Filtering

[FatMonsters]

I'm fairly new to the homebrewing process. However, I am brewing a hard lemonade in my Primary and am going to rack to Secondary. Is there something I can do or use when racking to remove the pulppy stuff and what kind of sanitization can I do to it to ensure my hard lemonade stays clean? I used fresh lemons and there is pulp in the mix. THANKS!

 

[magno]

The easiest thing to do is just let it settle out. When you are ready to bottle, rack the liquid off the cake of sediment that will have formed on the bottom of your fermenter. Most of the pulp and yeast will have settled out.

- magno

 

[JeanLucD]

Oo, good to see someone using fresh lemons, instead of all that lemonade concentrate stuff. What recipe are you using, just out of curiosity - I haven't found many recipes using fresh lemons, tell us how it works out.

Magno's on to it, let the pulp settle out, atleast that's what I've seen from around these forums. That seems to be one of the main reasons to put it into a 2ndary: to help clear it.

 

[paranode]

I have heard of people mentioning using a cheesecloth around their siphon, maybe that would work.

 

[FatMonsters]

Thanks for the input!!!! I will rack to secondary and let it settle out. If it is still pulppy when time to bottle, I might look at other options. I have heard of the cheesecloth around the siphon end, how do sanitize the cheesecloth though?? Boil in water or with cleaner solution?

The recipe I followed was adapted from liquorcraft, here is the link:

http://www.liquorcraft.com.au/wa.asp?idWebPage=13636&idDetails=105

I skipped the ginger and added 8 oz Malto-dextrin for body. I converted and rounded everthing to .lbs and gallons. I ended up using 16 fresh lemons and 3 fresh limes cut into wedges, the size you put on the side of drink glass. My batch volume was about 6 gallons, which is what they predicted. But I also added an extra pound of corn sugar to be safe. The sample I took last night was a little low on lemon flavor and not very sweet even though I added 1 .lb of lactose. I'm going to rack tonight to secondary and am going to give it a kick with a little more lactose and some REAL LEMON juice for a little more lemon taste. But so far it is going well. I think next time I would increase the amount of lemons from the start, but then again that starts to chew up volume in the fermenter!

 

[Wizza]

yes i use a 5 gal paint strainer over my auto siphon and into the secondary. wow that realy helped in mine, would think pulp would work even better! gl and have fun sounds like a nice brew u got.