This summer brought plenty of apples in our three kinds of apple trees. I had the luxury of tasting them all and deciding on the mix to have juiced.
And nailed it! Last time I used mostly the sweetest ones and the cider had very little apple taste in it. This one is very much apple tasting. Primary fermentation went on for over three weeks, and the result is bone dry, just like my type 1 diabetic ass likes it.
Also in the 23 l batch: 1 kg of malt (Simpsons Premium English Cara, Viking Cara Pale and Simpsons Maris Otter) to feed micronutrients to the yeast, 1 dl dark sugarcane syrup and 1 dl white sugar in the yeast starter. Yeast was fresh ‘sahti’ yeast, not really showing its banana character though.
Next time: more malt and taking the time to carefully boil down the volume of apple juice a bit. Hopefully next year, but one can never count on getting apples…
If it’s just apple juice, then you don’t need nutrient. Just yeast and juice.
You’ll have a lower ABV, and you probably won’t be able to bottle carb.
You might also have a harder time as a homebrewer creating and maintaining ideal temperature and assuring that there is enough nitrogen and sugars. But that’s home brewing.
Yes, exactly.
I’m sorry I didn’t understand any of that. Could you explain both parts?
ABV is the alcohol content.
Bottle carb is having it carbonated (fizzy) in a bottle.
ABV: alcohol by volume. Assuming you’re European - but as an American, when I visited Germany, I found it was something yinz cared about less, presumably because most beers were 4.5% or 6% if it was heavy. American beer culture is much wilder, with lighter style beers ranging from 4-8% and the heavier as 6-15% sometimes as high as 20. Be careful, lol.
Bottle carbing is a method of carbonating in a bottle
Thanks. Yeah I have never seen cidre stronger than 4.5%.