Apple juice vs apple juice with calcium

[squegeeboo]

Hey guys, just wondering if there is any reason to not use apple juice with calcium for cider.

A gallon of pure apple juice at my grocery store is roughly 5.50, but a gallon of apple juice with calcium is only 3.50. My cider recipe calls for 6 gallons, so it's a decent amount of savings if I switch.

thanks!

 

[ewebb]

If your looking for savings, maybe go with frozen concentrate?

I would wonder if the calcium might do something to the way the yeast interacts with the process, similar to complaints i have heard about hard water.

 

[squegeeboo]

The frozen is between the two in cost, it's def. something I could try. I currently use it for backsweetener, no reason it couldn't be primary also. Thanks!

 

[squegeeboo]

Ah, found out why there is a price difference, the calcium stuff is from concentrate. And it has more ingredients

Ingredients
Filtered Water, Apple Juice Concentrate, Calcium Gluconate, Calcium Lactate, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C), Malic Acid.

Vs

Ingredients
Apple Juice, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C).

 

[MindenMan]

I currently have a hard cider made from just AJC bottled in May of this year. It is really amazing there is so much flavor from something so cheap to make. I used the standard "add three cans of water...". When the fermentation had stopped, I back sweetened with just the concentrate, and for an idea of how carbonated it was I used a soda bottle. When the bottle was carbonated to the level I thought I wanted, I pasteurized the whole batch in my dishwasher, and it worked quite well. I suggest you try first in a 2 liter bottle the recipe you want to make full scale. My first batch of cider of sort of decent, then the smell of acetone in the second batch. ICK! I have since learned to treat hard cider like beer: keep the temp low when fermenting, and of course good sanitation practices are paramount. Make sure the bottles will be upright, as the caps must be a tiny bit loose to prevent the bottles from exploding during fermentation. My 2 liter bottles have valves in them so bottle bombs will never be an issue. Sorry for the long post, but I have ADHD and coffee.