Carbonate Wine / Apfelwein ( Do? / How To? )

[egiblock]

so after reading some of the other messages on here, i think i might dive into making the Apfelwein, just a 3 gallon trial.

1) should I carbonate it when I bottle?

1a) if yes, how do I? i've never done that before

1b) if yes, screw top bottles, growlers, or what for bottling ?

2) is it ok not carbonated?

 

[Yooper]

Sure, you can if you want. I don't like cider carbonated, but many others do.

Just add 1 ounce, by weight, of corn sugar for each gallon of finished cider to a little water and boil to dissolve. Add that to a sanitized bottling bucket, rack the cider into that, and bottle. Use beer bottles with caps, or soda bottles that seal well with plastic caps.

Do NOT use growlers or wine bottles as they won't hold the pressure!

 

[egiblock]

Sure, you can if you want. I don't like cider carbonated, but many others do.

Just add 1 ounce, by weight, of corn sugar for each gallon of finished cider to a little water and boil to dissolve. Add that to a sanitized bottling bucket, rack the cider into that, and bottle. Use beer bottles with caps, or soda bottles that seal well with plastic caps.

Do NOT use growlers or wine bottles as they won't hold the pressure!

if i don't have a bottling bucket, could i just rack and fill the bottles like i normally do with my bottle filler hose ?? or will this new corn sugar mess up the flow and a bottle bucket easier ?

 

[Yooper]

if i don't have a bottling bucket, could i just rack and fill the bottles like i normally do with my bottle filler hose ?? or will this new corn sugar mess up the flow and a bottle bucket easier ?

How do you normally bottle? You really need a bottling bucket to mix it, as you don't want to add the priming sugar to the fermenter and stir it up, as you'd resuspend all of the sediment.

 

[egiblock]

How do you normally bottle? You really need a bottling bucket to mix it, as you don't want to add the priming sugar to the fermenter and stir it up, as you'd resuspend all of the sediment.

Just wine in the past. Here was tonight..

View attachment 1419211733311.jpg

 

[Yooper]

Oh, you don't use a bottling bucket at all. But it would help- look at all the sediment in the carboy.

I'd highly recommend a bottling bucket, not just for the cider bottling, but for the wine as well.

 

[egiblock]

It has a tip on it just for filling the bottles. Real easy to use and just go bottle to bottle. Ill have to look into the bottling bucket though.. thx

 

[RegarRenill]

Go to Lowe's/Home Depot and invest in one of their 5 gal buckets...make a fairly good an cheap alternative(like $4-5), to the buckets from the LHBS, as long as you don't do larger than 5 gal batches...$20 for the 10-12 gal Brute is your next size up, a very good investment if you want to do any 5-6 gal fruit wines. You can still use your racking cane and bottling wand if you don't want to buy and install a spigot on the bucket(less than $2 from online retailers or most LHBS). But racking off of the sediment before bottling is definitely a good idea.

 

[indy]

Go to thebakery at walmart, they will give you empty frosting buckets for free including the lids.