Yellow jackets

[Coriba]

i see lots of first timers on this forum, me too. I’ve made lots of cider, all from pasteurized store bought juice. This is my first attempt from apple. I crushed and pressed 300 lbs yielding about 55 litres of juice at 1.050 gravity. This went well. Pitched with Red Star champagne yeast. Ferment was a slow start so I put in some yeast nutrient on the third day and it seemed to take off. Just racked from primary this AM and found several yellow jackets on the bottom of the primary. They were swarming during the crush and press. Juice tastes ok, still sweet at 1.035 sg. Will this be a problem?

Dan

 

[JimRausch]

Well, better than fruitflies which carry acetobacter. I'm not aware of anything on yellowjackets that would affect a fermenting or fermented cider or beer. This must happen all the time with big operations. But, I'm no insect specialist. GoodLuck! And let us know.

 

[ten80]

Most flying insects probably carry acetobacter, especially those that feed on fruits, but luckily acetobacter requires oxygen to convert ethanol into acetic acid and also doesn't do well in the presence of sulfites. Keep oxygen at bay and add a little sulfites (~50ppm) when racking if you want to be cautious.

 

[Blacksmith1]

"YellowJacket Cider".... Has a nice ring to it, you should consider it for.your label.

 

[Coriba]

Yeah, I like the label idea.

There were lots of fruit flies too. I think I saw one floating in the demijohn while racking. All under airlock and fermenting strongly so think I should be ok.

 

[RPh_Guy]

There were already > trillions of microbes in there that were living on the apples, including many organisms capable of producing acetic acid.

The insects didn't add anything.

 

[Coriba]

That’s a good perspective.

 

[gregbathurst]

I have worked in a winery where open fermenters for red grapes were normal. There were 100s of bees drowned in the fermenter, attracted by the sugar in the juice, the wine was fine.

 

[Coriba]

This juice has fermented to 1.000 or thereabouts and the flavour is bland. Had hoped the yellowjackets would have added some character, . It needs some acid. Can I add some malic or tartaric acid after the ferment to give it some zip? Really lacking any character right now.

 

[RPh_Guy]

This juice has fermented to 1.000 or thereabouts and the flavour is bland. Had hoped the yellowjackets would have added some character, . It needs some acid. Can I add some malic or tartaric acid after the ferment to give it some zip? Really lacking any character right now.

Absolutely. I use malic acid.

 

[Blacksmith1]

I use citric, well lemon juice actually. But it adds that "snap" the cider is lacking.

 

[Coriba]

I have a demijohn (54 litres) of finished cider. Without fiddling with pH and acid testing (I know it’s flat), how much malic should I add, round numbers?

 

[Miraculix]

I have a demijohn (54 litres) of finished cider. Without fiddling with pH and acid testing (I know it’s flat), how much malic should I add, round numbers?

Pour a pint, add acid till it suits your taste and scale it up from there.

 

[wasully]

There isn't a magic formula that exists without context.

Pull out some samples, measure the pH and titratable acidity. Experiment.

Maybe find some ciders you like, and get those values for comparison.

I know books usually give "most good ciders falll within these bands" numbers, but I don't have them in front of me. Check Lea, Jolicoeur, or Proulx/Nichols?

Might as well experiment with tannin, while you're at it.

 

[Coriba]

I bottled my Yellowjacket cider yesterday, 54 Litres. I added 50 grams of malic acid a couple of weeks ago while it was still finishing and topped with some crab apple juice. Finished acidity was 0.7% tartaric.

The apple quality was not great, lots of bruises and bits eaten. The cores had some sort of rot, I think moldy core rot. Not sure how many yellowjackets got squished in the grinder or press, several whole ones on the fermenter at racking. Didn’t sterilize anything other than the demijohn. With all the issues with this cider making, The cider turned out great. Apples seem to be pretty forgiving.

 

[Miraculix]

I bottled my Yellowjacket cider yesterday, 54 Litres. I added 50 grams of malic acid a couple of weeks ago while it was still finishing and topped with some crab apple juice. Finished acidity was 0.7% tartaric.

The apple quality was not great, lots of bruises and bits eaten. The cores had some sort of rot, I think moldy core rot. Not sure how many yellowjackets got squished in the grinder or press, several whole ones on the fermenter at racking. Didn’t sterilize anything other than the demijohn. With all the issues with this cider making, The cider turned out great. Apples seem to be pretty forgiving.

Or humans like to make big things out of small things.