Recent content by Bigsky406

Just got home after a few days on the road in my cider smells AWESOME. The safale S-04 is really a nice yeast and I don't mind having it fermenting away in my home office the least. Anyway, my primary is a brew bucket. Lots of great fermentation going. Airlock bubbles up ever five seconds...

I build my press out of 2x4s, 2x6s, an old metal end-table frame and I just use a screw jack to to press a pomace "cheese" (greenhouse shade cloth) between a hardwood board and rack. I get a nice dry pomace, fantastic juice and it's super easy to build and cost effective. I collect the juice an...

Yooper, you earned it with all the good Karma you generated here by giving us Noobs such good advice. Congrats! On a similar note, today I got about 10 bushels of beautiful Macintosh and two other varieties I can't remember for... wait for it.... FREE!!!! I happened to be passing near an...

Is this thick mat of krausen OK? I only recently switched from using a glass carboy as my primary to using the brew bucket. In the carboy it usually clings to the side of the fermenter and then stays there when I siphon into the secondary. Should I skim this off the top of the brew so it...

The one and only time I tried this the first bottle I put in the pot exploded. Luckily the heavy aluminum lid was on. Is there another way to do this that's safer? Bring the temperature up slowly or something? It was probably over-carbed too, but my test bottle didn't indicate that.

This thread made me laugh. I was up till 3 a.m. mountain time on Wednesday pressing one batch of juice and bottling a finished batch of cider. All the tubes and buckets and flasks and bottles reminded me of the early seasons of Breaking Bad. And while I like the ease and convenience of using a...

I thought the article was rather lame myself. Curious about some of the recipes tho. I was also intrigued at the idea of hopping a cider. I find this message board to be way more useful that most of the stuff I've read in magazines and such.

What kind of spices did you add and in what quantities? curious how this turns out.

I'm about to pitch Safale S-04 in 6 gallons of juice. I added the capden tablets and pectic enzyme about 36 hours ago. I'm thinking about adding a combination of Turbinado sugar, Morena sugar AND two different types of honey. Is there any downside to mixing the fermentables like that? I...

I did try the pasteurizing process from the sticky with my last batch. Thankfully I did it in a heavy aluminum pressure canner with a loose fitting lid because my fear came true and the bottle exploded into a million shards of glass. Thankfully it was mostly contained to the pressure canner, but...

Hi Yooper, Thanks for the info. So... given that I already added the Capden to the juice, what do you recommend? I'm fine with carbonation I guess, so if the fermentation starts back up after I throw a can of apple juice concentrate in there its not the end of the world for me, but do I risk...

I've got about 4.5 gallons of cider fremented with Safale S-04 to about 8.75%ABV. It's a nice stiff brew! I want to backsweeten it a bit. I'm going the still cider route for this batch because I want to focus on a good flavor rather than a carbonated beverage. Anyway, I tossed five crushed...

With juicy apples it's no problem. When the apples are drier I have to remove that white extension or it can clog. I just run a little water or juice down the "drain" and it gets going. It can overheat if you're not careful, but mine has an automatic shutoff. Once it cools you can run it again...

No. Bucket isn't a part of the setup. Like I said, not a great picture. He's a picture of my buddy Bob helping me press last Aug. this shows it in action a little better.

I should probably show a picture of this setup in action because these pictures really don't do it justice. It's a very rudimentary setup and nowhere near as fancy as the ones in this post, but I can press about 12 gallons of juice in about two hours with it. It's very efficient and, in my...