Cider House select 'flavor enhancers': hopped citrus, review

[andrewmaixner]

(couldn't find any reviews of these -- found one old related thread that was DIY: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/dry-hopped-citrus-peels-blackcurrant.408045/ )

Cider House select has a (new?) line of 'flavor enhancers', really just herb infusion packs. I sampled the "hopped citrus slam" at NHC2017, and thought it was good: https://www.homebrewing.org/Cider-House-Select-Flavor-Enhancers-Hopped-Citrus-Slam_p_6823.html#

I bought a pack to try (as well as the oak-orange version for future use).

Using a basic 5% ABV from filtered-store-juice cider, fermented at 60F for 1 month with Mangrove jack Mead yeast + nutrient.

The pack contains a little bit of un-named pellet hops, a little dry lemon peel, and about 3 Cups volume of shredded dry lemongrass.
Instructions are to put the ingredients in a muslin bag (not included), boil in 2C water for 1 min then steep for 5 min, and then add it all into the secondary for 7-10 days.

2C water was not enough to even cover the ingredients in a small sauce pan, I needed to use 4C water -- 3C shredded lemongrass is a lot of volume!

The lemongrass pokes out of the muslin bag a lot, and I didn't want loose herbs in my cider, so I dumped it into a fine nylon mesh dry-hopping bag, added it all to a 5Gal keg, and racked my dry cider onto it.

I have an event coming up very soon, so, I plan to let it infuse in the keg for 5 days, then pull, chill, and force-carb in time to give me the option of back-sweetening / acid adjusting before serving.

I'll update with how it turns out.

 

[andrewmaixner]

So at 12 days, it's fairly good.
Infused the herbs infuse for 4 days, then pulled the mesh bag out and chilled/carbed.
After it was cold/carbed, I tested and ended up sweetening to taste with 2 12oz cans of apple juice concentrate (about 300 grams of sugar) in the 5gal bach.

The lemongrass is definitely the most present flavor/aroma -- holding back half of of the shredded lemongrass would probably be fine.

 

[andrewmaixner]

Update: After conditioning for a while, I decided that the lemongrass flavor was unbalanced and somewhat one-dimensional (Note that it may have been fine if I had used a properly acid-balanced and more tannic cider from a kit, instead of filtered store juice).

I use some ginger to balance it out, to good result.
After taste testing several balances, I added a 5oz bottle of "The Ginger People - Organic Ginger Juice" to the 4gal remaining, and ended up with a very well balanced lemongrass-ginger cider.
Several people who like lemon and ginger have said that it is quite good.