Somber day

[primerib]

Well, it’s a difficult day folks. It’s the day that I have to own up to my arrogance and naivety.

Today I had to dump the rest of my sweetened, carbonated and bottle pasteurized experimental berry cider from last winter that I never really cared for anyway. Something went wrong, sanitation, pasteurization temperatures, something.

I thought they were shelf stable. We’d been slowly drinking them, one or two each weekend, because they weren’t all that good, for months. The weather has warmed up recently and we noticed the other day that they’ve become gushers. Terrible. I knew what had to be done. I put on my “safety” sunglasses and grill gloves at midnight tonight and popped the top on the last 18 bottles. The explosive force behind some of the caps was ridiculous. I’m glad nobody got hurt. Live and learn. Until I get kegging ability someday, it looks like I’ll be drinking things still or unsweetened and carbed.

 

[primerib]

The scene was terrible. Like those prohibition videos of federal agents draining casks of liquor.

But where there is death, there is also new life.

 

[Blacksmith1]

I've been thinking of bottle carbing my latest cider. Stories like this are the reason I haven't tried yet.

 

[primerib]

I’m definitely a sucker for sweet and fizzy things and I really thought I was beating the system when I thought I had this stovetop pasteurization process down.

That said, on this forum there are many many anecdotal examples of this method working well for people. Obviously something went wrong in my process somewhere. I guess my take home lesson is that it’s important to understand that there are some inherent risks with it and it isn’t foolproof.

 

[GeneDaniels1963]

I bottle carb in swing top bottles. works great... as long as you use heavy bottles. I have had 3 burst under 3.5 atmospheres of carb. Thank God no one was around for any of them, so no one was hurt. But I learned my lesson. I only use new purchased, heavy, swing-tops for my bottle carb. Anything else is too great of risk.