It's that time again. It's time for another 'Adventures in Homebrewing'. On Tuesday (2006.2.21), I started another delicious homebrew attempt. This time, hard apple cider. I decided to use the 'Sunset Cider' recipe taken from "The Homebrewer's Recipe Guide". The recipe is as follows:
* 5 Gallons Fresh apple cider (with no preservatives).
* 2 Pounds Light Brown Sugar
* 1 Pound Clover Honey
* 1 Pount Buckwheat Honey
* 1 or 2 packets Champagne yeast.
* (for bottling) 1/2 Pound Lactose
* (for bottling) 3/4 Cup Corn Sugar (priming sugar)

Now, it's no fun just following directions. So, here is what I actually ended up using.
* 5 Gallons Safeway brand Apple juice from (2 gallons that 'expired' on Dec 28th or so, and 3 gallons that expire in mid march)
* 2 Pounds 'Golden' Brown sugar
* 2 Pounds Clover Honey
* 1 tube of liquid champagne yeast cultures (specifically for a 5 gallon batch)
* 3 cinnamon sticks
* 3 whole cloves
I have not yet aquired the priming sugar and lactose

Why the changes? Well, first, I couldn't find *fresh* apple cider anywhere, and I had intended to make a small batch of hard cider back in December, but never got around to it. As for the honey? I still had plenty from when I made the mead, so instead of spending yet more money, I substituted. And I'm not sure how far off I was from 2 lbs, I was close. As for the inclusion of cinnamon and cloves? Well, it did interesting things to the mead, and cider is usually spiced a little bit, so I figured, why not, it should turn out well.

Now, the fun part. I, in my infinite wisdom, thought a 5 gallon carboy would be big enough to hold 5 gallons of apple cide, 2 lbs of honey and 2lbs of brown sugar. Oops...
As the recipe says, I Placed 4 gallons in the fermenter (my carboy for this), and took the last gallon, and put it on the stove and stirred in the honey and brown sugar. Here is where my mistakes were made.

Mistake 1:
A 16qt (or is at 12qt, I'm not sure), really isn't adaquet for brewing even a gallon of wort (I'm not sure that's the proper term in this situation, but it should work for reference).
Mistake 2:
5 gallons of apple juice + 4 lbs of other stuff > a 5 gallon carboy. I only got half to 3/4th of the honey/sugar/juice mixture in with the other 4 gallons.
Mistake 3:
This expands on Mistake 2. Since the 5 gallons really filled up the carboy, there is next to no room at the top. Where will the primary fermentation waste go? Into the airlock. I ended up creating a new airlock using the airlock base, the racking cane, some acrylic/plastic tubing and a bucket of water. It looks neat! But, next time, 6 gallon carboy would make more sense.

And that about sums it up. It's been fun, and will be interesting to see how it turns out without the transfer for secondary fermentation. I did do this semi-purposefully and semi-not-thinking-firstly. I'm curious to see how this will turn out; whether it'll be nice and clear like the mead, or perhaps slightly cloudy like a good hefewiezen. Time will tell. I'll keep you all posted on details, and will try to get some pictures taken. I unfortunetely didn't have a camera available when it began, but will hopefully be able to procure one soon.

--nullpuppy(out)