cider help

[jabberwalkie]

So, Im new to home brewing over all. The misses loves hard cider so I thought I would give it a go. Took 2 gallons of a local orchards cider, added 1# brown sugar and pitched Montrachet yeast. OG wast 1.070, fermented around 72 (temp of my apartment). After about a week took hydrometer reading which came out to be ~1.002. I tasted the sample and a alcohol taste dominated with the apple deliciousness taste almost nonexistent. Also, it was slightly carbonated already. Since I thought its just about done fermenting I racked into an over sized secondary (I know it will probably oxidized now but, I figured the batch did not turn out the way I wanted so it was better than trashing it and start over).

Question 1: any thing i can do to boost the apple flavor?

Question 2: Why is it slightly carbonated all ready? ( fermented in LBK so I think it wasn't vent CO2 properly)

 

[gratus fermentatio]

Your recipe sounds like a version of Apfelwein, no worries, it's just young. You'll get some of that apple flavor back with time. Wine yeast tends to strip out a lot of flavor, that's why a lot of people (myself included) use ale yeast for cider.

For future batches, you might consider using frozen apple juice concentrate (FAJC) instead of, or in addition to added sugar. Essentially, the FAJC "juices up" the juice. Just thaw & add to the juice.

The reason your cider is slightly carbonated is because there is carbon dioxide in solution. This is a natural byproduct from fermentation. Yeast eat sugar and excrete CO2 & alcohol. When you prime & bottle, the exact same process happens in the bottle & the cider becomes fizzy, but the bottle prevents the CO2 from escaping & it gets even more fizzy. This is usually called "bottle conditioning." Same process for beer or sparkling wine. If you let that cider sit & clear, eventually the CO2 will naturally come out of solution & the cider will be flat, or "still." Just depends on whether you like your cider still, petillant or sparkling.

Now for the oversized carbouy, if you leave your cider in a vessel with too much headspace, you're risking oxidation. Your cider should have as little headspace as possible. I'd rack to a suitably sized vessel & airlock it, put it somewhere dark & cool and wait for time to work it's magic. In about 6 months that missing apple flavor should start to come back. Then I'd prime & bottle, though you could bottle after it's clear & then wait 6 months, either way works just fine.
If you haven't already done so, have a look at this thread (it's really long), it may answer some of your questions & even assuage some of your concerns.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=14860
Regards, GF.

 

[dmtaylor]

I don't add sugar to my ciders. You'll typically get 6-7% ABV with zero added sugars. The extra pound of brown sugar just turns this into a wine, and a very young hot wine at that. It might need a year or two to mellow out. Unless....

You say you have an oversized secondary. Can you fill this up the rest of the way with more unadulterated apple juice? This will dilute all the added sugar you have in there, and make even more lower alcohol cider with more apple flavor. Sound good to you? It will also help if at specific gravity of about 1.020-1.025 if you add sorbate to injure the yeast to prevent it from fermenting all the way down to 1.002 again. Sorbate doesn't kill yeast, but hurts them and prevents them from reproducing. After that, rack often and keep cold and you can try to stall fermentation to keep the cider more sweet and with more apple flavor.

Otherwise...... if you don't want to try any of that, then you're stuck with a hot apple wine.

Carbonation is normal while young. The fermentation produces a ton of CO2. It will dissipate with age unless you add more sugars to keep the fermentation going or bottle it up with priming sugar.

 

[jabberwalkie]

you guys are awesome thanks so much.

 

[bernardsmith]

Hi Jabberwalkie - two quick thoughts.
As dmtaylor suggests fermentation produces carbon dioxide (CO2) but what you may not realize that for every pound of sugar the yeast turns into alcohol half that weight it turns into CO2. And while some of that CO2 is allowed to bubble up and out an airlock an enormous amount of the produced CO2 is saturated in the liquid. Raise the temperature of the room in which you are storing the cider and some of that CO2 will bubble up. Change the ambient air pressure and that CO2 will drop out of suspension. Drop fine particles into the cider and the CO2 will nucleate and rush to the surface.. This is why wine makers tend to allow their wines, ciders and meads to age. Aging allows the CO2 to be slowly expelled from the carboy. Alternatively, you can "degas" your cider or wine by either whipping the liquid with a stirring rod - (that adds enough energy to the system to allow the gas to gather and blow off) or you can pull the gas from the liquid by applying a 20-22 inch vacuum that will suck the CO2 from the liquid.

The second quick thought is that while you will get the very best apple juice from a local orchard that juice is typically made to be drunk sweet and unfermented. That means the juice will not necessarily have a low pH, a high enough sugar content or have enough tannins to make a really good hard cider. I have no idea where you are located but there may be orchards near you that prepare juice for the cider maker. If not you might want to consider adding some tannin, some acidity (could be malic or a blend of acids) and some sweetener AFTER the fermentation has ended and AFTER you have stabilized the cider. You might also consider adding a few grams of toasted oak. But note, if you add sugar to the juice before you pitch the yeast in order to up the ABV (the alcohol by volume) then what typically happens is that the alcohol itself moves center stage and the flavor from the apples is sent off to the side. Pressed juice will typically have a starting gravity of close to 1.050 (and sometimes even a little higher) and that means that the cider can have an ABV of about 6 or 7%. Not a wine, certainly, but about twice the ABV of a session beer...

 

[jabberwalkie]

I have officially made vinegar. Time to go back over my notes (and this thread) and start all over

 

[globell]

How do you know? is it hot with alcohol or does it have a some growth on the cider? Not sure what yeast you used BUT some have terrible fuel tastes over 70 degrees - like nottingham (trust me have been there). They do mellow over time. Just racked one that was 2 months old and I am amazed how much it has changed for the better. Thought it might have been a loss.....but NOPE! Taste good now!

 

[dmtaylor]

I have officially made vinegar. Time to go back over my notes (and this thread) and start all over

I'm sorry to hear that. It's happened to me three times in the past 10 years so it definitely is a very common thing to happen. However, all is not lost. You could let it continue to ferment into full strength vinegar if you like, which is still good to use in salads and cooking, etc.

 

[jabberwalkie]

How do you know? is it hot with alcohol or does it have a some growth on the cider? Not sure what yeast you used BUT some have terrible fuel tastes over 70 degrees - like nottingham (trust me have been there). They do mellow over time. Just racked one that was 2 months old and I am amazed how much it has changed for the better. Thought it might have been a loss.....but NOPE! Taste good now!

It smells and taste like apple cider vinegar. Serves me right for messing with it and not just leaving it alone. Thanks all for your help and suggestions. Will make a second attempt over the fall break.