Early kegging?

[Duane]

My apple cider is about 10 days through primary. Now I'm getting impatient. How terrible would it be for me to keg early? I plan to back sweeten anyway so my concern is NOT with its current gravity. My ONLY concern with kegging early is giving the yeast inadequate time to clean up off flavors. Should I be worried about this? I'm using US-05.

Thanks!


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[Yooper]

"Clean up off flavors"? Aside from a yeasty taste, I can't imagine what off flavors you'd have in there.

If you keep the keg cold, the suspended solids will fall out and the yeasty flavor will fade.

 

[BigFloyd]

If you pitched and fermented it at a good temp (65*F is good for US-05), you ought to be fine at 10 days on a normal gravity cider. Some folks will halt it short of fermenting all the way out by crashing it when it hits 1.010 or so (to preserve the apple flavor and manage the ABV).

Crash it before racking to the keg. I let my last cider sit a week at 35*F before moving it out if the primary, hitting it with potassium sorbate and back-sweetening. It was nice and clear.

 

[citywok]

I've done 3x 5 gallon batches starting with tree top apple juice and US-A05, letting them go for 3 weeks. The first one I did was in the spring and it probably went from 65 to 70f daily (brewed in a closet). The last 2 I did this winter so it was a constant 65f (digital space heater in a closet),

At 3 weeks each time I've transferred to a keg and tossed it in the kegerator, taking about a week to fully carb (just setting it to 8psi and forgetting about it).

We've had pretty good results each time, and it improves significantly between months 1 and 3, the first btach was probably the best but about the time it got great it also got gone. The 2nd is currently about half gone having been in the kegerator for about 2 months, and the 3rd was transferred to the keg a week ago and is aging, I just took a sip and it's probably the most flavorful batch yet. We prefer dryer ciders and that's what we've been ending up wth.

P.S. the true 2nd batch was done with Nottingham Ale Yeast #235, and was brewed in summer so probably went from 70 to 75f daily, and it came out like paint thinner. I back sweetened it and let it age for 6 months and it improved but was still pretty bad so I poured it out.