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mixed fruit cider
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10-11-2012 2:05am#1
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when u said it didnt taste like what you expected is that in a good way or bad. cheers looking forward to seeing some new recipes lol
Well...let me put it like this: My wife urges me to make more of it. So it tasted nice. HOWEVER! (it's a big however :pac:) If you taste the blended apple and raspberry juice it is utterly divine. That's really the only description I can give it. The finished product tasted nothing like it.
During primary, which was very active, there was a thick layer of "stuff" at the top of the bucket. That's grand, I got over it. I think the active primary takes away from the raspberry taste though. Now I really want to get that apple and raspberry juice taste in a cider, but I'm not a skilled brewer, so I've given it a bit of thought and here's what I've come up with....
My gut tells me that primary is stripping out the bulk of the raspberry taste (I used a lot of raspberries - they're cheap in the frozen section in lidl). Based on that I think I'll be adding the raspberries after primary. I have a few ideas on that front that I'll be testing out:
1) make a raspberry syrup by boiling up the raspberries and add it to secondary. Wait for it to finish fermenting, prime with more raspberry syrup (depending on how it works out)
2) Just add blended raspberries to secondary
3) Add raspberry jam (with seeds removed) to secondary
Now last night I primed 2 bottles of apple with a raspberry syrup that I got while on holidays in France. The problem with this is that it doesn't have a very high fruit content and also priming is only a small amount so it wont affect the flavour much on its own. It should give me an idea whether the principle is sound though.
I have a bag of mixed berries in the freezer (again from Lidl). I think these will give a nice flavour too if I manage to get the process right.
So there you have it.
It's probably not very useful to you at this stage, but I'm working towards getting a decent berry cider that approaches (or exceeds) commercial ones together. 0 -
Well...let me put it like this: My wife urges me to make more of it. So it tasted nice. HOWEVER! (it's a big however :pac:) If you taste the blended apple and raspberry juice it is utterly divine. That's really the only description I can give it. The finished product tasted nothing like it.
During primary, which was very active, there was a thick layer of "stuff" at the top of the bucket. That's grand, I got over it. I think the active primary takes away from the raspberry taste though. Now I really want to get that apple and raspberry juice taste in a cider, but I'm not a skilled brewer, so I've given it a bit of thought and here's what I've come up with....
My gut tells me that primary is stripping out the bulk of the raspberry taste (I used a lot of raspberries - they're cheap in the frozen section in lidl). Based on that I think I'll be adding the raspberries after primary. I have a few ideas on that front that I'll be testing out:
1) make a raspberry syrup by boiling up the raspberries and add it to secondary. Wait for it to finish fermenting, prime with more raspberry syrup (depending on how it works out)
2) Just add blended raspberries to secondary
3) Add raspberry jam (with seeds removed) to secondary
Now last night I primed 2 bottles of apple with a raspberry syrup that I got while on holidays in France. The problem with this is that it doesn't have a very high fruit content and also priming is only a small amount so it wont affect the flavour much on its own. It should give me an idea whether the principle is sound though.
I have a bag of mixed berries in the freezer (again from Lidl). I think these will give a nice flavour too if I manage to get the process right.
So there you have it. It's probably not very useful to you at this stage, but I'm working towards getting a decent berry cider that approaches (or exceeds) commercial ones together.
ya know imma gonna give this a go and see what i can get outta it and maybe the 2 of us can put our ideas towards each other to try find this special recipe thanks for starting the blueprint0 -
My plan has worked a treat.
So which one are you going with? berry syrup for secondary?
I gave this even more thought today - mostly as to how the commercial folks do it. I reckon they brew the cider, kill the yeast then add the berry syrup and sugar and artificially carbonate. I might attempt this at some point too.0 -
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Yet another idea....
Just make apple cider, then add some home made berry syrup at pouring time. May try this myself since I have an apple batch just gone into the bottle.
edit: Did some googling. Another option that might work well is to ferment out the apple cider, then liquidise the berries and strain them through a cheesecloth into the fermented cider. This could even be your priming, depending on the sugar content of the berries.
Apparently boiling (when making the syrup) may cause a pectin haze. You could get past this by adding some pectolase (which I happen to have).
your starting to explode now with ideas eh ha ha i get like that 2.
i tell ya the reason why i added this thread is cause iv tried so many methods and failed rather too strong not sweet enough no carbonation ya know yourself but at the moment i think im onto something.
ingredients.
8 litres apple juice
1 litre red grape juice
1 kg white tesco sugar
water
3 level teaspoons of youngs dried active yeast
equipment
30 litre fermenter with bottom tap
airlock
a big spoon
everything was sterilized i turned on the kettle and started adding all the juice to the fermenter. i then added the boiled water roughly a 1.5litres doesnt matter really how much. then added the kg sugar the hot water help it dissolve in no time. then i added cool tap water up to the 16 litre mark and left it sit to room temperature which was 16-18c so i added the yeast and covered my fermenter and wrapped it up with a blanket and lit the fire its brewing now for nearly a week rapidly and i had a taste (best thing about the bottom tap is you dont have to open it as it leaves out gas but its still too sweet so another week i say it be perfect but not like kopparberg but still lovely.
the red grape juice really does over take the apple juice even tho its an 1/8 of what apple juice went in it.
i might suggest cutting the sugar to about half or the most 3/4 kg or maybe adding more water to about 18-20 litres.0 -
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Adding berries is done like this when making homemade wine to simulate the fruit flavours that wine grapes can give off naturally after fermentation. So your on a winner there, been reading up a lot about it lately. Putting them in early does indeed 'blow off' the flavours and aromas. For juice extraction, going from frozen is key as it breaks down the cell walls. I was recommended to defrost the berries in a bucket over night with a layer of sugar over them. This will help extract the juice also. Then squeeze the juice through muslin, but dont totally ring them out them or you could add to much pectin through for even for pectolaise to handle and end up with a haze. Add it late in the ferment is what I was told, not after the yeast is fully dead, but then this was wine so maybe it is different?? You would need to account for the extra sugar in your recipe. Must start a cider 0
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Adding berries is done like this when making homemade wine to simulate the fruit flavours that wine grapes can give off naturally after fermentation. So your on a winner there, been reading up a lot about it lately. Putting them in early does indeed 'blow off' the flavours and aromas. For juice extraction, going from frozen is key as it breaks down the cell walls. I was recommended to defrost the berries in a bucket over night with a layer of sugar over them. This will help extract the juice also. Then squeeze the juice through muslin, but dont totally ring them out them or you could add to much pectin through for even for pectolaise to handle and end up with a haze. Add it late in the ferment is what I was told, not after the yeast is fully dead, but then this was wine so maybe it is different?? You would need to account for the extra sugar in your recipe. Must start a cider
thats great info redser thanks for that i really hope we can get somewhere near or even beat the real thing this is obviously gonna take a few months than the easy hard apple cider way but im willing thanks again0 -
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Sounds good although I'm not sure about waiting for the yeast to be dead before adding the fruit. I guess it would push the % up if it is still active - sorry dont know about cider, just relating what I've been reading on wine. Here's a post from this morning on it ...
"You can do either (add early or late) depending on what style of wine you are after. At the start of ferment will extract more tannins and much of the aroma compounds will be blown out through the airlock. Adding smaller quantities later alows alcohol extraction of tanins in the fruit and the less vigorous ferment means aroma compounds are retained in the wine.
Bill smiths book has opened up a whole new chapter wine wine making for me... Id recommend the book to anyone."
I just bought that book
Here's the thread. Again it is wine related but I think it has good background info that might be useful ...
http://www.homewinemaking.co.uk/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1352416923/14#14
I got the tip about not squeezing too hard from another thread.0 -
The yeast is still alive and well in a cider at that point. It's how you get carbonation when you prime - the yeast starts up again when you add the priming sugar, produces carbon dioxide which has nowhere to go but into the cider = fizzy cider. 0
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I like your priming idea, fermentation can expel volatile components during primary, and I think that is what is happening.
But priming with your final flavour component, then trapping it all in the bottle ... now thats rock and roll.
I lol'd. I should be making some more over the coming weeks and think I will prime with the berry juice alright.You will also trap aroma ... but mind your ratios. Dont make bottle bombs, but I think you could easily get away with 2 level teaspoons of raspberry syrup per 500ml bottle, if they are proper tough bottles.
I did 10-13g in the 4 bottles that I made recently (it was a bit slapdash - I just had the bottle on a scales, then poured in some syrup). The syrup is about 70% sugar. I drank both of the glass bottles. They worked out very tasty. You could really taste the raspberry, but the fizz left very quickly. I have 2 more in plastic bottles.0 -
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Havn't tried cider yet, but reading that you could save yourself a good bit on the yeast by making up a starter a couple of days before you plan to do your batch. Maybe you know about it already? Half pint of the juice at approx 20 degrees in a bottle, teaspoon of sugar and a little nutrient if you have it. Add 1 tsp of yeast. Give it a good shake and place it somewhere warm. Give it 2 days to build a nice colony and then chuck it in. It will be acclimatised to your jucie and have a nice multiplying colony already and should take off nice and fast for you. You can even hold a bit of the starter back and feed it some more juice and sugar for another batch and start building a new colony. Free yeast
Another thing you can do to help the yeast is invert the sugar, maybe you know already about that too? Bring it to boiling point in some water with a tsp of citric acid and then simmer for 15-20 minutes, stirring. Makes for a smoother ferment as the yeast doesnt have to split it to consume it. Helps prevent possible off-tastes too.0 -
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Havn't tried cider yet, but reading that you could save yourself a good bit on the yeast by making up a starter a couple of days before you plan to do your batch. Maybe you know about it already? Half pint of the juice at approx 20 degrees in a bottle, teaspoon of sugar and a little nutrient if you have it. Add 1 tsp of yeast. Give it a good shake and place it somewhere warm. Give it 2 days to build a nice colony and then chuck it in. It will be acclimatised to your jucie and have a nice multiplying colony already and should take off nice and fast for you. You can even hold a bit of the starter back and feed it some more juice and sugar for another batch and start building a new colony. Free yeast
Another thing you can do to help the yeast is invert the sugar, maybe you know already about that too? Bring it to boiling point in some water with a tsp of citric acid and then simmer for 15-20 minutes, stirring. Makes for a smoother ferment as the yeast doesnt have to split it to consume it. Helps prevent possible off-tastes too.
i appreciate the different ways to activate the yeast but it starts really quick when i have near the fire place roughly roughly 3-4 hours0 -
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