Homebrewing Hard Cider

I made some using the ‘balloon’ method last year. Used barley malt, orange peel, and coriander seed. Came out a bit thick, but was pretty good stuff.

[quote]beebuddy wrote:
zephead4747 wrote:
My friends brother wanted to try this he’s doing

(for each gallon)

1 gallon store bought apple cider (or would juice be better)
1 pound of brown sugar
half a container of honey
1 pack activated yeast

left to sit for a few weeks. This shit won’t kill people will it? It’s supposed to be ready in like a week.

It sounds like a lot of sugar, but what do I know…

It’s basically what I’m doing.[/quote]

what is your recipe like?

[quote]jonesk wrote:
I made some using the ‘balloon’ method last year. Used barley malt, orange peel, and coriander seed. Came out a bit thick, but was pretty good stuff.[/quote]

Where’d you get the barley malt? I noticed DC doesn’t have a brewshop unless you ride out to the burbs.

I got mine at wholefoods, not sure if they still carry it as I haven’t looked for it since last year. I heard molasses also works well as something to ferment, but I haven’t tried it myself.

[quote]jonesk wrote:
I got mine at wholefoods, not sure if they still carry it as I haven’t looked for it since last year. I heard molasses also works well as something to ferment, but I haven’t tried it myself.[/quote]

Interesting, which one if you don’t mind me asking? I live near the Georgetown (actually Glover Park) WF and I haven’t ever seen it. I wonder why they would sell it because I thought only brewers used it.

I’m in Foggy Bottom and I went to the one closest to Dupont Circle. Apparently people use it as a sweetener and for baking stuff as well. It was in the section with baking goods and stuff like agave nectar and rice syrup

[quote]jonesk wrote:
I’m in Foggy Bottom and I went to the one closest to Dupont Circle. Apparently people use it as a sweetener and for baking stuff as well. It was in the section with baking goods and stuff like agave nectar and rice syrup [/quote]

Good to know. I work in Dupont so I’ll have to check it out. If I go out to the suburbs and get some hops I can have some proper beer!

Hi,
I used to be a pretty avid homebrewer (beer and a few ciders) Only extract rather than mash (too much work with mash).
I actually had a whole batch of cider burst it’s bottles (and they were thick fermentation bottles) on a hot day. The room they were stored in had thick shag-pile carpet. The room kept the sickly sweet smell of apples for well over a year.

If your after any recipes for mash or extract beers/ciders/meads/melomels, etc try these 2 sites

http://brewery.org/gambmug/

http://brewery.org/brewery/cm3/CatsMeow3.html

The materials used here seem pretty handy…

Training time out here.

How do we know we’re not going to brew something that makes us blind?

[quote]you should be OK :wink:
[/quote]

That’s re-assuring.

[quote]bushidobadboy wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Training time out here.

How do we know we’re not going to brew something that makes us blind?

Because fermentation yields only ethanol (I believe), whilst it is distillation that produces (some) methanol.

Since it is methyl alcohol that makes you blind, you should be OK :wink:

BBB[/quote]

Brewing creates very very very small amounts of methanol which is always present in beer etc… that you would get from the store.

You would know more BBB, but apparently the first few ounces that come out of a still are high in methanol because it’s lighter or something. So a good moonshiner will throw out the first little bit from their distilling process.

But brewing cider and beer is completely safe.

[quote]ShaunW wrote:
Hi,
I used to be a pretty avid homebrewer (beer and a few ciders) Only extract rather than mash (too much work with mash).
I actually had a whole batch of cider burst it’s bottles (and they were thick fermentation bottles) on a hot day. The room they were stored in had thick shag-pile carpet. The room kept the sickly sweet smell of apples for well over a year.

If your after any recipes for mash or extract beers/ciders/meads/melomels, etc try these 2 sites

http://brewery.org/gambmug/

http://brewery.org/brewery/cm3/CatsMeow3.html

[/quote]

Thanks man.

FUCKING FAIL! Shit is nasty. There wasn’t enough sugar and it somehow 5 days was too long! If I would have stopped it last night it may have been salvageable.

Next time I’m just going to do it right instead of ghetto style.

[quote]beebuddy wrote:
FUCKING FAIL! Shit is nasty. There wasn’t enough sugar and it somehow 5 days was too long! If I would have stopped it last night it may have been salvageable.

Next time I’m just going to do it right instead of ghetto style.[/quote]

You made “HT punch,” as they call it in the navy.

[quote]bushidobadboy wrote:
beebuddy wrote:
FUCKING FAIL! Shit is nasty. There wasn’t enough sugar and it somehow 5 days was too long! If I would have stopped it last night it may have been salvageable.

Next time I’m just going to do it right instead of ghetto style.

Are you sure that it wasn’t oxidation that turned the brew bitter, and not too little sugar as you surmise?

In the same way that wine will turn to vinegar in the presence of oxygen, so will your apple juice turn into something undrinkable.

What makes you say that 5 days was too long?

BBB[/quote]

Well, there was no source of new oxygen with the balloons properly sealed on the jugs. I’ve made good beer before and there was no less oxygen exposure during that process than there was with the hooch. If anything with the 6 gallon bucket of beer wort there was more initial oxygen exposure.

Also the closet smelled good for the first 3 or 4 days and then got started to smell bad on the fifth day. The main difference was that there was only the sugar in the apples for the hooch, whereas the beer was loaded with malts.

The hooch did smell of vinegar as you mentioned, so it’s possible that all three were just sealed poorly or something, but I doubt that. My guess is that there was too much yeast for that amount of sugar and the balance was off.