Apple Cider 2016

The last time I made cider (see post here), I was failed by EZ Cap bottles, which just didn't hold any pressure. This resulted in a batch of still cider. Still cider is fine, but I aspire to make carbonated, homemade cider. One of the reasons I wanted to make homemade beer was to get beer to carbonate in the bottles, using standard bottle caps. That worked out just fine (see Festa Brew "Continental Pilsner). So, it was time to revisit cider-making, and attempt natural carbonation in the bottles.

Tanya and I picked the apples off of our tree, and made the fatal decision that there were enough apples that we could simply cut them up by hand before pressing. That was crazy - the manual labour to cut up all of our apples up into eights (or smaller) was just too much. Next time, I'm going to obtain a fruit crusher like last time.

The pressing however, went fairly well, and we obtained approximately 4 gallons of apple juice. The specific gravity of the apple juice was 1.034, which was almost identical to juice from the last time we pressed apples. To this, I added 4 crushed Campden tablets, 2 tap. yeast energizer, and 1 tsp. of peptic enzyme. After 24 hours, I added a packet of Lalvin EC1118 yeast, by sprinkling it on the surface. Fermentation was well underway a day later.

Primary fermentation proceeded quickly. Four days after adding the yeast, the foam on the surface had collapsed and it was time to transfer to a carboy. The volume (4 gallons) created an opportunity for two separate batches. I siphoned the bulk of the cider to a 3 gallon carbon and placed an airlock on it. This batch is meant to be regular cider.

Spiced Cider

The remainder (which amounted to a little over 1/2 gallon) went into a 1 gallon jug which I topped up with distilled water to which I had added 1 cup of sugar. This was done to get the alcohol level up to where it should be. If I did not add any more sugar, this would have been a 1:2 dilution, and the cider would be very weak). I also added 1/4 tap of nutmeg and two cinnamon sticks for flavour. I sealed the jug with an airlock.

Regular cider (left), and spiced cider (right). Fine solids are settling out.

After four days in the carboy, fermentation of the regular cider was virtually complete, and the bulk of the fine solids had settled. It was time to add priming sugar and bottle! So, I siphoned the cider to a large pail, added 3/4 cup of dextrose, stirred thoroughly, and bottled it just like you would beer. The yield was 4 x 1 L bottles, and 22 x 330 mL beer bottles.

I bottled the spiced cider one day later, adding 1/4 cup of dextrose to the (approx.) 1 gallon of spiced cider. Yield was 10 x 355 mL bottles.

A taste test of the spiced cider revealed a beverage that tasted like Christmas. The nutmeg and cinnamon paired well with the apple and the little bit of sweetness from the priming sugar. It remains to be seen how the spices affect the taste when the cider is carbonated and dry. I can't wait!

According to the purple "Winemaker's Recipe Handbook", you should age the cider for three months!!! This seems like a long time. I might get impatient and open a bottle in a month or so, just to see how it's coming along.

To Filter or Not?

To date, with the few wine kits I have made, I have never filtered the wine before bottling.  Most of the wine kit instructions recommend filtering because it supposedly enhances the clarity of the wine, and removes some of the residual yeast cells that are still floating around.  With my valpolicella kit, the store gave me a coupon for a half day filter rental, so I decided to go ahead and try filtering this wine before bottling.  The store gave me a "Buon Vino Mini Jet" electric filter for the afternoon:  http://www.buonvino.com/minijet.html

The wine filter consisted of a pump connected to an arrangement of plates that force the wine to pass through a sequence of three filter pads, and then through an outlet to a long piece of tubing that carries the wine to a carboy for storage until bottling. The edges of the filter pads are exposed, which allows some wine to escape.  This is probably good for the pump, because if the filter pads get clogged, wine can escape through the sides, which prevents the pressure from building up.  Any overflow wine is collected in a drip tray which drains to a holding container via a length of tubing.

My valpolicella wine had been sitting for some time after clarification, and there was an inch of precipitate at the bottom of the carboy.  So, before starting, I racked the wine into a clean carboy.  This way, I didn't have to worry about the fine solids clogging up the filter pads.  I noticed that the racked wine was already pretty clear.

After the somewhat fussy process of sterilizing the pump and tubing, rinsing with cold water, and flushing water through the filter pads, I began filtering.  I was pleased with the filtration rate, which was a lot faster than what I usually get when I siphon wine from one container to another.  When the carboy of unfiltered wine was empty, I filtered the two litres of overflow wine.

The filtered wine was 'agitated'.  That is, there was a fine foam on the surface, which is meant to be the result of carbon dioxide out-gassing from all the mechanical agitation that happens during filtration.  It took a few hours for the foam to disappear.  As per the instructions, prior to bottling, I let the filtered wine stand overnight in a carboy fitted with an airlock.

Bottling was uneventful, and a sample of the wine tasted much like it did when I first tested it.

30 bottles of filtered Valpolicella

So, was filtration worth the effort?   Filtration seems like a really good way to degas the wine if there is any excess carbon dioxide or sulfur dioxide present.  It is probably a good way to remove any of the finings that are left in the wine after racking, but this only applies to instances of sloppy racking.  If you are careful with racking, your wine should be very clear and may not even need to be filtered.

I personally found it to be a fussy process that creates a number of opportunities to contaminate the wine (e.g. sterilizing and rinsing the wine filter is not easy because of all the little grooves and small parts).  Plus, the whole process is clearly a very good way to aerate the wine: the wine is squeezed through filter pads with high surface area (in air); the overflow wine sits in an open drip tray before flowing into an overflow container; the filtered wine flows at a high rate from the outlet tubing, and this created a sort of waterfall effect in the final carboy, mixing up the wine with lots of little air bubbles.  Basically, there was a lot of aeration.

Would I do this again?  On balance, probably not.

The Limitations of EZ Cap Bottles

For about two weeks now, my cider has been sitting in those cool looking EZ Cap bottles.  Two days after bottling the first batch, I noticed tiny bubbles rising to the top, inside the bottles.  I thought this was a good sign, as it meant that the secondary fermentation was working, and the cider should be nice and carbonated when it was all over.  The problem is that the bubbles have not stopped.  That can only mean one thing:  the EZ Cap bottles leak.

Bubbles can only form if there is somewhere for the gas to go.  If the bottle is under sufficient pressure, the CO₂ stays dissolved in the liquid, and there are no bubbles.  However, as soon as the pressure drops, CO₂ becomes gas, and bubbles become visible.  This is exactly like opening a pop bottle.  When you unscrew the lid, the pressure inside the bottle drops, and CO₂ is released.

In exactly half of my 1 litre EZ Cap bottles, tiny bubbles are still forming in the cider.  Last night, I decided to open one of the leaky bottles and test it.  When I popped open the lid, there actually was an audible pop as if the bottle was under a small amount of pressure.  When I poured a glass, however, the cider was clearly not carbonated.  (So, I added some club soda and proceeded to enjoy!)

I really like EZ Cap bottles.  They look nice and they are easy to use.  I think they are perfect if your goal is to make still cider (i.e. non carbonated).  But if you want carbonated cider, you will need to use beer bottles and bottle caps, or maybe a plastic pop bottle with a tightly screwed lid.  Now, my experience might not be a total failure.  I still have hope for the other bottles of cider that don't have bubbles, because that suggests they are under pressure.  But here's the thing - a 50% success rate of getting a strong seal just isn't good enough for this purpose.

Here's my question:  Is there a trick to getting a good seal on EZ Cap bottles?

Bottling Cider

Yesterday, once I concluded that the fermentation was complete, I racked apple cider v.1 into a clean 1 gallon jug.  A secondary fermentation is required to carbonate the cider, so I stirred in some extra sugar - recipes often call for 1/4 cup of sugar per gallon.  I added a little less than this and stirred it until it was dissolved.  Then, I siphoned the cider into three 1 Litre EZ-Cap bottles.  The plan is to wait 2-3 months before I crack open a bottle.  This should be plenty of time for the secondary fermentation to be complete, and the lees to mostly settle out.

EZ-Cap Bottles.  Don't they look good?

Bottling the Mead

Mead v.1 was ready for bottling about a week ago, but I could not find time to bottle it.  May and June are always a crazy time at universities, so there have been a lot of demands at work.  Also, we've been working on a deck at home, which has used a lot of time on the weekends.

This morning, I had waited long enough and decided to go for it.  First, I siphoned the mead from its 3 gallon carboy into another one. Why did I do this?  There is a fine precipitate sitting at the bottom of the carboy  the result of clarifying the liquid.  It is easily disturbed, and during the bottling step, there can be a lot of movement of the siphon tube.  By transferring the liquid to a separate container first, it is easier to avoid disturbing those fine solids.  It has certainly worked out well in the past.  But this time, I managed to slightly disturb that precipitate and some of it got into the liquid.  It wasn't much, but there was a slight turbidity to the mead that I ended up bottling.  This is frustrating because the liquid was crystal clear before, and it was an avoidable mistake.  I just hope it settles out over time.

I used my auto-siphon to fill the sanitized bottles (pictured below).  The end result was fourteen 750-mL bottles of mead!  There was little extra, so I put it in a separate bottle and placed it in the fridge.  (This was so I could see what it tastes like when chilled.)

(1)  Bottling.  I don't really need to wear rubber gloves 

for this, but I was sanitizing with bleach solutions, and it was 

easier to just leave them on!

Several hours later, I am writing this with a small glass of chilled mead at hand.  First of all, this stuff is strong - certainly stronger than most wines.  You may recall that I estimated the alcohol content to be 15% or so.  It is obviously sweet, with a mild honey taste, and a hint of oak and cedar.  There is almost no acidity, and the finish is surprisingly clean.  And, yes, it is better served chilled, just like most dessert wines. 

When my wife tried it, she immediately looked up at me with her eyes wide, and said, "Yummy!"  This brings me to an important observation: this mead is ready to drink.  One doesn't need to age it for months and months before uncorking a bottle and pouring a glass.

My daughter asked if she could help make labels.  She drew a nice picture of a commercial bee hive.  From her artwork, I thought the name "Sunnyside" was appropriate.

(2)  Homemade bottle label.

Yesterday was summer solstice in the northern hemisphere.  If only I had bottled this a day before, I could have celebrated the longest day like the ancients - with a glass of mead!