Backsweetening question

[stansoid]

Hello,

I made up a batch of hard cider from apple cider that I bought from Costco up here in Canada (Its pretty run of the mill pasteurized store bought cider).

So far, its coming along well. It fermented well with WLP775 and on transfer to secondary, the unsweetened dry cider was pretty good. I am very excited about the final product, which I expect to keg up in a few months after it ages a bit.

In terms of back sweetening, I am planning to hit it with campden tabelts and sorbate to stabilize it per Yooper's advice here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=409986 and will then add in some of the same brand of unfermented juice. I am hoping this will give it a very mild sweetness and return some apple characteristic to it.

It is a 5 gallon batch (about 20 litres). I am thinking of adding 1 litre of juice to the 20 litres of fermented cider (so 5% of total volume). Does anyone have any feel for if this is enough juice, too much juice or about right? Also, is that method of stabilizing sound?

Thanks for any advice!

 

[MindenMan]

A can of FAJC is often used to prime 5 gallons of cider. You post looks about right for what you are planning to do.

 

[phug]

1 litre of approx 1.046 juice added to 20 litres will bump you up by about 2 gravity points. Or from about 1.000 up to 1.002. If you want something sweet you'll need to add about 5 litres or more to get you near 1.010. Figure out how sweet you want it. Then take a reading of the new juice. Multiply the points per litre of the new juice to get your total points of new sugar, and divide by the new volume to get your total increase.

 

[stansoid]

I ended up drawing 100ml off the keg and testing it with small amounts of honey to taste. Settled on 1.7ml per 100 ml for my taste. Pulled 400ml from the keg, mixed it up and added it back to the keg.

Turned out well. Still very dry, but a touch of sweetness to take the edge off of it.