Too much juice, not enough yeast!

[NicholasL]

Hi there,

This is my third year making cider, and I wanted to try a new recipe, which uses Wyeast Sweet Mead and Cider yeast. I bought 2 packs and each pack says it innoculates 6 gallons. Unfortunately, (or fortunately I suppose) I got more juice than expected from our apples and ended up with 15 gallons. Right now ive added the cambden tablets to kill off natural yeast and im waiting the 24hrs to add my yeast packs, but I would need 3 packs of wyeast according to their package.

My question is would I be okay to use the 2 packs of wyeast which would innoculate 12 gallons on all 15 of my gallons or would it be an issue?

I would just get more yeast but it came from Winnipeg (I live near Toronto) and it would take at least 4 days and Im worried my juice might spoil. Our Local homebrew supplies arent open until tuesday (today is saturday) and even still they likely dont carry that specific yeast.

Thanks for your help, please see photo of carboys attached. I have 3, 5 gallon carboys of juice.

-Nick

 

[bracconiere]

make a starter?

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

I would make a starter, or if you happen to have other yeast, you could use that in one of the fermentors.

 

[madscientist451]

If you didn't add the Campden, I'd say do one carboy as a wild ferment and you could compare. So at his point, I'd draw off a quart from each carboy, add to a gallon jug, add all your yeast and shake it up, then dump it back into the carboys dividing it as evenly as possible. Don't over think it, your cider will be fine.
When its done, you can re-use the yeast that will accumulate in the bottom of the carboys, just dump more apple juice in after you rack the fermented cider out.

 

[NicholasL]

If you didn't add the Campden, I'd say do one carboy as a wild ferment and you could compare. So at his point, I'd draw off a quart from each carboy, add to a gallon jug, add all your yeast and shake it up, then dump it back into the carboys dividing it as evenly as possible. Don't over think it, your cider will be fine.
When its done, you can re-use the yeast that will accumulate in the bottom of the carboys, just dump more apple juice in after you rack the fermented cider out.

Sounds like a plan to me, ill do just that.

Thanks, I appreciate the help!