my mead.
If you don't know what a sous vide machine is, it's a small pump-heater with which you heat and circulate water around food - usually meat - that is sealed in a plastic bag. It allows you to cook meat to precise temperatures all of the way through. I can make a perfect medium-rare steak every time I try.
But, it also makes for a wonderful way to heat my mead bottles in a water bath to exactly 140 all of the way through, and hold it there for the necessary 10-15 minutes to pasteurize them. No need to heat the water to 190 and risk bombs, plus precise control so that flavor isn't affected.
Go to someplace like Amazon and look up "Anova Sous Vide." Costs about $75.00. Great for cooking, better for mead.
I've been using a sous vide machine for cooking for years, and I also use it to bottle-pasteurize my mead.
If you don't know what a sous vide machine is, it's a small pump-heater with which you heat and circulate water around food - usually meat - that is sealed in a plastic bag. It allows you to cook meat to precise temperatures all of the way through. I can make a perfect medium-rare steak every time I try.
But, it also makes for a wonderful way to heat my mead bottles in a water bath to exactly 140 all of the way through, and hold it there for the necessary 10-15 minutes to pasteurize them. No need to heat the water to 190 and risk bombs, plus precise control so that flavor isn't affected.
Go to someplace like Amazon and look up "Anova Sous Vide." Costs about $75.00. Great for cooking, better for mead.
NateBodnar
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This sounds like a much better solution to stop bottle bombs! 75 bucks is worth no glass shrapnel in my opinion. Thanks!
InspectorJon
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This is a very long thread and someone has probably already said this but I thought I would post a few pictures of my process. It seems like slowly bringing bottles up to temp rather than plunging into hot water would be less stressful so I used a false bottom for my pot using a flat pizza pan and a pie edge protector. It is the same thing I use for BIAB to keep the bag off the bottom if I want to add heat to my mash. I put the false bottom in the pot and then the bottles and brought up to 160 degrees and held there for a few minutes. The bottle in the middle has water in it.
I was thinking along those lines way back .... I was wondering if the water/beer/cider's density would give different temperature readings - (I'm no scientist) but then I decided it didn't matter, temperature is temperature after all!
I haven't had the need to pasteurize anything so far, but I like the idea of warming the product up to the pasteurizing temps, rather than dunking them from fridge to 160°F water. nice pix!
J Trott
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jiMithing83
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The thermal conductivity of water and cider are probably not exactly the same, but also probably closer enough to not make any real difference. Engineeringtoolbox.com had data for apples, but not for cider. Whole apples are 0.87 btu/(lb°F), i'd imagine the juice is closer to water's 1 btu/(lb°F).
jiMithing83
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I use a meat thermometer in my mash, works just fine. Not quite "instant", but only takes a few seconds to level out.A floating thermometer is a cheap tool that really adds convenience to this process.
Would an instant read meat thermometer work? Never thought to try it in liquid but it is all I have at the moment. Thanks in advance for any insight!
What you show isn't "instant read".. but it'll work. I use a Thermo Pop pen thermometer from my BBQ for reading rehydration water temps and it works great. Responds in a few seconds.
J Trott
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Thank you. It says instant read on it. I think you may have seen the floating thermometer on the post I replied too. Thanks a ton for the response.
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About 12 months ago I put forward the idea of keeping some of the secondary ferment in a 100ml test jar in order to monitor the SG without having to sample all the time... it didn't work.
When the test jar showed 1.008 the secondary was already down to 1.000. Don't know why, so I declared the idea a "FAIL". pity!
BTW the idea of using sous vide had occurred to me. It wasn't something that I had heard of before it started appearing on the cooking competition shows that SWMBO watches. It seems like a great idea especially as it would reduce the chance of thermal shock. Might revisit the idea again. Has anyone had more experience with sous vide.
When the test jar showed 1.008 the secondary was already down to 1.000. Don't know why, so I declared the idea a "FAIL". pity!
BTW the idea of using sous vide had occurred to me. It wasn't something that I had heard of before it started appearing on the cooking competition shows that SWMBO watches. It seems like a great idea especially as it would reduce the chance of thermal shock. Might revisit the idea again. Has anyone had more experience with sous vide.
Blacksmith1
Captain Cheap
Not I, but somewhere previously in this post, one of the posters said they have done this with one. Since then I have been looking for a second hand one.
The Sous Vide quote is here:
I too use sous vide for cooking. I'm curious as to how big of a container is needed for this. I sometimes do batches of 2 cases (5 gallon). Have to figure out how to rig the anova into a big cooler. Leaving it for a couple hours (minimum) would be my suggestion. Could do 140, 150, whatever temp you are comfortable with.
I too use sous vide for cooking. I'm curious as to how big of a container is needed for this. I sometimes do batches of 2 cases (5 gallon). Have to figure out how to rig the anova into a big cooler. Leaving it for a couple hours (minimum) would be my suggestion. Could do 140, 150, whatever temp you are comfortable with.
Blacksmith1
Captain Cheap
Any large stock pot should work, or a steam table tray maybe?
Richard Swales
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First post here.
I've tried this a few times in 0.5 litre Pilsner Urquell bottles which here in Central Europe are designed to be returned and reused by the brewery over many cycles without killing any customers or workers - none broken so far. Like the OP now does, I ferment to dry before adding sugar.
A few things seem to have been missed so far in the thread:
1) Whether or not you have gushers is partly related to the pressure in the bottle, but only partly. For example champagne is said to usually have 6 volumes of CO2 - equivalent to letting it ferment in bottle from 1.009 down to 1.000 - or adding 24g per litre of priming sugar (about 3 oz per gallon) and the pressure is high enough to need special bottles even at ambient temp, but you don't get half of it flying out the bottle the bottle when it's opened. The rate at which the CO2 dissolved in the drink comes turns to gas when the pressure is released is partly the partial pressure difference, but also the number of "nucleation sites" i.e. places for bubbles to form. If you have gushers it's mostly because of sediment particularly loose sediment. Try refrigerating (this also reduces pressure as gases can fit better into cold water) with the bottle standing upright for 24 hours (so the sediment drops and forms a more compact layer on the bottom) before you try to pour into a glass (above the sink). Drink or rebottle.
2 short version) The average temperature in the system once things equalize is going to be pretty close (but under) the average temperature you start with.
2 long version) Ok so last time I had three 0.5 litre bottles at 35 degrees C (95 F), and put them into a pan with 3 litres of 80 degree (176 F) water.
(3L x 80C) + (1.5L x 35C) = 240LC + 52.5LC = 292.5 LC of heat energy - now to get the average we divide by the 4.5L - 292.5LC/4.5L = 65 C. So the average temp of the system at the start is 65 degrees (149 F). (You can do the same calculation with fahrenheit and fluid ounces or whatever, just as long as you are consistent)
When I ran the above, the temps seemed to equalize at about 62-63 degrees (when it was around 70 it was dropping at 1 degree per 30 seconds, but after 5.5 mins when we had 63.5 it was dropping 1 degree per 2 minutes) - so I know next time to aim a couple of degrees C over my target of 65 (maybe aim 5 F over) . The discrepancy will be partly due to cooling in the first 5 minutes (for example between minutes 15 and 20 we also lost 2 degrees which can only be down to general cooling). The specific heat capacity of glass is much lower than that of water (and the metal pan also holds heat) so I don't think that's a big factor.
Here is the time series of temp readings (minutes after I started measuring, which was a couple of minutes after I put them in and temp in C)
0 71, 0.5 70, 1 69, 1.5 68, 2 67, 2.5 66.25, 3 65.5,
3.5 65, 4 64.5, 4.5 64.25, 5 64, 5.5 63.5, 6 63.25
6.5 63, 7 62.75, 7.5 62.5, 8 62.25, 8.5 62, 9 61.75, 9.5 61.5,
10 61.5,
15 59.75
20 58
So i didn't measure inside a bottle, but I think from the above it's pretty clear the internal temps did get above 60 as the clearly stopped "pulling" the water temp down somewhere in the low 60s.
3) People who get explosions etc. when heating with the bottles in. Rather than approaching this to turn it off, you could consider throwing the master electricity or gas shutoff for the property you are in and shutting off the heat that way. (Though the way I do it the heat is already off when you put the bottles in).
I've tried this a few times in 0.5 litre Pilsner Urquell bottles which here in Central Europe are designed to be returned and reused by the brewery over many cycles without killing any customers or workers - none broken so far. Like the OP now does, I ferment to dry before adding sugar.
A few things seem to have been missed so far in the thread:
1) Whether or not you have gushers is partly related to the pressure in the bottle, but only partly. For example champagne is said to usually have 6 volumes of CO2 - equivalent to letting it ferment in bottle from 1.009 down to 1.000 - or adding 24g per litre of priming sugar (about 3 oz per gallon) and the pressure is high enough to need special bottles even at ambient temp, but you don't get half of it flying out the bottle the bottle when it's opened. The rate at which the CO2 dissolved in the drink comes turns to gas when the pressure is released is partly the partial pressure difference, but also the number of "nucleation sites" i.e. places for bubbles to form. If you have gushers it's mostly because of sediment particularly loose sediment. Try refrigerating (this also reduces pressure as gases can fit better into cold water) with the bottle standing upright for 24 hours (so the sediment drops and forms a more compact layer on the bottom) before you try to pour into a glass (above the sink). Drink or rebottle.
2 short version) The average temperature in the system once things equalize is going to be pretty close (but under) the average temperature you start with.
2 long version) Ok so last time I had three 0.5 litre bottles at 35 degrees C (95 F), and put them into a pan with 3 litres of 80 degree (176 F) water.
(3L x 80C) + (1.5L x 35C) = 240LC + 52.5LC = 292.5 LC of heat energy - now to get the average we divide by the 4.5L - 292.5LC/4.5L = 65 C. So the average temp of the system at the start is 65 degrees (149 F). (You can do the same calculation with fahrenheit and fluid ounces or whatever, just as long as you are consistent)
When I ran the above, the temps seemed to equalize at about 62-63 degrees (when it was around 70 it was dropping at 1 degree per 30 seconds, but after 5.5 mins when we had 63.5 it was dropping 1 degree per 2 minutes) - so I know next time to aim a couple of degrees C over my target of 65 (maybe aim 5 F over) . The discrepancy will be partly due to cooling in the first 5 minutes (for example between minutes 15 and 20 we also lost 2 degrees which can only be down to general cooling). The specific heat capacity of glass is much lower than that of water (and the metal pan also holds heat) so I don't think that's a big factor.
Here is the time series of temp readings (minutes after I started measuring, which was a couple of minutes after I put them in and temp in C)
0 71, 0.5 70, 1 69, 1.5 68, 2 67, 2.5 66.25, 3 65.5,
3.5 65, 4 64.5, 4.5 64.25, 5 64, 5.5 63.5, 6 63.25
6.5 63, 7 62.75, 7.5 62.5, 8 62.25, 8.5 62, 9 61.75, 9.5 61.5,
10 61.5,
15 59.75
20 58
So i didn't measure inside a bottle, but I think from the above it's pretty clear the internal temps did get above 60 as the clearly stopped "pulling" the water temp down somewhere in the low 60s.
3) People who get explosions etc. when heating with the bottles in. Rather than approaching this to turn it off, you could consider throwing the master electricity or gas shutoff for the property you are in and shutting off the heat that way. (Though the way I do it the heat is already off when you put the bottles in).
Last edited:
teddyearp
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I'm just curious, has anyone had a bottle bomb before putting it into the water? i.e. over carb before trying to pasteurize?
JordanfromOK
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JordanfromOK
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Well, I'll try to make my 2nd post only once. Haha
So, not very promising results from the first test. I used the "Pots & Pans", "Hi Temp Wash", & the "Heated Dry" settings on our basic Hotpoint dishwasher. Both probes were just placed inside. One on the top rack and one below. The top rack probe recorded a max temp of 135°F for only 2 min. All together, the top (which reached hotter temps than below) stayed at 130°F for a solid 20 min.
Will try and get a probe through a corked bottle and get an actual internal temp of the bottled water later.
(Edited: Still had 1 typo. Grammar Nazi on myself. Mods, please feel free to delete my 1st post. 2 posts ☝. Thanks everyone.)
So, not very promising results from the first test. I used the "Pots & Pans", "Hi Temp Wash", & the "Heated Dry" settings on our basic Hotpoint dishwasher. Both probes were just placed inside. One on the top rack and one below. The top rack probe recorded a max temp of 135°F for only 2 min. All together, the top (which reached hotter temps than below) stayed at 130°F for a solid 20 min.
Will try and get a probe through a corked bottle and get an actual internal temp of the bottled water later.
(Edited: Still had 1 typo. Grammar Nazi on myself. Mods, please feel free to delete my 1st post. 2 posts ☝. Thanks everyone.)
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Caps would be OK, corks probably not. But if bottles are vertical popped corks would be no big deal.
Do you think the corks would just move a little or pop?
Dunno how much expansion there would be. Try a bottle and see...
I will! Also gonna try different methods. Like 145 deg. for 30 min. Or 160 deg. for 5 min.
homebrew93
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Thanks for this thread. I read the original instructions but not all 35 pages in between there and here. I don't understand why the cider needs to be in the bottles at all to pasteurize? I heated my cider up to about 160 degrees and then removed it from the fire let it cool and put it in bottles to sit and settle out.
After that I may add sugar and bottle to make a still sweet. Or for sparkling I will force carbonate after I let it cool, and either add sugar if I want a sparkiling sweet, or leave it to make it a sparkling dry cider.
Is there something wrong with what I am doing?
After that I may add sugar and bottle to make a still sweet. Or for sparkling I will force carbonate after I let it cool, and either add sugar if I want a sparkiling sweet, or leave it to make it a sparkling dry cider.
Is there something wrong with what I am doing?
"Sparking Sweet" means sugar inside (sealed) bottles with live yeast. Live Yeast + Sugar = CO2. The yeast won't really stop consuming any, and all available sugar within said bottle. You want them to stop at some threshold - because it has enough CO2 bubbles, and you want some sugar for yourself. One way to do this is to pasteurize within (the already sealed) bottles to kill the yeast.
"Still Sweet", or "Sparking Dry" are easier to do. Kegging easier too - you can pre-pasteurize and force carb. There's more than one way to skin this cat - which points to why there's 35 pages in this thread!
Cheers!
Mark
If I am paying attention, no.
People doing it in closed bottles... are not force carbonating.
I think force carbonating is safer...
Hummm,
How do you force carbonate glassbotles?
I know they have screw cap things for plastic bottles-
but are there similar devices for crown cap and flip-top bottles?
Blacksmith1
Captain Cheap
Most people force carb in a keg, then if they want to, they bottle. Some leave it in the keg.
