4th batch : overdone it on Metabisulfite... Help!

[Melou]

Hi guys,

First off thank you all for your help in helping me make 3 good batches of hard cider since this past Christmas season. There's nothing you could have done better to help me avoid a total brain rhino fart this past Saturday. Second time I was playing with homemade juice... Here's the play by play:

1. Juiced 17kg of apples and ended up with 9L of juice (nice mix of granny smith, gala, yellow & red delicious - all tasted awesome).

2. Followed the equipment sanitization formula recipe on my metalbisulfite package, and ended up adding a nuclear 110g of MB to my must. Should have probably added around... 3g? The fact that the must almost instantly turned yellow should have gave me pause you say? Nope, not this newbie.

3. Waited 24 hours, topped off with 16L of pasteurized store bought old style cider, added my pectine enzyme, not yet realizing I was dealing with Chernobyl liquid waste. Also added 2 cups of raisins and 1 cup of dried apricots, thinking of awesome times to come.

4. Waited another 24 hours and actually tasted the stuff, not believing my usually bang on nose: tasted bad as you can image. Not phased just yet.

5. Pitched a good batch of S-04 that probably died upon entry. But I didn't know that until this morning...

6. Called my local shop who told me to splash the cider like there's no tomorrow, or just get rid of the stuff and start a new batch. Now there was a lot of elbow grease and brownie points spent doing all that on Saturday, so I'm not gonna call it quits just yet.

7. I have racked the hot liquid magma in two separate carboys and have been aggressively shaking the life out of it then letting it breathe for a few minutes. The smell is receding: no more instant nose bleeds.

I'm going to be doing just that over and over until Thursday night and then over pitch 3 packs of EC-1118, which i am told could probably brew in outer space.

Questions:

What are the odds of salvaging this stuff?
Should I use the H202 trick I have read around the forum? (At this point it's tough for me to know where I stand on the MB level.)
What about the raisins and apricots? Sell them off as glow in the dark fruits or reuse? I think they might have soaked up too much MB...

Thanks!

Melou

 

[gregbathurst]

Since you have gone to all the trouble of juicing the apples it would seem a waste not to try the h2o2 trick. Otherwise you should ditch it because it won't be saved any other way. Sulfite is fairly toxic in large doses, it pays to be very careful (or not use it at all if you are using healthy rehydrated yeast).I don't use it and don't get problems.

 

[Maylar]

Dunno man - seems like you made drain cleaner. I don't think I'd ever want to drink it. Sulfites do dissipate with time though and commercial yeasts are tolerant to a reasonable amount of it. See this article http://www.wired.com/2015/06/wine-sulfites-fine-heres-remove-anyway/

 

[bembel]

I'm sorry to say you have not a lot o choices other than to read up on sulfites addition from a source making cider not wine. Claude Jolicoeur's book has the best information available. You dose by PPM, between 50 and 100, based on PH. For 20 liters of juice, a 50 PPM dose is 2g of k-meta powder. Basically 1g/10l. You added 110g to a 26l batch. Which is appx. 42g/10l. So 43 times too much. Do NOT drink any of this unless you wish to get sick.

But look on the bright side it's not going to spoil ( it's also not going to ferment, ever, at that concentration)

Put it in an airtight container and use it very small amount at a time to top off the headspace in future batches. But calculate the total PPM doSE you will be adding to say, a 5 gallon carboy, if you top it off with 200 mL of that solution.

 

[Melou]

* Cue in Phil Collins' Against all odds *

After a week of splashing, TLC... and 710ml of well measured 3% hydrogen peroxide, it still killed 4 alive and kicking packs of EC-1118 !

Down the drain it went.

Thank you all for the replies!