So I finally signed up for AHB

[fungusmungus]

Salutations!

I've been trawling around on AHB for years now, and only just realised I never actually signed up.

So here goes: the traditional life story post.

I discovered beer that was not Corona about 6 years ago, discovered kit & kilo brewing about a month after that, and finally jumped into all grain brewing about 3 years ago.
Given my penchant for home made things, I'm currently running a home made 3 vessel system that usually achieves around 82% efficiency on a 55 litre, 1.060 batch, and a 3 tap keezer.

Pretty much everything <6% gets kegged - currently pouring a 4.5% amber ale, a 5.9% choc porter, and a 4-6% cider that keeps fermenting in the keg as long as it's topped up with a few litres of fresh juice every week.

My garage is currently gestating a ~9% quadrupel in primary, and a Russian imperial stout and biere de garde are sitting on oak chips in secondary.

For what it's worth, I'm as happy to share recipes and advice as I am to recieve, so here's hoping I can add as much to the community as I've gained over the last few years.

Cheers.

 

[Yob]

Do you just have your cider at ambient?

 

[Bribie G]

Aha. Another perpetual cider man. It will keep working slowly at serving temperature.
Using the OP's method I find that it just about generates enough gas to serve all three kegs in my kegmate.
I've been here for 3 years and only on the second 10k bottle.
The other advantage is that you can have sweeter cider along the same lines as Mercury or Strongbow.

 

[user 25501]

Address please,,,,,and what times happy hour next Fri?

 

[fungusmungus]

Cheers for the replies. It's been a while since I used forums, and Facebook and G+ have conditioned me to expect notifications when I get replies. I'm sure I'll get back into the swing of it soon enough.

Do you just have your cider at ambient?

Nah, but I only have my keezer at about 4 degrees, and this yeast strain seems to cope fairly well at that temperature.

Aha. Another perpetual cider man. It will keep working slowly at serving temperature.
Using the OP's method I find that it just about generates enough gas to serve all three kegs in my kegmate.
I've been here for 3 years and only on the second 10k bottle.
The other advantage is that you can have sweeter cider along the same lines as Mercury or Strongbow.

I lasted 2 years of pretty solid drinking off a single 2.6kg bottle, and I'm guessing the Perpetuapple had a lot to do with it.
Unfortunately, we overdid it last weekend and blew gas out of all 3 taps. Time to get a batch of cheap Aldi cider on so I don't have to deal with grumpywife until next harvest.
In the meantime, I've got a couple of kegs from work to see me through until my next batch of sessionable beers are ready.

Address please,,,,,and what times happy hour next Fri?

Ballarat, Vic, and I don't limit my happy hours to Fridays.
I have a nasty habit of having internet acquaintances round for beer and BBQ, so if you find yourself in the area, feel free to hit me up.

 

[squirt in the turns]

I'm not a cider drinker but this perpetual fermentation thing is interesting. What yeast strain(s) happily keep going at 4°C? I assume that all kegs including the cider are just hooked up to a manifold or splitter and fed by the same CO2 bottle? Is an effort made to stop excess CO2 from the cider over-carbonating itself or the beer?

Exactly how perpetual is it? As in, how long can the repeated topping-up go on for? Is yeast mutation a concern? What about sanitation? A raging debate in another thread regarding re-using a keg without washing between fills comes to mind.

 

[fungusmungus]

I've had the same keg going for about 8 months with no discernible change to the yeast character.
It was T-58, for anyone interested.
My manifold has anti-return valves, so it won't charge other kegs. It keeps itself charged though, and has never needed to be plugged in to the CO2 tank.

 

[shacked]

T-58 for cider? Interesting...

Going to have to give that a go!

 

[NikZak]

Hmmm... Perpetual cider, I'll have to give that a go!

 

[HBHB]

Welcome