Hi everyone, I'm new here.
I am trying to start a small cola bottling operation and I am planning on bottling in glass bottles using a post-mix system. I am basically building a tiny factory capable of producing about 3000 bottles of cola a day. I am still months away from production and I have some questions I would like to ask mostly about preservation.
The ingredients will basically be water, cane sugar, GRAS essential oils for flavor, citric acid, and gum arabic. I understand most bottlers use sodium benzoate in small/safe quantities to preserve. Phosphoric acid also seems to be common for both tartness and preservation through acidity.
I am still testing my recipe and I am not sure whether I will be using phosphoric acid. I would really like to not use sodium benzoate. I'm reasonably sure there isn't some magical-mystery additive that is safer/more natural than sodium benzoate and/or phosphoric acid. I've heard that some people pasteurize their soda afterwards for sterilization and preservation, however, from my understanding pasteurization at adequate temperature is going to decrease the amount of carbonation in the bottle which would really suck for me, I want a fizzy drink. Plus pasteurization equipment is costly and all my other equipment is only coming to about $5000 total plus bottles!
Does anyone know of a natural way to preserve soda without pasteurization? And if not, what is the method for figuring out the absolute minimum amount of sodium benzoate to put in it - I really don't want to use sodium benzoate, but it seems like throwing a small amount in the batch just kind of solves the entire equation, unfortunately. Can I preserve soda with ONLY phosphoric acid? Boylan's Cane Sugar Soda doesn't list anything other than phosphoric acid and it tastes absolutely great, so if I can use only phosphoric acid I would work it into the recipe, but if they're also pasteurizing, nope.
(2) The other question I have is, part of my mini-factory work flow calls for a 200L (50 gallon) mixing vat for my syrup room. I don't need to boil the syrup like for 'mash', I just need to heat the water at "low heat" while I dissolve the sugar in it. Do you folks who have beer knowledge think that a 50 gallon brew kettle with a heating stick will be adequate for this? I'm thinking around 120'f is what would be considering low heat for mixing syrup.
Any help would be really appreciated.
I am trying to start a small cola bottling operation and I am planning on bottling in glass bottles using a post-mix system. I am basically building a tiny factory capable of producing about 3000 bottles of cola a day. I am still months away from production and I have some questions I would like to ask mostly about preservation.
The ingredients will basically be water, cane sugar, GRAS essential oils for flavor, citric acid, and gum arabic. I understand most bottlers use sodium benzoate in small/safe quantities to preserve. Phosphoric acid also seems to be common for both tartness and preservation through acidity.
I am still testing my recipe and I am not sure whether I will be using phosphoric acid. I would really like to not use sodium benzoate. I'm reasonably sure there isn't some magical-mystery additive that is safer/more natural than sodium benzoate and/or phosphoric acid. I've heard that some people pasteurize their soda afterwards for sterilization and preservation, however, from my understanding pasteurization at adequate temperature is going to decrease the amount of carbonation in the bottle which would really suck for me, I want a fizzy drink. Plus pasteurization equipment is costly and all my other equipment is only coming to about $5000 total plus bottles!
Does anyone know of a natural way to preserve soda without pasteurization? And if not, what is the method for figuring out the absolute minimum amount of sodium benzoate to put in it - I really don't want to use sodium benzoate, but it seems like throwing a small amount in the batch just kind of solves the entire equation, unfortunately. Can I preserve soda with ONLY phosphoric acid? Boylan's Cane Sugar Soda doesn't list anything other than phosphoric acid and it tastes absolutely great, so if I can use only phosphoric acid I would work it into the recipe, but if they're also pasteurizing, nope.
(2) The other question I have is, part of my mini-factory work flow calls for a 200L (50 gallon) mixing vat for my syrup room. I don't need to boil the syrup like for 'mash', I just need to heat the water at "low heat" while I dissolve the sugar in it. Do you folks who have beer knowledge think that a 50 gallon brew kettle with a heating stick will be adequate for this? I'm thinking around 120'f is what would be considering low heat for mixing syrup.
Any help would be really appreciated.