Amount of yeast needed?

[bmd2k1]

Newbie here...looking to fire up 1st batch this week.

Is one pack of liquid yeast (Wyeast) adequate for 5gal of hard cider?

Same true for dry yeast?

Thanks in advance...
Brian

 

[Maylar]

Yep.

 

[bernardsmith]

I really think that it depends as much on the starting gravity as it does on the total volume. You might want to check the specs and the literature on yeast. Dead easy to under-pitch next to impossible for a home wine maker to over-pitch.

 

[bmd2k1]

Follow up ?

If only doing smaller 1gal batch...how much yeast is best to pinch?

Thx!

 

[Maylar]

There's no penalty in pitching too much yeast, so using a whole packet for a gallon is fine. If you want to split a packet between multiple small batches then 1 gram per gallon is about the minimum. I've used Nottingham at 1 TSP per gallon and it worked fine.

 

[johnnyseko]

I weigh out 2 grams dry yeast per gallon. No issues.

 

[bembel]

Opinions vary. Judith Maloney of West County Ciders uses half the amount amount recommend for wine. I have found that adding a whole 5 gram (dried) packet to a 5-6 gallon batch results in far to fast a fermentation with a huge peak then collapse, so now I scale it back to half that and my fermentation speeds are much slower and more constant, which leaves my standard ciders naturally aromatic.

 

[Evan55]

Follow up ?

If only doing smaller 1gal batch...how much yeast is best to pinch?

Thx!

I do 1/2 tsp for single gallon batches with success. Ive gone as low as 1/4 tsp but I think that's cutting it too close. Ive read that 1g per gallon is good, which IIRC translates to 1/3 tsp. Add a bit to that to make sure you hit critical mass.

I like to make my yeast go as far as possible

 

[bmd2k1]

Thanks everyone for great info....tomorrow I kick off my 1st batch...

 

[BrianDorry55]

I use a single Wyeast smack pack without a starter for everything with an OG up to 1.080 with no problems. Freshness makes a big difference though. My homebrew store moves a lot of product so I’m always getting yeast that’s less than a month old. Which is great...because I don’t like making starters.

 

[Nebraskan]

We use 1 lb / thousand gallons of DV-10 yeast. It is a S. Bayannus yeast. Many times I've inoculated based on a 500 gm pkg per each 1000 gallons just to make it easier. 500 gm is 17.6 oz, but for your figure, 1 gm / gallon is good. We get in raw apple cider (juice) and once it reaches above 50 deg F, we inoculate. Winemakers inoculate, beer makers pitch. I know... funny language.

Also what helps is if your apple cider is a bit anemic in TA Total Acid, you can boost it just a bit with some Malic acid..... NO citric or Tartaric acid, just Malic.

Yeast is a living growing organism. You could put in just a few grains and it would start fermenting when the population reproduced enough to use up O2 reserves and would start going from aerobic fermentation that produces CO2 and water to anerobic fermentation that produces EtOH and CO2.