Last year after cider fest we had some issues with our (attempted) hard cider turning green. One possible cause of this, according to our cider book is that the malic acid in the fresh juice can leach iron out of the cast iron crushing components which can turn green if oxidized. So this year when we started the cider pressing, I pulled six gallons of cider off the little press before we ever got the cast iron press up and running.
I put it in the basement which is sitting at exactly 60 degrees (little on the cold side) and added campden crush to kill any yeasts, molds or bacteria in the juice.
Left it over the day on Sunday, and then on Monday the 13th checked temp, and specific gravity.
Sitting exactly at 60 degrees F. A little on the colder end of the range for primary fermentation.
Initial specific gravity 1.052.
Added EC-1118 yeast.
Did not stir it in. Maybe I should have just for some initial aeration.
Then capped it without an airlock for primary fermentation.
The next day we had some good yeasty froth on the top.
A week later, on the 19th, most of that froth was gone. I wiped away the residue on the sides of the bucket, and rechecked SG.
Initially it collected a bunch of foam and bubbles stuck to the sides which made it float high, but when I took it out and cleaned it, it dropped a bit lower.
I would call that 1.023.
Then capped with an airlock. I need to check that specific gravity again today or tomorrow. The fermentation didn’t look very vigorous, which could be due to a number of things. For one thing, the basement may be a little too cold although EC-1118 should be active anywhere between 50 and 86 degrees. It could be there is not enough yeast nutrient in there. Apple juice un-doctored may not have enough nitrogen to help the yeast process the sugar. Also, I may not have used enough campden crush (the usual dose is 1 tablet per gallon) so some wild yeast may have been helping out, and created an inhospitable atmosphere for the champagne yeast.
So if I don’t see any change in SG tomorrow, I will need to add some nutrients, warm up the cider a bit, and maybe give it a gentle stir.
