Man, I love Apfelwein

I just bottled up a small 2.5 gallon batch of this last night. Used S-05. It tasted great at bottling time. Kind of like Sake with an apple aftertaste. I really like it. Hopefully it will be carbed up by christmas!

 

I like it straight, but if anyone has some Mountain Dew in the fridge cut it 50/50 and try it out. Amazing combination.

 

How much priming sugar did you use? TIA

 

I just found some cheap apple juice, so I think I'll try my hand at EdWort's Apfelwein. Only I am going to try to caramelize the sugar before adding it!

Wish me luck!

 

I would suggest trying the original first. At least then you know what it is supposed to taste like before altering it.

 

Well I am not altering it, more using it as a guide. I have the idea of caramelized cider/apfelwein on the mind and I decided that Edwort's recipie would be a good place to start. I'll give the original recipie a try next time, I kind of like doing things a$$ backwards. It helps keep things interesting!

 

Well Ed says to prime just like you would for an equal amount of beer, but i wanted mine a little more bubbly to make it seem more champagne like. I used 2.8oz of dextrose for 2.43 gallons of apfelwein. I'll let you know how the carb levels are around Christmas.

 

I've used DAP in the last couple of batches when my FERMAX got wet and stinky. Didn't notice any off flavors...but in one case I probably didn't use ENOUGH DAP as there were still rhino farts.

 

That's interesting! I opened up an almost 2 year old bottle of Apfelwein over Thanksgiving and it wasn't very good Had a little phenolic/band aid flavor developing. Maybe a little oxidized? Never got that before, though I think the oldest Apfelwein I have tried was only 1 year old. I think I have a couple more bottles of the 2 year old stuff, so I will try it again. Maybe just a problem with that bottle. It was still carbonated, so I don't think the seal was bad.

 

My batch has been fermenting since the 3rd, kind of slow and steady on the ferment......then I read about using yeast nutrient in apfelwein, and it makes sense, given the less complete nutritional environment apple juice presents to the yeast. So yesterday I eased out the stopper and put in a sprinkle of Wyeast Yeast Nutrient.

 

I forget who (there were a couple explaining why you shouldn't use just DAP in apple juice) detailed why the DAP could have the potential to be rather bad. In a nutshell though it made sense as it does provide the nitrogen but pretty much nothing else for the little yeasties and encourages them to consider going cannibal. I actually buy bakers yeast and boil it down to feed to them generally and it works to great effect (not to mention you can buy 2lbs for like $4 @Sams and it can cover your breadmaking needs too). To be fair though I've only had the one batch go bad and I could never put my finger on the cause (and it was bucket based as well). I've tried to stick to either nutrient and/or DAP+Boiled Yeast/ghosts since and have had no further problems yet at least.

 

So all of my brewing gear has been packed up in a PODS for the last 5 months since we're currently living out of the USA. But this thread reminded me just how easy it can be to make alcohol.

We bought some apple juice, added lots of liquid glucose, then pitched some cheap dry ale yeast directly in the apple juice jug. We've got 2 jugs fermenting away. Since we're fermenting in the apple juice jugs we didn't need to sanitize anything but the lids before we put them back on (the lids are loose to let the CO2 out). Fermentation started within an hour. It's been lots of fun tasting the juice as it ferments, a few times a day for the last few days...

Also, we had to pour some of the juice out of the jugs to make room for the glucose, so we have a small plastic water bottle with the excess (yes we cleaned & sanitized it first to remove any funky mouth bacteria). We didn't pitch any yeast into the smaller water bottle, instead we tossed in some skin from a fresh peach which we hoped would have some wild yeast on it... and within 2 days we've got fermentation there too!

Attached a couple pics. The first is a juice jug we're fermenting with the dry ale yeast and you can see fermentation has started. The second is a pic of the excess with the peach skins... the green coloring is the label adhesive.

 

Opened last night and it is very good. There is just a hint of pomegranate flavor. It finished dry of course. I wonder if some back-sweetening would bring out the flavor more.

 

I've enjoyed mixing it with a splash of apple juice on ice.

I opened a bottle that I added a carbonation tablet to and it hasn't even started to carb. I'm doubting I got enough yeast after it sat in the primary for 9 months. It's only been about 2.5 weeks though. We'll see.

 

Maybe a splash of pomegranate juice would be good. Did you use just one carb tablet? I have used them for beer and usually use 2. For a highly carbed beverage, I might use 3.

 

I really like carbonated apfelwine wine served at about 62 deg F. I think that is where the best apple taste shows. I do not back sweeten and I think I'd like it sweetened with 7up, but am too cheap to buy the soda, also. I am posting drunk, but I do love me some apfelwine, also, damn iPad auto correct. Whatevs have another. Mine is so dry out of the bottle i feel i should add an olive, but that would be gross eh? Cheers, n_g

 

Mine has been fermenting for over 5 weeks (following original recipe only used 2 lbs sucrose not dextrose). I hit recipe OG or thereabouts, now I'm at 1.002. I'll check again this weekend when I plan on bottling... but is it normal to finish above 1.000?

I know the wait a few days and recheck rule but I've never had any beer ferment this long... don't know if the process is slower. BTW I drank all of the gravity sample and it was amazing. Going to have to start another batch soon.

 

FWIW, the batch I just bottled about a week ago finished about where yours did. It was slightly higher after adding the priming sugar, of course. Keeping it in balance, I had to ask here if it was safe (asked after I bottled - my normal MO ). The answer I got was that it should be okay. I cracked open a bottle yesterday (exactly one week after bottling) and it made a psst sound when I opened it, but wasn't carbonated enough to even notice ... just one week in, though.

That's the extent of what I have to offer on it.

 

My first batch was created 10/29 and I was planning on bottling around 12/22. But I was thinking I would like to make a 12 pack of them carbed up for x-mas. I know I'm pushing the time but do you think if I bottle a batch tonight would they be fully carbed in 12 days?

 

They won't be fully carbed, but if you let them condition on the warmer side, (mid 70's) you should see a decent amount of carbonation by Christmas.

 

They probably won't be very good either. Not bad, but not good (at least to most people).

 

To some of us, it is already good right out of the hydrometer tube

 

Still Apfelwein is every bit as good as carbed

 

Thanks for the replies. My original plan was to make this batch all still and then my next batch I would carb some. I'm new at this and I just successfully had a nice batch of beer so I was thinking I should try carbing since my beer came out ok.

 

I made a 6 gal batch exactly to Ed’s instructions and it turned out great. For the second one, I would like some advice on experimenting. I would like the end product to be a bit sweeter and more syrupy. I would also not mind if the alcohol level goes up even more.

Would substituting the 2 pounds of dextrose with lots of honey produce the desired effect? If so, about how much honey should I use? With my limited understanding of the fermenting process – I assume the yeast generating the alcohol will start to die out once it reached about 12% alcohol or so. If so, let’s say 3 pounds of honey will bring 6 gal of apple juice to about 12% alcohol. If I were to add 4 pounds of honey would that last pound not be converted and would then make the end product sweeter and less dry? If that is how it works how much honey do you think I should use?

I know most people just back sweeten or add non-fermentable sweeteners. Besides the higher cost, would adding 5 pounds of honey instead of the 2 pounds of dextrose result in a sweeter, more syrupy and slightly higher alcohol content? Anything else I should be aware of?

Thanks for your help!

 

LOL! Amen - although the problem I'm running into is my "wine thief" (aka turkey baster) has reached it's maximum depth, and I am no longer able to pull and an occasional SG sample .

Fred

 

I had that problem. I didn't feel like sanatizing my siphon tube to i just leaned the bottle over slowly and got back to bastin'

 

Two tablets for each 24-25 oz bottle.

 

I'm not referring to carbonation level, I'm referring to aging time. Mine tastes fine to me straight out of the hydrometer. But to a lot of people, that taste is "very" bitter and has pretty faint apple flavor. All I'm saying is that it's not the finished product, that's all.

Frankly, I find young Apfelwein to be pretty tasteless and nothing special, but I'm a snob.

 

My mistake. I haven't had the luxury of aged yet, but I have 5 gallons that will go into a secondary in two weeks, where it will stay for hopefully one year.

 

That's pretty hardcore. I'm planning on bottling mine next Monday or Tuesday and setting a few bottles back for a year+. I'd like to give it longer, but I'd like to give the majority away for Christmas with the explicit instructions not to drink until April. :cross:

 

I can brew so much at any given time that as soon as it is done I will have 20 gallons going into primary, that way I can just put the aging out of my mind. In fact, I should probably age 10-15 gallons

 

I made my first batch, per original instructions, back in mid-October, and I've tasted it a few times since then. It has a distinct taste/smell...almost a little like vomit. Is this anywhere near normal?? I know it hasn't been aged too long, but if it tastes anything like this, I don't see how I can drink it.

If I sweeten it with 1 splenda for a ~12oz serving, it's barely okay, but still noticeable. Did something happen to the batch? Do I just give it more time?

 

Is it clear?

 

I would not describe that as even remotely normal.

 

Tonight we have a vintage 2011 low calorie, sweetened, fermented apple flavored vomit wine...would you care for a bottle?

I got a bit of the rhino farts for a couple days early in the fermentation, but nothing even remotely close to what you describe. Never had an apple indulgence where I puked to know what apple vomit smells or taste like, though.

 

Hmmm... vomit flavored. I'm wondering if that may be a mix of some sort of rotten flavor combined with acetic acid. Or maybe even just a bit the latter.

 

How clear is this stuff supposed to be? Mine after 2 months still looks like apple juice but not as dark as it was in teh beginning. So i guess it is getting a bit lighter.

 

This sample is a bit pre-mature. It should clear a little more than this, at least in my experience.

 

Every time I go in to my cellar, I see a bottle of apfelwien that I put in a clear bottle. I say to myself "holy ****, that's clear!"

So something along the lines of that clear would be what you're shooting for.