I am making a cider from store bought apple juice, is that okay?

[sucram1989]

I'm making a cider from store bought apple juice. I got the recipe from a local brew store, but they just gave me roundabout instructions. I but 5 gallons to ferment at 70F with cider yeast and a tbsp of apple pie spice. It has been 5 days since fermentation started. Airlock bubbles are about 3 1/2 min apart. I'm waiting until about 5min between bubbles to rack to secondary. I'm just wondering if I'm doing anything correctly. Also, I heard some people add sugar. Should I add sugar when I rack to secondary, or would that be a bad idea?


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[bernardsmith]

IMO You really need to measure the gravity and not the rate of bubbles. But that said, I am not sure I really understand your question.
You can certainly make cider from store bought juice. But yer gets what yer pays for and store bought apple juice is not likely to be as complex or interesting to taste as apple juice from locally pressed apples.
You ask if you can add sugar to the secondary. But if the apple juice you have fermented is of sufficient sugar content for the amount of alcohol you want to produce then why are you adding sugar to the secondary? If the amount of sugar in the juice when you pitched the yeast is insufficient then you want to add the sugar to the primary.
In my experience (and that is not great) store bought juice will have a gravity of about 1.040 which if fermented dry will give you an ABV (alcohol by volume ) of about 5%. It will be dry - so no residual sugar and so no sweetness. You can add sugar to back sweeten but you do this AFTER the cider has fully fermented and you have removed all the active yeast and then stabilized the cider by adding K-meta and K-sorbate. You then make a simple syrup and add that to the cider (about 2 oz /gallon increases the gravity by .005 - you need to calculate how much sugar you want to add by bench testing and tasting). You would back sweeten just before you bottle.
Not sure if anyone in this forum would agree with me but I rack to the secondary after the gravity has fallen to almost 1.000 . I then keep the cider in the secondary 2 -3 months and rack onto K-meta and allow to age for about 3 months and then rack again onto K-meta and allow to age another 2-3 months and then bottle. But you can drink the cider after about 2-3 months in the secondary.

 

[robbyhicks]

The ciders I have done have been all with juice... both bottles and frozen concentrate... like the 1st response mentioned if you wanted to boost the abv you wanna add sugar before primary, if you want sweet cider then add at bottling... I did an experiment with some bottle juice that fetmented to 5.5% with no added sugar... the last one I did will be about 5% with the juice and a little sugar... you may find you want to add more spice for 3-4 days before bottling as primary tends to carry the spice flavor off... if you want to carb this batch up then dont add the sorbates and just bottle and carb then either cold store or stovet top pasteurize... as for times I generally go 10-14 days in primary followed by 3-7 days of secondary then bottling... I found it is good from the start but hit its prime at 6-9 months in the bottle... let me know if you need more info...

 

[sucram1989]

Thanks for all the help


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[sucram1989]

Not exactly sure what k-meta or sorbates are or what they do tho


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[robbyhicks]

Me either I know they are used in wine to "stabilize" the must... I usually just use some campden tabs crushed up in the bottling mix and store cold since I prefer still ciders... I have yet to use the other wine add-ins...

 

[MoonDawg]

Sucram, i brew hard cider exclusively-so i have a fair amount of knowledge to impart. FIRST, did the juice contain preservatives?(I.e.- Sodium Benzoate, Potassium Sorbate) If so, then the brew could be essentially doomed. Actually, these days you would most likely have to go out of your way to find a supermarket apple juice containing these preservatives.(There are some indications these are harmful to humans.) The ingredient list should read: Apple juice(or apple juice from concentrate), water and Ascorbic Acid(Ascorbic Acid will not harm your yeast and indeed some sources claim it as a yeast nutrient.) Be careful when adding fermentables to your serving bottles, Your safest bet is to bottle before gravity reaches 1.000.( That is, if you're ok with a dry cider.)

 

[frankusb]

My experience with store bought juice is to stay away from concentrate, either frozen concentrate or juice made from concentrate as your primary source of juice. It can turn out good but can also turn out very tart/pale/bland.

So far, using store bought juice not from concentrate has worked consistently well.

I would have to check my logs on total numbers for the above statements but I would estimate my from concentrate batches to be in the 20-ish range, while my not from concentrate batches are in the 6-ish range.

Frank

 

[MarkKF]

I have never used k-meta sorbate or Camden tabs after fermentation. I almost always go dry and don't back sweeten. But I pasteurize all my bottle conditioned cider.

As for store juice I only use it for cider flavored with other juices or fruit.


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[sucram1989]

Do I have to pasteurize my cider when I bottle? If so, why?


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[MarkKF]

Pasteurizing kills any yeast left

This prevents over carbonation and bottle bombs

If you don't back sweeten and calculate the proper amount of priming sugar it's unneeded

But it's cheap insurance and an easy way to remove old labels


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