Recent content by gentlemansavage

I got an aerating drill bit from my buddy last night and set to sanitizing things before giving the carboy a whirl today. I drew out a sample for gravity testing and guess what - dry as a bone. Gravity of 1.000. So somehow this batch totally fermented without showing any action in the airlock...

To be clear, it has been over a month since my initial pitching of the yeast. A buddy of mine has one of those long drill bits with aerating blades on it that I'll borrow to introduce some oxygen into the juice. If that doesn't start it up I'll throw in some yeast nutrient. If *that* doesn't...

What constitutes "thoroughly?" At most I swirled the giant, heavy carboy a bit.

I haven't put the carboy in my ferm chamber yet - I've just left it at ambient basement temperature, about 66F, until it gets going. I purposely did not treat the juice with anything like campden tabs because I wanted a natural fermentation. Didn't add yeast nutrient either as I've read that it...

I am new to cider-making, having just started this past fall, and I have a problem with a recent batch. My limited experience in the field has proven inadequate to the task. In late October I purchased five gallons of unpasteurized cider from a local orchard that pressed it themselves. I knew...

Looks like I have some trial and error in my future. Looking forward to it! Just want to say thanks a million for taking the time to answer questions like these for *years* in this thread. Cheers to you.

Thread necro, but BigJoe, if you're still around these forums, how did your experiment turn out?

Thanks for the quick response, Kevin! I'll give the search function a workout soon. One further question. Cold crashing has been an integral part of almost all your experiments. If I choose to ferment at 50F, say, is cold crashing still warranted? Or could I simply rack off to a new carboy at...

This thread might be the most useful source of information on fermenting hard cider anywhere. Thank you for all the work, CvilleKevin and others. I'm only ~40 pages through and my head is spinning. I'm new here and to brewing generally, but I'm getting into cider because I love it and I'm...