is my cider infected?

[BrewMatt]

Newbie posting here although so sorry if this isn't appropriate or there's a better place for questions. I usually make cider with juice and an ale yeast but in the summer I got hold of loads of windfall apples and used them instead, pressing them and using mangrove jacks cider yeast. Made two gallons one I have since bottled and one I racked into a secondary demijohn and left as I didn't have enough bottles and figured it wouldn't hurt to age it a bit. Just gone to dig it out again to actually bottle it and there was a thin film with bubbles on top but after disturbing it the film went all dangly. Pretty sure I just have a gallon of vinegar now but thought I'd ask.

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[electrolight]

Looks infected to me.

I wouldn't panic. I'd get ahold of a sour beer that doesn't filter or sterilize the beer and pour some dregs into there and wait 6 months. (Jolly Pumpkin comes to mind, if you can get some.)

You don't want some random strain running too far with it, you want to balance it out.

I'm also not a great winemaker, just tried it once or twice. But if you aren't making sours... I'm pretty sure you have to put some sort of powder into the pressed apple juice and kill off random bacteria first. Or boil it.

If you don't, you risk infection.

What happens is yeast is low on the totem pole. It eats basic sugars quickly and you poured millions? (billions? (I forget the order of magnitude)) of cells into there. But when they are done they leave behind complex sugars (among other things). So even though it looks like there isn't much going on, bacteria (and sometimes (but less frequently) mold too) can keep working on it all. But remember, you didn't pour millions of cells, so it will take wayy longer for it to multiply and catch up, anddd by now all the low hanging fruit (basic sugars) are gone, so it has to work even slower now. (Which is why you are just now seeing stuff.

 

[BrewMatt]

I did put a Campden tablet into the juice 24 hours before pitching yeast , I will have to boil next time or use stabilizers after fermentation is done. I don't think I can get hold of a sour beer easily here in the UK without ordering online, although I could probably find someone with a kombucha culture if that's a viable option

 

[oldstyle69]

did you taste it? thats the first thing that will tell you if you infected it. very unlikely that you have vinegar. ill drink it if you dont want to.

 

[stpug]

I'd agree that it's infected. Sometimes this is good and sometimes bad; tasting it should give some idea one way or the other. If you have acetobacter (which that scoby makes me think of) then your time is limited and, if it still tastes okay, you should consume relatively quickly and keep refrigerated. If it's not acetobacter then you may have a few more options.

 

[BrewMatt]

I'm not the best with describing flavors but it doesn't taste vinegary maybe a bit tart andf bit more funky than I'm used to but that might just be the random assortment of apples I gathered.