First Cider Results/question (it's Crap)

[lordy]

Hi,

I have kegged my first cider and I'm not too happy with the results.

I suppose my first question would be - is it normal to have the yeasty sort of aftertaste? I was hoping for something similar to commercial ciders with a clean crisp taste at the end. If it is possible to get this, how do I do so?

I ended up getting this into the keg quite quickly - after about 7 days.

It had gone from 1044 to 1008 and was quickly losing sweetness, so I was hoping to stop the process.

I used 4 x 2.4L Apple and 2 x 2.4L Apple and Pear Berri juices. I also used S04 and some nutrient, but that was it.

Did I do something wrong in order to end up with something that I don't particularly want to drink?

 

[manticle]

You can get clean crisp cider if you allow the yeast to drop out. Cold conditioning and time are the best things for it, along with a low fermentation temperature (lower end of the range of whatever yeast you are using).

Let it sit longer and see how it goes. Keggers really are impatient sometimes. Just because it's fizzy, doesn't make it mature.

 

[MHB]

Ok you used 14.4 L of fruit juice, was that fermented neat or did you dilute that to ~23L?
If it was fermented as is, it should taste pretty good, tho I would not have chosen S-04, its very attenuateive. For my house cider I use 100% Apple juice, a touch of yeast food and Muntons Gold yeast.

If you diluted the 14.4 L to normal volume, its going to be dry as. The only thing I can suggest is to add a couple of litres of apple juice directly to the keg and dont let it warm up ever.

Handy thing about commercial juice is the nutrition panel. It will tell you the sugar content, from there you can work out exactly where you want to go, the other thing I just dont get is this obsession with Pear juice, traditionally its used to make Cider cheaper and thinner, I just dont get it.
MHB

 

[manticle]

A bit of pear can supposedly add natural sweetness to cider. I've only ever used a portion of fresh pears when I've tried to make cider from apples though. No resulting pear flavour and no lactose or other sweetener in my last one but just held back from being bone dry.

30kg of apples and 10kg of pears certainly isn't cheap.

 

[lordy]

Thanks guys - I'll leave it to sit.

I used the pear juice in there because of what I had read surrounding sweetness.

I didn't dilute the juice at all, I'm reasonably happy with the level of flavour in there so that's fine.

I'll do another batch next week with a different yeast and all apple juice to see how that turns out.

 

[fcmcg]

Hi,

I have kegged my first cider and I'm not too happy with the results.

I suppose my first question would be - is it normal to have the yeasty sort of aftertaste? I was hoping for something similar to commercial ciders with a clean crisp taste at the end. If it is possible to get this, how do I do so?

I ended up getting this into the keg quite quickly - after about 7 days.

It had gone from 1044 to 1008 and was quickly losing sweetness, so I was hoping to stop the process.

I used 4 x 2.4L Apple and 2 x 2.4L Apple and Pear Berri juices. I also used S04 and some nutrient, but that was it.

Did I do something wrong in order to end up with something that I don't particularly want to drink?

Now this surprises me...
I did 3 x 3 litres of Coles no name apple juice , no nutrient and some rehydrated s-04....( cause i had heard a commercial brewer usues it for their cider)
Ended up with a clear , crisp cider....
I didn't use my fermentation fridge as it had a beer already in it....it was in my studio though , which is aually about 20 degrees anyway....
It dropped out bright and cleer...with no yeasty aftertaste...
The only thing i did differently was i kegged after 14 days.....and then force carbed...
It has a lovely apple sweetnes at the start but finnishes quite dry and crisp....perfect in a tall glass with some ice & mint !
I could not tell you what my sg or fg was , as i didnt measure it. I went with an attitude of it is , what it is....
Maybe i held my tongue the right way this time ? :blink:
Cheers
Ferg

 

[Tanga]

Mine was about the same mix as yours (juices were on special at your supermarket too I guess =p). It was half assed, and allowed to brew kinda warm (24-26) and isn't half bad - and that's without maturing, which I'm doing atm.

 

[dr K]

In response to my daughters needs I brewed 18 litres with a german brand name juice (reconstituted but no preservatives or added sugar)it should have yeilded a tad short of 2kg of fermentable sugar whichis an sg of abot 1044. I read a tad under, chucked in some frozen rasberries a micro pinch of nutrient and Windsor Ale Yeast, looking for a fruity, summerry style. Fermented at shed temp (around 23 ish cool break) finished 0996, dry as but excellent, got two more on go at 21C temp controlled, one with wheat yeast (a dampfcider if you will) one with Nottingham. Friday the Wheat was tasting good at 1006 and the Notto shit sweet at 1011, both continue to termination
its pretty much a nofail drink...

 

[DU99]

Ferg it was the yeast..

 

[Tanga]

Dr K - they sounds like some awesome ciders. Did you find that the berry cider seemed to not taste as dry as an apple cider of the same FG? I did a blackcurrent apple juice version recently and it tasted wonderful - it was still dry, but not mouth puckeringly so.

 

[///]

remember if you want sweetness, as many of the commercials do with added apple flavour, is to backsweeten with extra juice. The issue here is stopping the added product from fermenting out again, so you could chill it and never letit get warm again or hit it with sulphur dioxide to knock of the yeast.

I did not realise the backsweeten trick till a few weeks ago ...

Anyways, I like the idea of 'Real Cider' more than mucking around with natural process ...

 

[dr K]

Tanga
The berry was a mere dozen frozen berries, a subtle addition.
///
You can always use aspartame, just call it E951
Tanga
It is remarkably drinkable, I was I must say shocked and can only hope it was not a fluke (not likely given my mid ferment tastings of the next 36 litres).
I did, however, choose to ferment under controlled (ish) pressure.
I am not advocating this method, indeed I do not even recommend it but it floats my cider.
Doing so may stall the fermentation (which will result in perhaps sweet but underfermented crap and I want dry anyway)
Doing so may cause total loss as the pressure breaks a seal and hello fountains all over the place.
Doing so is likely to mutate your yeast so bye bye re-use.
On the plus side you may get lower fusels and lower naughty esters which I see as a benefit for a simple sugar fermentation.

K

K

 

[lordy]

Just an update - I tried it again today and it definitely tastes a lot better. It's been in there for a week so far, I'm much happier now

Is there a rough agreed upon time for how long it should take to peak? Or at least be considered pretty good?

I'd like to experiment with another cider with a change of yeast but I really love a good ginger beer so that may be next.

 

[Tim]

Commercial cider 'manufacturers' knock out the yeast with potassium sorbate and the back sweeten with juice.

Good cider should be dry and slightly astringent. If it needs to be sweet then you probably shouldn't be calling it cider.

 

[Airgead]

Good cider should be dry and slightly astringent. If it needs to be sweet then you probably shouldn't be calling it cider.

Au Contraire blackadder...

Many traditional ciders aren't dry. Neither are they back sweetened.

Mind you, they aren't made with shop bought juice either. Many of the traditional processes use the pectin in the freshly crushed apples to deplete the nutrients in the juice and give an under attenuated result. Look up 'Keeving".

Sweet cider is much, much harder to do than dry but it is possible.

Cheers
Dave

 

[Tim]

Keeving is a modern French method and produces a slightly sweet cider. Keeving relies on PME and calcium salts to knock nutrients out of the juice, and is not really traditional (considering that the Normans have been making cider for over 1000 years). Its more like demi-sec sparkling than something you would describe as sweet.

Andrew Lea has an excellent book on craft cider making which is to real cider what Palmer is to brewing.

 

[fcmcg]

Ferg it was the yeast..

If you read the op , you'd see we used the same yeast...so it couldn't possibly be just the yeast

 

[scott_penno]

I've just experimented with my first cider - 50/50 apple/pear - and fermented with S04. About 2 weeks at 18oC and another week CC'ing and have just bottled it. Crystal clear and initial tasting is quite good so I'm hoping that with some bubbles in it, it may be better. Might pass onto another AHB member for a second opinion...

sap.

 

[grantsglutenfreehomebrew]

Hi all, I have a cider recipe using only supermarket bought ingredients on my webpage. http://grantsglutenfreehomebrew.webs.com/cider.htm

Should help you out.

I use S-23 yeast with this as it creates a nice dry cider. For an extra tang I sometimes add 1kg of diced granny smith apples to the fermenter (kind of like dry hopping) after I've boiled them for 10 minutes. To make a sweet cider I either add 500g of lactose to the barrel or to make half sweet half dry I add the lactose to the bottles. Works a treat.

Don't use champagne yeast with longlife juice as I explain on the webpage it imparts a yeasty corn chip aftertaste.

Happy brewing.

Grant

 

[manticle]

Why do you boil the apples? If you're concerned about the wild yeast, I would just look at pasteurisation temps rather than boiling.