Carbonating sweet cider without bottle bombs or pasteurizing.

[RealFloopyGuy]

I have been playing with some bottles of apple juice. I have been fermenting some in the bottles to test a recipe. I have kegs and I don't have a problem killing the yeast off, backsweetening and then carbing so this is just a theory and not something that I have to do.

I don't use a airlock on all the bottles as it is really necessary. I just put the lid back on loosely. None of these are getting bottled and aged for years, and the yeast certainly has an advantage over anything that could, however unlikely, get it.

It occurs to me that you could simply get an old pressure cooker and put the stem and the pressure valve on a apple juice bottle lid. I believe they run at 15 psi. 15 psi wouldn't be an obscene level of co2 for a cider. This would allow the cider to be sparkling when fermentation is done. You could backsweeten and kill off the fermentation at this time. You could always pasteurize it at this time too if you wanted. You wouldn't risk bottle bombs since you know the cider is carbonated but not at dangerously high levels if you did.

You could reuse the lid over and over. It would replace the airlock since it would hold constant pressure in the bottle and that would keep anything from entering.

You could probably adapt it to a carboy too. I would assume they could easily hold up to 15psi but I imagine someone will tell me if they don't.

 

[sandyeggoxj]

You could ferment under pressure in a keg and crash it and bottle it and then pasteurize it.

 

[RealFloopyGuy]

Of course. Myself, I would rather just rack it to the keg and force keg it after it is all done. I don't really plan on bottling anymore except to give away or to take with me somewhere.

It was more of a theory thing. If I weren't kegging, I would be trying it out. If I find the right pieces, I will try it out anyway. I bought a lot of apple juice when it was buy one get one.

 

[KingDeNNiZ]

DeNNiZ

 

[RealFloopyGuy]

What was the picture for?

 

[KingDeNNiZ]

Cider bomb. Apparently I put too much priming sugars as it went BOOOOOM. It's what's left of a 64 oz growler


DeNNiZ

 

[RealFloopyGuy]

I just used plastic bottles for my sweet sparkling cider before I got kegs. 2 liter soda bottles work great. Less work to just use the apple juice bottle though.

It seems like there would be a cap with a pressure relief valve.

I just looked up how many PSI a latex balloon takes to inflate, and it is about 15 psi at a constant pressure regardless of how full it is.. Which means if you want carbonated cider, that you could just let it ferment out, backsweeten and then put a balloon on it. Once it inflates, cold crash it with balloon still on it and it should be carbonated, no?

 

[KingDeNNiZ]

Well. That batch where one exploded. I took all the bottles and released the air pressure 2x. It's been fine since. I don't have enough space to throw it in the fridge


DeNNiZ