Graff (Malty, slightly hopped cider)

[JimRausch]

What yeast do you use? Most times I use WY1007 because late September/early October is the time I do my Altbiers. This year I got some cider early, so just used Munton's Gold dry yeast. I have done the wort as AG in the past, but this year just did a PM with 3 lb. LME and about 3 lb of grains.
Having read Denny's post of his success using WY1450 in a cider, that's what I'm going to try next year.

 

[DTAB]

Thanks

 

[hopness monster]

Subscribed

 

[zonkman]

Any successes with WY 1318 (London Ale III)?

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

I think that I will make my Barleywine graff with cherry cider rather than apple cider. The idea being a strong beer/graff with the tartness of the cherry and cherry flavor that is so excellent in a vintage port.

 

[DTAB]

Is your cherry cider just cherry juice?

 

[MikeTodd]

Holy Sh*t this is amazing!!! I reserved a small sample and I am about to crack open a bottle. Nice malt backbone, slight bitterness and a little bit of a tang (store bought juice). I am impressed! I am going to start a Gunslinger’s next!

 

[bstacy1974]

Bottled 2 cases last weekend. Tried one last night. This was my second batch of Graff. I used some washed Mangrove Jack's M44. Also added some flaked oats to the mash. Apple juice was half regular apple and half honey crisp apple. Super cloudy at this point. But tasty none the less.

 

[Coontail]

So, it's finally fully carbed for me today and so I cracked one open and i can't say it's amazing. It's good but a bit too dry, my OG was 1.055 and it finished at 1.005 with s-04. This was my first so I didn't really know what to do raise the gravity. Better luck next time I guess!

 

[orbless]

Last bottle from my first batch. Made from apples from three different areas of SF Bay Area, Newton Pippin from my yard in SF, Fujis from Berkeley and a large red apple form Vallejo. 5 gallon batch basically following the recipe. Used WLP001 California Ale yeast. Has a bit of residual sweetness, may be mostly from the malt but does retain some really nice apple flavor. I think the blend of fresh yard grown apples helped with depth of flavor. Bottled early November, drank most for Thanksgiving. Would definitely brew again, but think I want to do a darker version first, maybe a porter grain bill with a 3:2 apple to wort ratio.

 

[AzOr]

[QUOTE="MikeTodd I am impressed! I am going to start a Gunslinger’s next![/QUOTE]

Is Gunslinger a cider?

 

[MikeTodd]

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/gunslingers-graff.147726/

It is much darker with a higher ratio of wort:juice.

 

[AzOr]

Thank you. I guess I missed it because I rarely go into that page. Sounds interesting.

 

[Jwin]

So, it's finally fully carbed for me today and so I cracked one open and i can't say it's amazing. It's good but a bit too dry, my OG was 1.055 and it finished at 1.005 with s-04. This was my first so I didn't really know what to do raise the gravity. Better luck next time I guess!

Lactose or other unfermentable sugar is the only way to make it sweeter if you bottle condition unless you want to play with fire.
Another option is to dose your glass with apple juice or sugar before you pour.

 

[Coontail]

Lactose or other unfermentable sugar is the only way to make it sweeter if you bottle condition unless you want to play with fire.
Another option is to dose your glass with apple juice or sugar before you pour.

Surprisingly after a couple days in the fridge the taste improved a lot. Not sure if this is normal?

 

[Jwin]

Yeast dropping out andCo2 getting into solution (vs headspace) can both change the flavor pretty drastically. Both as a result of prolonged refrigeration.

 

[snd1990]

So, it's finally fully carbed for me today and so I cracked one open and i can't say it's amazing. It's good but a bit too dry, my OG was 1.055 and it finished at 1.005 with s-04. This was my first so I didn't really know what to do raise the gravity. Better luck next time I guess!

First off it will improve with time. 2nd are u sure you used s04? It usually has a lower atten and doesn't usually finish that low. 3rd to raise the FG you need to get some more unfermentables in the wort. With this recipe just bump the crystal up to .75lbs of 120l or add .25lb of carapils or similar. Steep this with the wheat @158° or so to increase the unfermentable sugars that ur able to withdraw from the grain. Also to bump up the apple flavor I add a can of frozen apple juice concentrate to the juice. Just make sure it is 100% apple juice.
Good luck

 

[Coontail]

First off it will improve with time. 2nd are u sure you used s04? It usually has a lower atten and doesn't usually finish that low. 3rd to raise the FG you need to get some more unfermentables in the wort. With this recipe just bump the crystal up to .75lbs of 120l or add .25lb of carapils or similar. Steep this with the wheat @158° or so to increase the unfermentable sugars that ur able to withdraw from the grain. Also to bump up the apple flavor I add a can of frozen apple juice concentrate to the juice. Just make sure it is 100% apple juice.
Good luck

The flavor has improved greatly after being in the fridge a few days. I am 100% sure I used S04, does s04 always finish at 1.010 or does it depend on how low the OG is? Thanks for the tips though! My brother recently got a homebrewing kit from our local HBS so I'm borrowing the book it came with so I can really read up on it more

 

[Spooghet]

I just kegged a 5 gal batch following Brandon O's recipe. Came out very tasty, but of course I got too excited and decided to dry hop. Bagged and dropped an oz of cascade in about 3 hours ago and its already too much "bitterness" compared to earlier. Ive dry hopped many ciders at a ratio of about .25 oz per gal with a ton of success so I figured what could an oz hurt in 5 gal of this graff. I find it hard to believe that in 3 hours its changed so much. Anyway I'm gonna yank that bag out tonight and see if it gets better with time. Anyone else run into this? Any advice would be great but this is mainly a warning to others.

 

[pshankstar]

I brewed up a batch of this on Tuesday night. I hope to get it into a keg before the Super Bowl to share. I know I am rushing it a bit...

I did a mini mash to get one gallon of wort. I used 3lbs of 2-row, 0.75lbs of Paul's Dark Crystal Malt (what I had on hand), 2oz of wheat and 0.4oz of Hersbrucker (2% AA) at 30 mins since I had just that amount left over from a previous brew. Lastly Nottingham yeast and it's bubbling away. I'm excited to see how it turns out! Cheers!

 

[MikeTodd]

I’m having some carb issues. So far I am on week three of in the bottles and barley any carbination. I did 5oz of priming sugar as I do with my beers and other ciders. The difference is that I used gelatin for fining and then cold crashed and bottled right after I took the graf out of the fridge. My house stays a constant 64-66 degrees. Should I make a yeast starter and add some back into the bottles and recap? The drink is plenty sweet and I get a small psshh with a little bit od “smoke” but almost no carb and no head when I pour it into a glass. I used s04.

 

[Spooghet]

Update: The overly bitter flavor was just a trub that lasted longer than I expected. Ended up leaving the dry hop charge in for the two weeks it took me to finish the keg. It turned out fantastic and I might experiment with even more dry hops next time. Great recipe!

 

[MikeTodd]

Finally getting some decent carbonation. It has been in bottles for over 4 weeks now.

 

[TGFV]

Some ciders and higher abv drinks seen to take longer for me (my Graff took 6 weeks to get to a good carbonation and my ciders take 6-10 on average, which is fine because they just improve with age)

 

[11oclockBrewery]

Just bottled my graf and had the first taste, really fantastic. Extremely Smooth for being 7.2% ABV, has great apple character, perfect final gravity not too dry not too sweet (1.008). Here is the recipe I used:

**Fermentables:
*Apple Juice
4 x 1Gallon Tree top Apple Juice bottles (no Vit C Added!)

*Malt - Steeping Grains and DME
1 gallon water (carbon filtered, no other treatment)
Steep grains for 30mins (155-160degF)
4oz C20
4oz C80
4oz Honey Malt
Add - 2 lb light DME
Bring to Boil

**Hops
- 0.25oz Azacca Hops (12.2% AA) @10mins
(Total boil time = 10min)

Add 1/4 whirflock @ 5mins
Add 4oz lactose at flameout

**Cool to 65-70deg in ice bath

Add 4 teaspoon yeast nutrient to Apple Juice, then add Wort to it

**Yeast = Nottingham, rehydrated and pitched @65deg

Primary: 2 weeks @ 60deg F
Secondary 2 weeks @ 60deg F

O.G. = 1.062
F.G. = 1.008
ABV = 7.2%

The combination of crystal malt, honey malt, and lactose contributes nice sweetness/body without adding too much "malt" character. This still tastes much more like cider than beer.
Should be awesome when carbed to 2.0 vol

Cheers!

 

[MikeTodd]

Has anyone tried this using wyeast 4766? It is their Cider/Sweet Mead yeast. I have some I harvested after making a straight forward cider and was wondering how it would do for this graf.

 

[Psywar]

Hello everyone,
I ordered my stuff from AIH:
This is what I am looking to brew with using tips from this thread:


Materials needed for a 5 Gallon Batch

Yeast: Fermentis Saflager S-23 (Ideal Fermentation Range 53F)
1lb Rye Malt
.5 lbs Honey Malt
.5 lbs of Crystal 120L (Get rid of the tartness and add sweetness)
1 oz of torrified wheat (head retention)
4 Gallons of apple juice
1 lbs of DME
1 lbs of Brown Sugar
0.5 oz of Cascade Hops
2-3 lbs Honey

I wanted to make an Applejack Cider. A long time ago there was a whisky called Applejack and it just consisted of Rye Malt and Apples.
So I wanted to do something along the lines of that, but not distill it.

Last year in March I made an Apple Pie Cyser and I gave it out for Christmas as presents and it was a huge hit so I decided to mix these 3 elements and I am hoping come December we will have something pretty wonderful tasting.

I am using a Lager yeast -
I went with 1lb of Rye - I am not sure if this is going to be too strong or not, but I wanted to try it out.
Honey Malt to add to the honey flavor I am chasing.
Crystal 120L to add sweetness

Then the 2-3lbs of Honey which I will add directly into my fermentation bucket on top of the wort and apple juice.
So I am kind of doing a Mead/Cider/Lager combo.

As I mentioned I just ordered everything to make this today. If you guys notice anything that might be weird about this let me know, but if not I am going to roll with it and cross my fingers lol.

 

[Snausages01]

Just got finished putting another 5 gallon batch into the fermenter.

The first time I made it, the only change I made to the recipe was that I initially only fermented 4 gallons (1 gallon wort and 3 gallons AJ), and I added the fourth gallon of AJ when I kegged. I kept the keg at 32F and hooked up to CO2 for the remaining time. I did this so I could ferment in a 5 gallon keg, and not have to back sweeten with concentrate. It was drinkable as soon as it was carbonated, but you could almost tell it was blended with fresh AJ. It definitely better/smoother 4-6 weeks after kegging, and is really good around the 7-8 week mark. I’m making the second batch the same way.

 

[Hankhill11]

I've started a 2nd batch of Graff following the original recipe again. Its been fermenting at ~64 degrees for a week and a half. I racked it to a secondary and topped with juice. i'll let it finish and clear before bottling. I think it was 1.008 when racked. The sample tasted pretty good, like the first batch. This recipe got good reviews from those who i shared it with the first time.

 

[762frmafr]

So 2 weeks ago, I made a batch of Graff following the recipe exactly using Mount Rainier hops and Nottingham yeast. Well today, I bottled this batch with 8 ounces of amber DME for priming. Now I am brewing a second batch to go on top of the yeast cake from the first. This new batch is 2.5 gallons wort. 1 pound Chocolate malt, .5 lbs de-bittered black, 2 ounces carapils, 1 ounce willimete hops and topped up with apple juice. All thrown on top of the yeast cake from the first batch. Will let you know how it turns out.