Apfelwein question

[Verio]

This probably belongs in the Wine forum, so please move it if it needs to be...

Heres my question; I bottled my Apfelwein as soon as fermentation was over. It's been in bottles for over 2 weeks, and I haven't noticed a flavor change at all. Should I have let it sit in the secondary fermenter for a long time? Will it "condition" in the bottles and improve in flavor?

At this point, I'm honestly considering tossing half the batch just to use the bottles. I've passed around 4 or 5 of the bottles to a few family and friends, and the same reaction. It takes like crap.

I know it should age for a year, but I want to make sure the taste will actually improve in the bottle.

Edit -

On the other hand, my Witbier (my first homebrew ever) that I made mid early November is the best Witbier I've ever had. It is damn delicious. It gets better and better each day. Honestly, I've already killed half of my 5 gallon batch :-s

 

[Revvy]

Let me share with you my answer from earlier today when someone asked when they should bottle their couple week old apfelwien.

I'd rack it to a secondary in another 3 weeks or so, and bottle in about 5 months. And crack the first on on Chritstmas, NEXT year...or maybe thanksgiving.

This is a game of patience and we are rewarded with great tasting stuff.

Hell last time I tried serving folks cider less than 3 months old they refused it. Even six. So I don't bother til it's been bottle conditioned for 6 months, and bulk aged for 5-6 months prior. I make mine around x-mas to serve the next year.

This may give you some more incentive to wait.

I have been brewing cider for somewhat over a year, and I haven't found anything that I've made that doesn't suck (nekkidness and straws not withstanding), and I was feeling pretty dismal about the whole thing. Until I came across one that had been overlooked in my disgust. I figured I'd better drink it, or at least sample it, to complete my degradation. It was surprisingly good. Really, really good. My faith in humanity was restored, and more importantly, my self-respect. So WHAT if the first batches tasted like sump water? So WHAT if small animals passed out from the smell? So WHAT if I could successfully use it as a rodenticide? Eventually, even *I* could make something ... remotely drinkable.

So I haven't given up. My patience hasn't gotten a LOT better, but now I can see what they were talking about when they kept saying to LEAVE IT ALONE.

If your results are like mine, you'll be pretty blah about the out-of-the-vessle results, and at 3 months, not much better. Bottle them. Hide them. Lock them up. Forget about them. Start another batch, on blind faith if you have to. Then start another. Set a timer or mark your calendar, or even do a Google reminder. Open one of the original puppies up and give it a sample. Compare it to the batch you're getting ready to bottle. It'll make it easier to salt them away for another day.

Walk away from the bottles for several months and it will be better than you can imagine. My friends love it now, when it is carbed and a year old. It's like apple champagne.

 

[RobWalker]

So your question is - should I mature my home brew that was bottled straight after fermentation for more than 2 weeks?
The answer is always yes.

 

[Verio]

So your question is - should I mature my home brew that was bottled straight after fermentation for more than 2 weeks?
The answer is always yes.

haha I guess so

So... I proposed a kegging system to my wife, and I got "the look". I mean seriously, how many bottles should I have floating around my house!!

 

[jiggs_casey]

Walk away from the bottles for several months and it will be better than you can imagine. My friends love it now, when it is carbed and a year old. It's like apple champagne.

Easier said than done...

 

[Revvy]

Easier said than done...

Why? Personally it tastes like what I imagine my pee tastes like after a trip to the cider mill when it's young....Especially when you know how awesome it is when it is matured. After you taste your first year old bottle, you never think twice about making it and socking it away ever again.

 

[Rossnaree]

wow, Revvy - reading that a little too fast the first time, I wasn't sure whether it was the cider mill that was young, and just exactly how you figure we'd know how awesome your pee tasted when it was matured, let alone why we'd even think about ever having it the first time let alone socking it away!!! blech!!!

Second time through and paying attention, I'm good.

I've got a tad over 7-gallons going now, the ferment is winding down. I'm glad I started making wine long before beer, it establishes the mindset early on to leave it alone. It's kind of like Frost's poem, "The Road Not Taken" -- it has made all the difference.


Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference

...Robert Frost