First time I've added sugar. When will it taste good?

[domingo]

Being something of a purist (and a fan of dry wines), I've never added any sugar to my ciders before this year, except for maybe to prime if I don't have juice handy. But this autumn I thought to myself, all right, I'll be a grown up. I'll experiment and expand my horizons.

I've added corn sugar, cane sugar (refined and raw), corn syrup, and brown sugar to various ciders/yeasts. I had a two week primary and I'm at 4-6 weeks in secondary on most of these that have sugar added. They're pretty gross, not going to lie. Sugar flavor very obvious to me. Almost acrid. It's...not...good.

I've been pretty content with drinking cider aged a week, pre-MLF, post-MLF, with induced Brett, aged one year, etc. This stuff. When does this age to a point of drinkable? I'm not opening any of it at this point for fear of oxidation but I'd like to know when a logical check up would be.

 

[domingo]

Y'all are breaking my heart here.

 

[barnaclebob]

It may never get good enough to be enjoyable but it will certainly get better. No one can say for sure how long. There is literally no good reason to add sugar to cider besides to increase ABV. It cannot ever help the flavor. What was the OG of your ciders? This does not mean you cannot get a good tasting cider with sugar added.

I gave a rasberry/strawberry cider with an apple base a year before dumping it. Had a really weird unpleasant flavor, hard to describe it.

 

[domingo]

It may never get good enough to be enjoyable but it will certainly get better. No one can say for sure how long. There is literally no good reason to add sugar to cider besides to increase ABV. It cannot ever help the flavor. What was the OG of your ciders? This does not mean you cannot get a good tasting cider with sugar added.

OG on most of these was right at 1.050. I added dextrose because the apfelwein recipe told me to! And I tried a lot of blends because I've seen several recipes on here call for different types of sugar...thought it might be worthwhile to experiment.

 

[UpstateMike]

What was the SG after you added sugar? What was the FG?

I had a high ABV cider (15% +) that tasted like paint thinner after fermentation, but 18 months later it was very good.

 

[barnaclebob]

OG on most of these was right at 1.050. I added dextrose because the apfelwein recipe told me to! And I tried a lot of blends because I've seen several recipes on here call for different types of sugar...thought it might be worthwhile to experiment.

If the og was 1.050 then you probably didn't add much sugar, it could have been something else too.

 

[domingo]

What was the SG after you added sugar? What was the FG?

I had a high ABV cider (15% +) that tasted like paint thinner after fermentation, but 18 months later it was very good.

Apfelwein: SG was 1.065 or thereabouts, FG was ~0.995.

Cider 1: SG was 1.090 but this was actually mostly honey induced (up to about 1.075) with a little bit of raw cane sugar sugar to take it to the gravity I was hoping for. FG about 0.995.

Cider 2: SG 1.065. FG of 0.998. Mostly honey with a little corn syrup. To my surprise, this one does not taste disgusting.

Also: Various ciders with various sugars to take them up to 1.060 to compare afterward. Are all finishing between .995 and 1.


Re: your 18 month thing. Probably patience is a virtue here. I gotta say I'm shocked at how sweet many of them taste even with the low FGs though. If someone handed me a bottle and asked what I thought the gravity was, I'd say 1.01-1.02 range.

 

[domingo]

Ugh, sorry, it double posted. My computer is a mess lately.

 

[domingo]

If the og was 1.050 then you probably didn't add much sugar, it could have been something else too.

I was unclear. 1.050 was the OG of the cider. See above post...I got most of them to start around 1.065 to 1.090.

 

[Maylar]

Give it a couple months and taste it again.

Next time, 1.050 is a perfect starting point for cider, no need to add sugar to that.

 

[domingo]

Give it a couple months and taste it again.

Next time, 1.050 is a perfect starting point for cider, no need to add sugar to that.

Well see I agree with you here but there's this apfelwein recipe that everyone's so over the moon about...

 

[carlnpa]

IMHO the biggest influence on flavor is the type of yeast used to ferment. We don't really like the wine yeasts, too dry and unpleasant aromas. The ale yeasts all seem to be a good fit with ciders.

The cville thread has lots of yeast and batch taste comparisons but the consistently best tasting would be Safale S04, US-05 and Nottingham.

OG of 1.085 and these three will finish out at around 1.01-1.005 and still have a little sweetness.

We just use the Safale S04 and US-05 at this point.