Cider uPdate

Now we have 10 gallons of cider. The first 5.5 gallons were pasteurized and pitched with commercial Wyeast cider yeast, we call this the "beauty" batch. The second 4.5 gallons were unpasteurized and are using wild yeast as the fermentor, we call this the "beast" batch.

Today we racked the beauty into the secondary fermentor to get rid of lots of the apple solids and yeast poop. The gravity reading was at 0.996, which, compared with the OG of 1.056 is looking like 7% ABV, or thereabouts. Whoa! We threw some pectinase in to clear up the cider because the initial ferment had slowed to a crawl, but the cider was still very cloudy, so hopefully the pectinase breaks down all those long polysaccharide chains and produces more alcohol while clearing it up.

The beast took about 1.5 weeks longer to really start fermenting, it's bubbling along nicely now, but we have a while yet before we rack that off.

Cider Update

We're drinking some of the fresh apple juice now, and I decided to take a gravity reading so we have some idea of how the hard cider ends up, alcohol wise. The OG is 1.056. Not sure how heavier sediments might be contributing to the density of the juice...

The cider is bubbling away, all happy like.

Kayaking (b)Log

9/27 - SFA - The Gorge - 1500cfs - Went w/ Marion - good trip, turns out Marion is only happy when she's in the big waves. Saw Dan McL at the takeout/shuttle.

9/26 - No. Feather - Lobin - 800cfs - One day trip, drove up w/ Gabrielle, met Bill, Brian, Luke @ river - Definitely a step up, pretty awesome section of river, would definitely do it again!

9/20 - SFA - Chili Bar - 1650cfs - Went with Melody, Bill, Rafael, Gabrielle - Handpaddled, awesome, and surfed it up at First Threat.

9/19 - SFA - The Gorge - 1650cfs - Went with Marion - Started early (before water), but rode the bump through the gorge. Awesome run, both of us felt really confident with all the rapids/lines.

9/13 - Pacific Ocean - Albion Cove - 100000000cfs - Paddled with Melody and Will, Marion and Rafael in attendance - Kayaked with Chris and Rafael while they were Abalone diving, then spent an hour surfing some nice waves with Melody and Will

9/5 - 9/7 - Lower T - 1200cfs - Marion, Melody, Will, Rafael, Libby, Bill, Brian G, Luke - Last T release of the season, was super nice run, I got to do Clavey IV sneak twice, pretty much nailed it the first time in Diesel 75, got to see most of the rapid upside down in the Java. Video

Apple Cider

We have approximately 300lbs of golden delicious apples on our back porch in 8 boxes, a 20 gallon trash can, and an old pot. They are starting to get wormy, but we're going to get a few batches of juice out before they're all rotten.

Last night we ground up enough apples to fill a 5 gallon pot, it worked out to just under one box... my b.o.t.e. calculation says we've got about 40 gallons of potential juice. At the most, I think we'll be making 10 gallons, so if anyone actually reads this and wants some apples, let me know!

The juice was pasteurized (brought up to 160 degreesF) then cooled to 75 and some Wyeast Cider yeast pitched in. It was bubbling this morning. Sweet!

Einished d Beerz

Well, the stout is now bottled. FG = 1.016, so about 4.5% ABV in the finished product. It tastes pretty good, the bitter hops are pretty bitter and there isn't much aromatic, so I think maybe next time I'm going to either throw the aromatic hops in then start cooling immediately, or try dry-hopping. I don't mind the bitterness, just think having another stand-out characteristic would be nice. I think also, as it carbonates in the bottles, it will get a bit of character from the bubbles and become more balanced, will report in ~1 week...