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semi-sweet sparkling cyser?

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S

sacco

NewBee
Registered Member
Mar 8, 2012
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hello all,

my first post but i've been lurking and learning from this site for a while.

i've made a handful of beers and a couple meads now and am starting my first cyser.

this is what i started with:

6 gallons cider (no preserve, UV pasteurized)
12 pounds wild flower honey
5 cinnamon sticks
3t pectin enzyme
1/2 t tannin
1 1/2 t acid blend
1 Tbs nutrient
2 packs of Nottingham ale yeast

my OG was 1.110

cellar is 65*F.

I was thinking a month or two primary, a few months secondary or more, no hurry. I would like the notty yeast to max out at about 10% which i think should leave me with a FG of ~1.03. then bottle with 4 oz of dextrose in 22 oz. beer bottles.

now i'm having some second thoughts. i was hoping for semi-sweet with 2 pounds per gallon but that OG seems pretty high to me. is this going to finish dessert sweet with only the ale yeast?

will the ale yeast have anything left to carb?

why is it so easy to bottle condition beers fairly consistently but so difficult with meads? i understand that honey has more variables but in this case i plan to add the dextrose to carb it.

i thought i was starting to understand the basics of the whole process until i started trying to make this one. now i think i have more questions than my first batch.

MUCH THANKS in advance!
 
Well if the alcohol tolerance tops out at 10% it will not be able to carb but don't count on it being so predictable.
When fermenting barley worts there are sugars present that the yeast can't metabolize (thus the balence of bittering hops) so some residual sugars are always presant and we keep our SG's low enough to allow for the yeast still having enough alcohol headroom to consume the priming sugar, easy bottle conditioning.
When fermenting honey musts however, all the sugars present are fermentable so
A. your alcohol results will likely be higher than one might expect
B unless you start off with a lower gravity you will possibly hit your tolerance and have no headroom left to bottle condition
You may get that FG lower than 1.03 though, sounds like you have a potential of around 13 to 14%? Not sure what your yeast will do if well cared for.
 
Ok that makes sense. Thanks. Does apple cider have much indigestible sugars like barley malt or are they mostly yeast food? Do you think with my og and only ale yeast this is going to finish cloying sweet?
 
Apple sugars are basically entirely fermentable. There might be some small amount that aren't, but you won't see it show up very well on your SG readings.

I'd bet your yeast will take you to at least 12%. Yeast love apples. You might even see it go dry.
 
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