Home Brewing

[Root]

I decided to brew up a batch of hard cider today. I watched this video the other day and got inspired.



Here's all the ingredients.

I boiled up the raisins with a packed cup of brown sugar.

Sanitized my gear.

Strained the raisins, so only the sugar water and "raisin juice" was transferred to the fermenter.

Let the party begin.

 

[libertygold]

Thank you very much. I might try this.

 

[presence]

20 gallons of home sqeezed hard cider bubbling, 1st fermentation 1118 in corny kegs. 10 additional gallons of juice canned mason jars. Probably equal still sitting in barrels of harvested but unprocessed apples. I can't say how much is still on the ground. Also 16 apple pie fillings frozen. Busy like a bee. 30g of hard cider and 30g of juice is the goal. Cold weather looming. Takes about a 32g trash can of apples to make 10g of juice; which is one run through my press.

 

[Root]

20 gallons of home sqeezed hard cider bubbling, 1st fermentation 1118 in corny kegs. 10 additional gallons of juice canned mason jars. Probably equal still sitting in barrels of harvested but unprocessed apples. I can't say how much is still on the ground. Also 16 apple pie fillings frozen. Busy like a bee. 30g of hard cider and 30g of juice is the goal. Cold weather looming. Takes about a 32g trash can of apples to make 10g of juice; which is one run through my press.

Do you always ferment your hard cider with 1118?

 

[Todd]

That looks like it would be tasty.

 

[presence]

Do you always ferment your hard cider with 1118?

I'm doing some w/ 1116. This is actually my first go at cider. I acquired the orchard 3 years ago... lots of pruning and thin yield 1st two years. Lots of labor and we only put back a few score masons of apple sauce/butter and some frozen pie filling fiddling with tiny silver dollar apples. This year however has a good chance at 100 gallon yield. I'll probably still leave 2X that to the wildlife. I just got in from another harvest session. We're sitting on 6-7 presses now worth of apple harvested in buckets/barrels/laundry baskets; about 60-70 gallons more juice. We shook trees with hooked poles over multiple 15x12 canvases; transferred to plastic containers; quite efficient.

I'm out to town tomorrow to pick up more yeast and raisins actually. Any recommendations? 1118 was recommended as "die hard" not picky as to temperature. I was told there are better "flavors" to be had w/ other yeast, I'm going to talk to the brew shop guy about it.

For what its worth when you Amazon search: "cider yeast" first result is 1118.

 

[Root]

I'm doing some w/ 1116. This is actually my first go at cider. I acquired the orchard 3 years ago... lots of pruning and thin yield 1st two years. Lots of labor and we only put back a few score masons of apple sauce/butter and some frozen pie filling fiddling with tiny silver dollar apples. This year however has a good chance at 100 gallon yield. I'll probably still leave 2X that to the wildlife. I just got in from another harvest session. We're sitting on 6-7 presses now worth of apple harvested in buckets/barrels/laundry baskets; about 60-70 gallons more juice. We shook trees with hooked poles over multiple 15x12 canvases; transferred to plastic containers; quite efficient.

I'm out to town tomorrow to pick up more yeast and raisins actually. Any recommendations? 1118 was recommended as "die hard" not picky as to temperature. I was told there are better "flavors" to be had w/ other yeast, I'm going to talk to the brew shop guy about it.

For what its worth when you Amazon search: "cider yeast" first result is 1118.

I'd get actual yeast nutrient if you're planning to make anything stronger than 10% abv.

 

[Root]

Buy one get one free 5 or 6 gallon plastic carboys at Northernbrewer.

http://www.northernbrewer.com/free-...NBHomepage&ici=BOGO-BUBBLER-Oct-24-2013_Slide

 

[grizzlymere]

I have a friend who ferments wine. He does it with juice concentrate, yeast and balloons. I'm not totally sure how it works though...

 

[cbc58]

I am thinking about buying a still for various reasons. Where would be a good place to buy ingredients to make whiskey, moonshine, etc?

 

[presence]

I'm going to check out a bunch of 1950's 28oz "ACL soda bottles" this week for bottling sparkling cider. I understand that the labels may contain lead. How much of a concern should this be? Is it an issue with just the handling of the bottles or do the interiors get tainted as well?

 

[Todd]

I am thinking about buying a still for various reasons. Where would be a good place to buy ingredients to make whiskey, moonshine, etc?

Probably a Walmart.

A Quick Recipe for Making Moonshine
The basic ingredients:

corn meal
sugar
water
yeast
malt

The basic process:

Mix all ingredients together in a large container. After mixing, move the mixture, called "mash," into a still and leave it to ferment. How quickly this process occurs depends on the warmth of the mash.


Heat the mash to the point of vaporization at 173 degrees. The mash will produce a clear liquid, often the color of dark beer. You must watch this process with careful attention.

Trap vapor using a tube or coil. The vapor will be transferred into a second, empty container. The resulting condensation is the moonshine. It is then ready to drink or sell.

Keep mash in container. It is now called "slop." Add more sugar, water, malt, and corn meal and repeat the process.

Repeat the process up to eight times before replacing the mash.






Here is a basic recipe for the legendary apple pie moonshine. It’s really easy to make, and you don’t even need moonshine (though you can’t really call it apple pie moonshine if you don’t use moonshine.)

Ingredients:

1 gallon apple cider
1 gallon apple juice
3 cups white sugar
8 cinnamon sticks
1 liter bottle of 190 proof moonshine or grain alcohol

Directions
1.In a large stock pot, combine the apple cider, apple juice, sugar, and cinnamon sticks.
2.Bring it to a boil, then take it off the heat and allow it to cool.
3.Add the liter of high proof liquor.
4.Pour this into mason jars, put the lids on, and let it mellow out. You could drink it right away, but it does get better after a couple of weeks.

This recipe makes about 9 quarts of apple pie moonshine. You could easily cut this recipe in half if that is too much.

 

[presence]

Ordered more yeast for my cider; looks like I'll easily clear 100 gallons of juice and hard cider this year. Ordered a variety pack Nottingham, S05, S04, Cotes de blanc, and a few others. The sound and smell of bubbling corny kegs is exciting. Everything bubbling to date is on Lavin 1118 or 1116. The ale yeasts should produce a little lower alcohol percent, but retain more apple flavor. They're 3x as expensive as Lavin 1118 though. But for $3.25 for 4 gallons of hard cider who can complain

 

[tangent4ronpaul]

Buy one get one free 5 or 6 gallon plastic carboys at Northernbrewer.

http://www.northernbrewer.com/free-...NBHomepage&ici=BOGO-BUBBLER-Oct-24-2013_Slide

$24 each!!! Places like Lowes, Home Depot, Walmart, etc. sell these full of water for office "water coolers". I'm pretty sure the deposit is still $5 each.

I have a friend who ferments wine. He does it with juice concentrate, yeast and balloons. I'm not totally sure how it works though...

take a 1 gal or so jug, add water and juice concentrate and optionally sugar or honey, then add yeast. stretch balloon nozzle over opening and place in cool, dark place. The balloon will inflate and then deflate. when it deflates, it's ready.

I am thinking about buying a still for various reasons. Where would be a good place to buy ingredients to make whiskey, moonshine, etc?

I was going to put this in the other thread about storing alcohol for barter as this one has been about beer and wine so far, but someone came along and mentioned stills, so I'll put this here.



TTB Laws

Under Federal rules administered by TTB, it depends on how you use the still. You may not produce alcohol with these stills unless you qualify as a distilled spirits plant. However, owning a small still and using it for other purposes is allowed. You should also check with your State and local authorities - their rules may differ.

A still is defined as apparatus capable of being used to separate ethyl alcohol from a mixture that contains alcohol. Small stills (with a cubic distilling capacity of a gallon or less) that are used for laboratory purposes or for distilling water or other non-alcoholic materials are exempt from our rules. If you buy a small still and use it to distill water or extract essential oils by steam or water extraction methods, you are not subject to TTB requirements. If you produce essential oils by a solvent method and you get alcohol as a by-product of your process, we consider that distilling. Even though you are using and recovering purchased alcohol, you are separating the alcohol from a mixture -distilling. Under regulations in part 29 of title 27, Code of Federal Regulations, TTB has the right to require manufacturers of stills to give the name and address of each customer.

http://www.milehidistilling.com/economy-moonshine-distillers/

There are a number of things you can do with a still, among them are making hard alcohol, making ethanol (fuel) and SURPRISE antibiotics...

Possum living (see chapter 12)
http://www.deeplyrootedorganics.com/downloads/PossumLiving.pdf

Expedient Antibiotic Production:
http://web.ornl.gov/info/reports/1988/3445602771613.pdf

On bottles, I've seen an imported beer that comes in a REALLY HEAVY bottle with a ceramic "cork" and gasket. It has a built in metal latching mechanism to seal that cap. These seem like ideal bottles for re-use. Grolach or something close to that is the brand name.

Now a challenge question: How do you make yourself self sufficient in your ability to make beer, wine and hard alcohol post SHTF?

-t

 

[presence]

Now a challenge question: How do you make yourself self sufficient in your ability to make beer, wine and hard alcohol post SHTF?

-t

Freeze distillation


oh... and its Grolsch by the way; and the white lids have been plastic for at least 5 years now.

 

[presence]

Ok... so I just racked my first two corny kegs of cider. About 7 1/2 gallons total less 3/4 of sludge left me

3 gallons of 1118
3 gallons of 1116

3/4 gallon of 1116 and 1118 blend

3/4 gallon of dead yeast

So now I have 6 3/4 clear and fermenting in gallon jugs.

I might rerack the 3/4 blend and perhaps the dead yeast in the morning depending upon how it settles.

Gave it a taste... definitely not apple juice any more. Will let sit 120 days though for flavor improvement before bottling. The ACL soda bottle thing fell through for me, it turns out they contain lead and I'm just not in to risk it. So I might be going with wine bottles. I have someone willing to give me 120 1.5L green wine bottles for $60 and I think I might jump on it. I really wanted to carbonate... but wine bottles don't hold carbonation and beer bottles is just a bit to meticulous for the quantity I'm dealing with... something like 1000+ beer bottles if I took that route.

 

[presence]

18 gallons @ 7.8%, once racked and final perk in gallons jugs for 120 days.

Had a taste, bit yeasty but

Apple shines through and this stuff is only 10-14 days old.


Can't believe I've got another 100+ gallons of unpressed apple juice sitting in my garage, pretty sweet!

 

[tangent4ronpaul]

Freeze distillation


oh... and its Grolsch by the way; and the white lids have been plastic for at least 5 years now.

Yeah, that's it!

Are you sure about the plastic part? I just tapped the last one in my fridge, and it felt ceramic. Sure about the 5yr time frame? I seriously doubt that something that yummy would last 5 years in my fridge... Though it does have some dark corners...

I've also thought that they would make some pretty decent IV bottles, but they are undersized for that...


-t

 

[presence]

Yeah, that's it!

Are you sure about the plastic part? I just tapped the last one in my fridge, and it felt ceramic. Sure about the 5yr time frame? I seriously doubt that something that yummy would last 5 years in my fridge... Though it does have some dark corners...

I've also thought that they would make some pretty decent IV bottles, but they are undersized for that...


-t

no idea how long the beer itself lasts... my comment was that, at least 5 years ago, maybe more (struggling for official source... but it seems around 1999 actually) grolsch switched from ceramic to hard glossy alcohol resistant plastic. The ceramic ones are usually sold as "vintage ceramic capped grosch" on ebay. Home brew supplies can usually get you replacement caps (plastic) w/ new rubbers. Not sure of a source for the ceramic ones besides resale.


last year golsch reduced the weight of their spring closure too:
http://www.packagingnews.co.uk/news/grolsch-lightweight-caps/

keyword: straplock

 

[Root]

Witbier has been bottle conditioning for several weeks now. I'm going to sample one tonight.

Boysenberry ale has been racked to a makeshift secondary and added on top of the fruit purée.

The first gallon of hard cider will be racked to a secondary this evening. I now have a second gallon of Apple cider going. For this one, I removed 2 cups of juice and added 1 container of Apple juice concentrate to boost the abv. I also added 1tsp of yeast nutrient. OG was 1.062. The airlock is bubbling like mad on the second one.

I've also picked up 2 5 gallon fermenters. I now have the capacity to have 17 gallons going at once.