moguy1973 Posted July 10, 2015 Posted July 10, 2015 My buddy brews beer. And lots of it every year. Here's his set up. He makes some real tasty stuff. David Unnerstall, ness, Flysmallie and 1 other 4 -- JimIf people concentrated on the really important things in life, there'd be a shortage of fishing poles. -- Doug Larson
ness Posted July 11, 2015 Author Posted July 11, 2015 Racked it off the sediment of dead yeast and apple stuff into a clean container to finish fermenting. John
ness Posted September 7, 2015 Author Posted September 7, 2015 Bottling day. The cider had cleared and fermented to dry. I siphoned the cider off the sediment and added four cans of frozen 100% apple juice and one cup of brown sugar. This serves two purposes -- adds a little sweet, but also gives the remaining yeast something to eat in the bottle to produce the natural carbonation. I'm using 1-litre wire bail bottles. The nasty part of this hobby is all the cleaning you have to do to keep everything sanitized so you don't get spoilage or funky off-flavors. The worst of the cleaning is doing the bottles. I give them a hot, soapy water cleaning followed by a chlorine water bath. This little gadget hooks to a hose and helps a lot with the rinsing. Push down on the bar and water flows. Siphon off the sediment into the bottling bucket. In that is the melted frozen concentrate and the brown sugar dissolved in a little cider. Give it a good stir to combine the cider, concentrate and sugar. Then get ready to siphon the cider into the bottles. This little gadget goes onto the end of the siphon tube that goes into the bottle. Drop it in the bottle and the pin is pushed up and lets the cider flow. When the cider reaches the top of the bottle, lift it up and the flow stops. Pull out the tube and it leaves the perfect amount of head space. Finished product -- 17 liters plus the test bottle. The test bottle is about ⅔ full. By squeezing it I can judge the level of carbonation pressure building up in the bottles. When it gets pretty tight, I'll halt the fermentation through pasteurization. Should be within a few days. BilletHead 1 John
BilletHead Posted September 7, 2015 Posted September 7, 2015 Looking good there buddy! I was beginning to worry about you. Thought that your still might of blown up and you with it or that meat counter lady had you all tied up like in the movie Misery I bet the cider is good, well done brewoligist Ness, BilletHead ness 1 "We have met the enemy and it is us", Pogo If you compete with your fellow anglers, you become their competitor, If you help them you become their friend" Lefty Kreh " Never display your knowledge, you only share it" Lefty Kreh "Eat more bass and there will be more room for walleye to grow!" BilletHead " One thing in life is for sure. If you are careful you can straddle the barbed wire fence but make one mistake and you will be hurting" BilletHead P.S. "May your fences be short or hope you have long legs" BilletHead
ness Posted September 7, 2015 Author Posted September 7, 2015 Ha! Yeah, it's been crazy around here lately. John
Lancer09 Posted September 9, 2015 Posted September 9, 2015 I was just thinking about this the other day as I was drinking a cider! Hope it turns out good! ness 1
ness Posted September 12, 2015 Author Posted September 12, 2015 Well, the test bottle is swollen up, so it's time to pasteurize. Bring a big ol' pot of water up to 190 degrees, stick the bottles in for 15 minutes and that knocks out the yeast for good, halting the fermentation that produces the carbonation. BilletHead and Lancer09 2 John
rps Posted November 3, 2015 Posted November 3, 2015 Your last post was at the pasteurization point on September 12. You never reported after that. Good stuff? Changes you would make?
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