****...potassium sorbate

[JZ_brewing]

Jist pitched two packs of Wyeast sweet mead yeast with 2 lbs of brown sugar and 2 lbs of raw honey in 5 gallons of cider. Just realized it has .1% potassium sorbate in each gallon.

What is going to happen?!?

 

[LeBreton]

You're going to pay a lot more attention to the ingredients when buying cider in the future

Seriously though, this is probably a no go. You could try splitting the sorbated juice into 2 batches with non stabilized juice added to dilute. Make a BIG starter and hope.

 

[jayott]

Potassium sorbate is not a problem if you make a starter AND cut it with non sorbated juice AND not use sulfites.

Typically orchard juice fermented alone is thin (one dimensional), so other juice is necessary unless the proper blend of apples is pressed with maybe the exception of Winesap apples.

Believe it or not, 1qt of any raspberry lemonade per gallon of orchard juice is well on target for balancing a boring cider made from pie apples.

 

[JtotheA]

This may sound unrelated but it's not...
Take the skeeter pee recipe for instance. That uses lemonade that has preservatives in it. So obviously it's possible to ferment juice with preservatives (using some kind of starter or getting creative). And on top of it, it's highly acidic lemon juice. So I personally think it possible to do. Just have to put in extra effort in order to do it...such as in the skeeter pee recipe.

 

[mojorader]

I just did the exact same thing! If I can't Trade it back to the orchard for some cider without K-sorbate I'm going to experiment with some stuff. Maybe split the batch with juice or store bought cider and use a huge starter.

Question tho: what does the skeeter pee thing suggest? I checked it out but must have missed it.

...lesson learned!

 

[Leadgolem]

http://skeeterpee.com/?page_id=17

Potassium sorbate doesn't actually kill yeast. It keeps if from reproducing. The yeast will produce alcohol from sugar once the oxygen runs out. Since they can't reproduce though, you need to pitch WAY more yeast then is normal. Yeast nutrient will sometimes allow the yeast to go through a couple generations before the sorbate stops them. I would say you want to pitch at least 2 yeast starters. If the batch stalls, you'll want to do even more until it's at about the right FG.

It's actually more complicated then that though. Here's more information on the subject.
http://www.fermentarium.com/homebre...ng-you-know-about-potassium-sorbate-is-wrong/

 

[Leadgolem]

You could also try a little caffeine. It's supposed to prolong the life of yeast. Though I haven't tried it specifically with potassium sorbate.

 

[mojorader]

Just called the orchard and they told me they can't sell anything without a label and they only have a label for their normal cider with preservatives but they did give me raw cider. Phew!