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OfflineCptnGarden
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How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! * 1
    #8259775 - 04/09/08 12:56 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

First of all, do some reading on how yeast works.
Theres quite a few helpful sites out there.
It basically splits the sugar molecule inside itself using an enzyme, pooping out C02, and peeing out Alcohol.

Saccharomyces is the yeast used for brewing, whats it mean?
Saccharo = sugar
Myces = yeast

So it basically feeds on sugar. So if your goal is to make something alcoholic, the more sugar you add, the stronger the alcohol.
Each yeast produces different amounts of alcohol, meaning each yeast has a tolerance and will die off in certain alcohol concentrations.

The yeast I use is red star brand "Premier Cuvee"
cause it is known to be at least 18% alcohol, sometimes up to 22%, depending on how much sugar it is fed.
Premier Cuvee is the yeast Saccharomyces Bayanus, its important to know what strain of yeast you have to know how your brew is going to turn out.
And Premier Cuvee ferments within' a month or so.
Some yeasts only produce around 12%.
Some yeasts like bread yeast, will produce hydrogen sulphide, and S02 gas and come out smelling like eggs/rotten eggs.
It's good to study your strain of yeast well.

with that said, onto the brew :smile:

Your Gonna Need:

[Click for Image]
Juice, concentrate is fine, fresh pressed cider is best. If it tastes good before you brew it, it will probably taste good afterwards. Don't get anything with any preservatives in it lke potassium sorbate etc, ascorbic acid (vitamin c) is fine though.

[Click for Image]
A glass, Your yeast, and not shown in the pic but important - A bunch of condoms (sounds like a joke but its serious), and a bag of white sugar.

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A strong-bladed knife.

Ok heres what to do:

[Click for Image]
Crack open your juice and pour a glass, this gives room for later on when you need to add sugar, or if the foam starts getting too high in the container.

[Click for Image]
Now use your knife to pop off that plastic ring, it keeps your airlock from sealing properly.

[Click for Image]
Pour some of your yeast into your juice. How much you add is up to you, if you pour a lot it will be in a full roaring bubble within' 24 hours, if you add just a lil' it may take a day or two to gets bubbling good.
I usually make a 75cent packet good for 5 gallons last about 8 gallons or more.

[Click for Image]
Now put a condom on top, this is no joke.
Read on for more on why.

[Click for Image]
[Click for Image]
Keep your brew at the preferable temps for your yeast, but usually on the colder side, near 65deg F. Try not to have the temps fluctuate cause of various bad/weird flavors that are produced when the yeast is stressed.
In the pics above u can see some foam appearing, this is fine in the few days after u pitch your yeast, as its the yeast itself reproducing on the surface. This may continue for a while, and eventually you will have blotches of bubbles on the surface similar to this.

[Click for Image]
Once your condom inflates a bit, poke a hole through it with a needle, make sure to have it poke two holes like shown above.
This is your airlock!
As long as theres air pressure inside and the condom is inflated, air will be blowing out these two holes, meaning no germs can fly into it through them to contaminate your brew.

[Click for Image]
Make as many as you like!

The main thing to make sure of is that your sterile, dont use an old condom, or a used one :smirk:, and dont put anything thats not sterile into the bottle. Try to leave it closed or capped as much as possible in the preparation.

Now, onto strengthening this brew!

Fruit juice alone will only get you around 8% alcohol, this is fine for some, but i personally like to use my yeast to the best of its power, not to mention get more bang for my buck when buying juice.

For every cup or so of sugar, the percent will go up about 4-8%.
Try to only add sugar when the condom deflates, or the bubbles slow down, as too much sugar can choke out the yeast and slow them down greatly.

IMPORTANT!
When adding sugar to your brew, after its been sitting a few weeks, and has slowed down a lot, add the first few bits REALLY SLOW, and i mean add 1/2 teaspoon and wait for the bubbles to subside. I have added a tablespoon size all at once and had it overflow all over my carpet within' a matter of seconds. This is because the yeast has eaten most of the sugar, and a lot of the yeast in there is starving, so a sudden addition of sugar will send millions of yeast producing C02 all at once, and usually create an inch or so of foam.
Keep adding the sugar slowly to the container, until the reaction doesnt seem to be so severe. Try not to let it overflow as this may cause contamination, and keep doing this everytime the nipple on the condom drops, or everytime it starts to slow down a lot.
Eventually your brew wont react when you add sugar, or will lightly react from the first addition compared to nearly exploding, meaning your yeast is dying off from the alcohol content, this means were done!!!

Either use the previous condom to seal it back up after each sugar addition, or better yet, use a new one.
Free condoms are available in many health clinics, and most places are glad to hand you bagfulls of them.

Settling your brew
Just cause its done fermenting, doesnt mean its ready to drink, if your brew is still cloudy, it means its full of yeast still, you can either drink it now, or you can let it sit for a few weeks, and wait for the yeast to starve and drop out of solution. Your brew will be "DONE" when its clear, but you can drink it at any time as long as its not contaminated.


Contaminants!!!

Contaminants are not too common, but they do happen, they may range from vinegar-flavors and scents, to rotten eggs, to huge bubbles of bacteria on the surface, to even mold!
Some contaminants, such as E.coli ARE POSSIBLE! so always take caution.

I always swish a mouthful of finished brew around in my mouth and give it a taste, making sure its not sickeningly sour with contamination, before i drink it. And i always make sure to have a glass and wait 24hours before i let anyone else drink my brew.
Scent alone is not enough to let you know if your brew is contaminated or not, swish some around your mouth.

Preservation!
You can use Potassium Sorbate, or one of the many preservatives known, which can be found at most brew stores to preserve your brew, but alcohol concentrations of 14% or higher will naturally preserve your brew. If your brew is under 14% alcohol, you can expect it to go bad after a while, and possibly even contaminate.
Oxygenation is another problem, try to keep it in a container with little to no oxygen exposure. Plastics leak oxygen, glass doesnt.
If you have the ability to bottle your brew, this is the best thing to do.
Just dont bottle it too early while its still bubbling, and have it explode on you.
Oxygenation will just make your brew taste funny.
So if you must, drink it up!


Thats it for now, any questions?

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InvisibleBrainiac
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8259820 - 04/09/08 01:06 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

Quote:


So it basically feeds on sugar. So if your goal is to make something alcoholic, the more sugar you add, the stronger the alcohol.




Yeast can only eat so much,Before the Alcohol will kill the yeast....The yeast thats used in bread making is taking form major beer company's and dried...


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OfflinegeokillsA
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8259875 - 04/09/08 01:18 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

Whoa, this looks so easy, and I'd love to be flush with 20% abv cider! :yesnod:
Thanks for the great write up! :thumbup:

Your airlock is genius :laugh:


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OfflineLiquidSmoke
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8259942 - 04/09/08 01:39 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

this thread is AWSOME



FREE BOOZE!!


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"Shmokin' weed, Shmokin' wizz, doin' coke, drinkin' beers.  Drinkin' beers beers beers, rollin' fatties, smokin' blunts.  Who smokes tha blunts?  We smoke the blunts" - Jay and Silent Bob strike Back

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InvisibleBrainiac
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: LiquidSmoke]
    #8260146 - 04/09/08 02:41 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

By or find a 1gal contaner and use a air lock.


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OfflineCptnGarden
fuck this site

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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: Brainiac]
    #8261002 - 04/09/08 06:31 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

Quote:

Brainiac said:
By or find a 1gal contaner and use a air lock.




you dont need one to make cheap closet hooch. :smile:

the condom is just as efficient an airlock mechanism, and most juice bottles dont let much oxygenation occur.
the only issue i see is the bottle leaking out things leftover from the plastic manufacturing due to the high alcohol content, but i doubt it will pose much a problem, and ide be interested to hear what wiccan_seeker has to say about it.

but if u do wanna get serious about brewing, go buy a carlo rossi wine bottle at a longs or rite aid (or whatever u got goin on)



the 1gal containers work great, and most rubber fittings for airlocks will fit these. they are great for practicing getting your brew-style down.
they are however too small for beer.

and once u get good, get the plastic "better bottles" instead of a 5gal glass carboy, too many stories about people dropping the carboys and having the pressurized containers send glass into them cutting tendons etc
fuck it, "better bottles" are plastic but are designed not to let barely any oxygen through and are easy to clean.

by all means, this closet cider is not meant for a brewing professional and i do not guarantee quality, but if u want 20% alc for 4$ a gallon, you'd be missing out if you didnt try this.

any questions?

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InvisibleBrainiac
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8261027 - 04/09/08 06:36 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

Airlocks are only 1-2.00 dollars.

You can make one by getting a tube. Some how hook it up to the bottle.Then put the other end in a cup of water.Keep water above the end of tube..

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OfflineCptnGarden
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: Brainiac]
    #8261104 - 04/09/08 06:50 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

yeah you can make your own.

i used to use soda bottles, drill a hole in the cap and attach some vinyl tubing in the hole with glue, and put the end of the tubing in another 2-liter filled with water and hydrogen peroxide.
anything will work, you could even do that with these juice bottles and their original lids.
i however have become quite used to using the condoms, its quick and easy, and i get them by the bagfull for free.

if u want to let your 20% brew sit for a while, u can transfer it to a glass container, probably not too good to store it for a long time in the juice bottles. but for getting it to 20% in a month, the juice bottles are fine.
those carlo rossi bottles make good for storing brew for periods of months/years.

just make sure to pick up some iodophor or something and give them a good sterilizing. :smile:

for this simple process, why spend money for an airlock for every bottle?

this is a cheap process that yields lots and lots of alcohol.
it does however take up space, something which a 5gal carboy could fix.

still its your choice how you want to brew and what you want to use, this is just a good beginners brewing tek, and its what i do inbetween batches of mead for a quick cheap punch in the face :wink:

a beer bottle of this brew puts me on my ass.
one night i drank 3 beer bottles of it and blacked out.

its really strong, really cheap, and doesnt require much skill or attention.

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InvisibleBrainiac
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8261122 - 04/09/08 06:53 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

Make sure there the ones without (what ever thats called)..


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OfflineCptnGarden
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: Brainiac]
    #8261190 - 04/09/08 07:04 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

you talking about the condoms with spermicidal jelly?

yeah dont use those :lol:

who knows what that would do to you.

i use just regular lubricated condoms, the lubrication helps em slide onto the bottle without tearing.

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InvisibleBrainiac
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8261205 - 04/09/08 07:08 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

You tell i haven't used one before..:nonono:


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OfflineCptnGarden
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: Brainiac]
    #8261237 - 04/09/08 07:12 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)


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OfflineCptnGarden
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: Brainiac]
    #8261257 - 04/09/08 07:15 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

ugh the infamous double post

Edited by CptnGarden (04/09/08 07:15 PM)

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InvisibleBrainiac
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8261272 - 04/09/08 07:17 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

:rofl2:


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Invisibletiny_rabid_birds
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: Brainiac]
    #8262252 - 04/09/08 10:20 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

dude, this is definitely intriguing. hell, i think i'll run by the teet later on tonight and pick up a couple gallons of decent cider and some yeast to do this. but let me make sure i have everything straight regarding the adding of sugar.

you said each cup ups the alc content 4-8%, so for a strong 20% brew, you add a total of roughly 1.5 cups to each gallon, correct? and you add approximately 1/2 teaspoon each time the condom deflates, right? but there are 48 teaspoons in a cup, so you add a total of like 150 1/2 teaspoons of sugar??? about how long does it take the condom to deflate between each addition of sugar?

and how does the 20%+ brew taste? does it taste ridiculously strong, or is it palatable?


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Invisibletiny_rabid_birds
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: tiny_rabid_birds]
    #8262267 - 04/09/08 10:24 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

also, what is your method for keeping the bottle covered and clear of contaminates during the very slow addition of sugar?


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OfflineCptnGarden
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: tiny_rabid_birds]
    #8262418 - 04/09/08 11:02 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

everytime u need to add sugar, add 1/2 teaspoon first, as the first addition everytime will cause it to nearly overflow.
the condom nipple drops because theres not enough C02 in the container to "keep it up" (:lol:), theres a lack of C02 cause theres not enough sugar for each little yeast guy - they are starving, so when the first addition of sugar after that time arrives, yeast will jump on it like crazy, and thousands of yeasts will break up the sugar nearly instantly, causing a shitload of bubbles due to rapid fermentation.

like i said i once added a tablespoon and it overflowed like a volcano experiment for school.

wait for the bubbles to subside from the 1/2 tsp, and then add some more a little at a time.
once it stops "reacting", pour in a few more tablespoons worth and then stop adding sugar.

I just pop the condom off by prying the ring of it off with a pen, add the sugar as quickly as i can, having to wait for the bubbles and all.

I've yet to have a contaminated batch!

and the taste is tolerable, though depending on the yeast it may come out very dry and hard tasting.
Premier Cuvee(and many other yeasts for red wine) preserves a lot of the fruity-flavors that the apples hold, and therefore is a lot better than say Pasteur Champagne, which makes your cider come out like a dry white wine.

the alcohol taste is hidden with Premier Cuvee, as far as i can tell.
The first time i made this i drank away at it cause it didnt taste too strong and i wanted to get drunk, i dont even know what happened that night :confused:
ever have one of those mornings where u wake up on the living room floor naked not knowing how you got there?

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InvisibleStein
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8262421 - 04/09/08 11:03 PM (15 years, 11 months ago)

Finally I have a reason to go buy rubbers!:) :sad:

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Invisibletiny_rabid_birds
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: CptnGarden]
    #8262896 - 04/10/08 01:39 AM (15 years, 11 months ago)

ohhh, okay, so the sugar all goes in at the same time, just in small increments to prevent overspill. gotcha. well i picked up a gallon jug of relatively cheap apple juice. now i just need to find some premier cuvee yeast.


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OfflineCptnGarden
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Re: How-To make 20%+ Apple Cider!!! [Re: tiny_rabid_birds]
    #8263752 - 04/10/08 09:43 AM (15 years, 11 months ago)

many places online sell them
theres also many brew stores all over the place

http://homebrewheaven.com/premier-cuvee-wine-yeast.htm
heres a good link with descriptions and alcohol tolerance of a lot of yeasts.
they also sell PC for .85cents a pack.

if u search the net good u can find it for around .50cents too.

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