My new batch!

[Dend78]

Okay got tired of having an empty primary while waiting on my skeeter pee/dragons blood variation to finish

Plans are this

Apple Pie Wine (2 gal)

6 cans apple juice concentrate
2tsp pectic enzyme
2tsp yeast nutrient (added 1/2tsp at first slow down 1.085ish giving me 2 1/2tsp total)
2tsp energizer (added 1/2tsp at first slow down 1.085ish giving me 2 1/2tsp total)
7lbs of sugar (im going to go for rocket fuel here)
water top up to 2gal mark
Lavlin 1118 (i know this probably isnt the right yeast for this but its a test)

heated up water and juice added in yeast nutrient, and enzyme until it all disolved. with this configuration gravity should be somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.080ish depending on the juice and total water content, i over shot a little bit say 1-1.5L. I then added sugar to get to my desired level of 1.140.

once this ferments dry i plan to backsweeten with more juice concentrate, brown sugar, white sugar, and a few undecided spices for an apple pie flavoring.

my thought is if i see the yeast starting to slow down before my desired gravity of 1.000ish is reached i will toss in yeast energizer and possibly more nutrient. I also was thinking of stirring to introduce more O2 during primary, good idea/bad idea?

thoughts, comments, concerns, additional ideas, criticisim??



i will keep this updated with progress

 

[Ernest T Bass]

I used apple pie spice in some apple wine, a little bit of it goes a long way and it gets stronger the older it gets. Bench test.
Semper Fi
Bud

 

[winemaker_3352]

I used apple pie spice in some apple wine, a little bit of it goes a long way and it gets stronger the older it gets. Bench test.
Semper Fi
Bud

You are right - spices added to wine goes a long way. Especially cloves - do not use much at all.

I take a tea bag - empty it out - place my spice in it - tie with a string and dip it into the carboy - makes it easier to completely remove all spices..

 

[southlake333]

Ha, I just finished posting my Apple Pie Cider recipe in another thread. You have a basic apple wine going already so I'll focus on the backsweetening part. In order to get a good apple pie flavor (for 6 gallons of wine) use the following:

Cinnamon solution = 2 cups of water, 2 cups of light brown sugar, 2 tsp. ground cinnamon - heated until everything is fully dissolved.

Mix all of the cinnamon solution into wine in a bottling bucket. From there sweeten to taste using additional apple juice concentrate.

Obviously you'll want to cut that down since you've got 2 gallons. Cinnamon goes a long way so if anything, use less, not more.

 

[Dend78]

thanks for the quick responses, and idea's. i love the teabag idea thats great! would it be wiser to have the cinnamon in a tea bag to remove since it wont actually disolve? im not scared of floaters, (i grew up drinking well water ) but some people dont like to see things floating in their drinks, especially a wine

 

[winemaker_3352]

thanks for the quick responses, and idea's. i love the teabag idea thats great! would it be wiser to have the cinnamon in a tea bag to remove since it wont actually disolve? im not scared of floaters, (i grew up drinking well water ) but some people dont like to see things floating in their drinks, especially a wine

I use cinnamon sticks - not the powder...

 

[Dend78]

i was thinking about sticks as well still undecided there.

 

[Dend78]

well tested temp today, gravity and stirred it up, gave it a taste

temp around 70% and fermenting nicely

gravity here is where the weird part comes in my SG was 1.140, this morning i check it and wow 1.155 only thing i can think of is possibly the sugar since i didnt use warm water in a pan to heat it up it didnt all disolve, but im pretty sure there wanst any left in the bottom of the primary. my other thought on this the pectic enzyme broke out more of the sugar from the juice either way im kinda like

so i went from roughly 18% to 20%

foamed up nicely on the stir

tastes like super sweet apple juice

anyone have any thoughts on the gravity?

 

[winemaker_3352]

That is what it sounds like - the sugar added was not dissolved yet - over nite more of it dissolved raising your SG.

 

[Dend78]

That is what it sounds like - the sugar added was not dissolved yet - over nite more of it dissolved raising your SG.

oh well wont need to backsweeten so much

 

[Dend78]

8/23/12 Update
headed in the right direction now 1.130
added some yeast energizer to the mix to help out


8/24/12 Update
opened it up checked 1.119+
put the stir to it everything is moving along great, again going for dry here


8/26/12 update
checked it out shes still going like a beast, 1.102 this morning down from the high end of 1.155 im guessing by mid week it will be done and ready to move into secondary, which means....empty primary!!!!!! WOOT WOOT


8/27/12 update
going like a champ 1.092 this morning, one thing i have noticed this batch has a lot more CO2 much more spinning of the hydrometer to get it to set in, at this rate this should be done once it gets to around 1.015+ so at that rate 8 more days probably 9 to be safe, which would toss out my above guess of mid week, but it could suprise me and make a jump, i hope so, i need more blueberry wine stat!!


8/28/12 update
hit a little slow down today 1.085 tossed in a 1/2tsp energizer and 1/2tsp yeast nutrient to help it along the yeast has been working hard but im still not quite where i want to be to transfer to secondary.

 

[snowgirl812001]

I am also doing the apple pie. I wonder if I should add some energizer? Yeast has been in for 24hrs and not much bubbling going on. Starting SG of 1.090, and today it is 1.120. Normal? Or is something wrong??

 

[Dend78]

i would say give it another 24hrs it sounds like you have the same issue i had with the sugar not being fully disolved and causing the SG to jump faster than the yeast could take it up.

a shot of energizer might not hurt due to the higer SG now. i added more last night because im shooting for dry which according to lavlin is 18% for the EC-1118 so im going to push that limit then back sweeten. which my guess puts me at 1.020ish roughly.

 

[snowgirl812001]

Thank you

 

[Dend78]

your welcome hope that helps, keep me posted we can compare notes at the end

 

[snowgirl812001]

Will do! This is my very first batch, so I'm sure I'll have more questions haha.

 

[Dend78]

what is your recipe if you dont mind sharing?

 

[snowgirl812001]

I am using Southlake333's recipe...

Apple Pie Cider

15 Cans of Apple Juice concentrate
Sugar to an SG of 1.080 (didn't measure but it was over 4lbs)
3 tsp Pectic Enzyme
3 tsp Yeast Energizer
6 tablets Campden - crushed up.
1 packet Red Star Pasteur Champaigne Yeast
Water to 6 gallons

Mix all ingredients (including Campden) and let sit a day.
Pitch yeast and ferment in primary until 1.020 then rack to secondary.
Ferment dry, then rack onto campden and sorbate. Mix in sparkolloid solution for clearing. (follow qty directions on packages of all of these).
Once clear, rack to bottling bucket prepare the cinnamon solution by heating all ingredients until nothing is left suspended.

Cinnamon solution = 2 cups of water, 2 cups of light brown sugar, 2 tsp. ground cinnamon

Mix all of the cinnamon solution into bottling bucket. From there sweeten to taste using additional apple juice concentrate.
The result will taste like a liquid apple pie.

 

[Dend78]

should be a winner just yours will end up either a touch dryer in need of some back sweetening or a touch sweeter depending on when you stop it or the yeast just cant take it anymore.

i would for sure toss in the engergizer especially if you go for dry thats a pretty good haul for the yeast from the 1.120 to reach 1.020 im not sure on the Red Star yeast as to what it can take before it chokes itself out.

i to plan to use something close to southlakes cinnamon solution im gonna have to cut it down for my 3gal batch, and i thought i would need white sugar as well but being as it is i should still have plenty of sugar left after my yeast kills itself off. i will post up exactly what i do when i get to that point

 

[southlake333]

I am also doing the apple pie. I wonder if I should add some energizer? Yeast has been in for 24hrs and not much bubbling going on. Starting SG of 1.090, and today it is 1.120. Normal? Or is something wrong??

It could be that the yeast got going already. Right when active fermentation starts, its hard to get an accurate SG reading. So it could just be that your SG reading is off now. Try it again in another day. If its still over 1.1 then maybe you added too much sugar that was sitting on the bottom when you first measured.