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Bottling!

Sun, 13 Jan 2008 20:22:03 -0600

Yesterday was The Day. After approximately three months, two carboys, and one impatient brewer, it was time to bottle the cider. I picked up the basic supplies last weekend from the local “Brew and Gro.”

• Bottles
• 6-gallon bucket with hole
• spigot for hole
• 4 feet plastic tubing
• bottling stick (has a special pressure valve)
• EZ-clean for sterilizing the bottles & equipment

I borrowed a racking cane from my friendly amateur brewer neighbor (who has already enjoyed his 10 gal. of cider, as have I - I owe him at least 10 pints of mine!), and then I was off. After cleaning everything, I first racked the cider into the 6-gallon bucket with the cane.

I did the bottling in the kitchen, so I lugged the ~4 gal. of cider upstairs and hooked up the tubing & bottling stick. From there, it was pretty simple, bottling stick in the bottle, wait till it fills, lift. New bottle, repeat.

I was able to fill about 16 1L bottles. I used the Grolsch-style bottles, so I didn’t have to invest in a bottler, and I’ll be able to more easily check the progress of the carbonation.

Oh, right - carbonation. Forgot about mentioning that. I took about 1/2c. + 5 Tbsp. of raw sugar (turbinado) with approx. 1 pint of water, heated and dumped in the bottom of the 6 gal. bucket before I racked the cider in, so it got mixed up good. The remaining yeast in suspension should gobble that up and carbonate the cider over the next 1-3 weeks. I’ll check in 1 week, I should notice some light carbonation by then.

In the meantime, it’ll be hard waiting!

Cider update

Thu, 25 Oct 2007 20:38:43 -0500

Heeding my amateur brewer neighbor’s advice today, I took a measurement with the hydrometer to measure the specific gravity of my fermenting cider. According to my neighbor, at this point, I should be at zero (even, or 1.000), indicating that the majority of the sugar had been processed (I think).

Well, its not (yet) - its reading at about 1.020. Still have a little ways to go, I believe. If my calculations are correct (caveat lector: I doubt it) I’m at about 4.2% ABV at the moment. Here’s what I used to figure that out:

• Started (OG) at 1.050, probably at ~70-75ºF (kitchen)
• Measured (FG) at 1.020, probably at nominal temperature (60ºF) (basement)
• Used Wikipedia’s handy formula

So, the waiting continues (and the hoping that it will be worth it!).

Locavore Potluck Picnic

Sun, 21 Oct 2007 13:18:37 -0500

Members of Denise’s Moms In Madison bookclub recently read Barbara Kingsolver’s latest book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. To wrap up the experience of reading Kingsolver’s experience with local food, Denise organized a local food potluck picnic, where the only entry requirement was that the dish would be made from mostly local foods.

Mother Nature was on our side yesterday for the picnic, and the weather was absolutely beautiful. Maybe that’s Karma ;-). The dishes were absolutely delicious, and we brought local apple cider and bread baked with local wheat as well.

We enjoyed meeting other area families that were interested in local foods, and the boys enjoyed playing with new kids, too!

Environment: Understanding Impact

Mon, 15 Oct 2007 18:37:31 -0500

October 15th is Blog Action Day for the Environment. For me, I won’t go into what things I’m doing or plan to do to reduce my impact. My goal and message today is simple: Understand. Through a variety of avenues and turns of events, society in general, particularly in the U.S., has become less and less aware, with each generation, of what’s actually going on.

Let’s take shopping for clothing as an example. What happens to deliver new clothing to the mall stores? What happens to keep the lights on at the mall? What happens to keep the mall clean, day after day? What happens to build the mall? What happens to waste when a new store opens at the mall? Where do the raw materials come from? How are the materials processed? What waste is generated? Where does it go? What materials is the mall itself made of? What will happen when a new mall is built? What’s the impact? (and is shopping Amazon.com any better?)

For me, it comes down to Impact. Over the past few years, little by little, I have been learning with my family and understanding more about impact. The impact of buying limes from Chile, salad greens from California, toys for my kids from China (never mind the lead), and wine from France. I can’t say I’ve reached the point where each bit of understanding has led to an actionable item. But understanding is building. The blinders have come off, and there’s a reservoir waiting to be filled, where previously there was none.

On this day of action, if you’re looking for an easy way to start, or an easy way to expand your eco-friendliness, try to Understand.

Note: Picture courtesy of howstuffworks.

Started!

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 20:45:59 -0500

Well, the cider is started! My neighbor dropped off an extra carboy for the cider, and I dutifully poured in the fresh-pressed cider as soon as I had a chance. Per the recipe, I left out about a pint per gallon of cider, so I started w/ 5 gallons, less 5 pints leaves about 4 gallons & 3 pints (8 pints to a gallon).

My neighbor also dropped off a hydrometer, to measure the relative sugar content of the cider. He recommended shooting for a reading of “50” on the hygrometer (which translates to something like 1.050, I think). Lo and behold, my specially blended cider came out to exactly 50. My apple pressing cohort, Jim, really knows his stuff!

It will take a few days for the yeast to get established. I am shooting for “spontaneous fermentation” - that is, using the yeast that’s already in the apples from the pressing. All told, it’ll take almost 6 months before this cider is enjoyed fully! I’m sure I’ll have a taste now and again, to make sure things are on track ;-).

The same neighbor who is loaning me the carboy told me of a local shop that recently brewed a one-month cider (using commercial yeast, not spontaneous fermentation). I might give that a shot sometime, to tide me over until my “wild fermentation” is ready!

I’ll post pictures of the carboy fermenting, when there’s something to see (right now, its a glass jug w/ dark cider in it, I’m sure you can imagine!).