Yeah! I love this tree...three or four trees grafted together, so I always have a variety of different apples in different colors, sizes, and flavors. Thanks for the kind words! 😁
Hey, thanks! No, I didn't core the crabapples. Would have taken forever, and I was thirsty. 🤣 I do core regular apples for other ciders, though, as it's not so many apples to deal with. I don't think there's much of a safety issue or anything. It likely extracts a bit of bitterness or tannin or something, but I'm looking for that in a crabapple cider, anyway. Hope that helps. Thanks for the question!
Hey, there! This came in at 4.4% ABV, which is perfect for my purposes. Don't get me wrong, the last cider I made, at 6.8%, was super delicious...but dangerous! Diluting this with water helped with that, and I'm glad that I incorporated the very flavorful crabapples. That helped retain a lot of flavor and character, even with the water addition. I have yet to try a straight apple juice cider with a water dilution, so I don't know how muted the apple character would be. I think I'd be tempted to add some strong fruit (maybe raspberries, blackberries, or something like that - either fruit or juice) to a straight apple version, if I was going to add water. Looks like it's time for another experiment! Thanks for the question. I'll update the video description with that alcohol percentage. 🍻
@@ThisDadGoesTo11 I've been doing a few straight apple juice ciders with fruit recently, specifically strawberries and blueberries (3 pounds of frozen fruit per carboy) and even adding in some lemon hops along with using the same Mangrove Jack's yeast. The strawberry came out very nice with an excellent flavor. The blueberry I have in my kegerator now - it looks wonderful and tastes decent but it did get a few off flavors that I think came from fermenting it mid-summer and my basement isn't as cool as I would like it. Perhaps I'll try another batch once we move into the fall. You are right about the alcohol percentage - straight apple juice is about 1.050 and not even accounting for the sugars from the fruit, the final product does pack a punch. I might bring that starting gravity down for the next batch for a 4 to 5% ABV range. Enjoy the channel - a lot of the stuff you do is what I do as well and picked up a few good tips and ideas
Those are the largest crab apples I've ever seen. Enjoying your videos immensely.
Yeah! I love this tree...three or four trees grafted together, so I always have a variety of different apples in different colors, sizes, and flavors. Thanks for the kind words! 😁
Hi! Nice set up! looks like it was really good. Quick question, did you core the apples when juicing to remove the seeds or just leave them in?
Hey, thanks! No, I didn't core the crabapples. Would have taken forever, and I was thirsty. 🤣 I do core regular apples for other ciders, though, as it's not so many apples to deal with. I don't think there's much of a safety issue or anything. It likely extracts a bit of bitterness or tannin or something, but I'm looking for that in a crabapple cider, anyway. Hope that helps. Thanks for the question!
Hi. I was wondering what alcohol percentage for the final cider. Cheers from OZ mate.
Hey, there! This came in at 4.4% ABV, which is perfect for my purposes. Don't get me wrong, the last cider I made, at 6.8%, was super delicious...but dangerous! Diluting this with water helped with that, and I'm glad that I incorporated the very flavorful crabapples. That helped retain a lot of flavor and character, even with the water addition. I have yet to try a straight apple juice cider with a water dilution, so I don't know how muted the apple character would be. I think I'd be tempted to add some strong fruit (maybe raspberries, blackberries, or something like that - either fruit or juice) to a straight apple version, if I was going to add water. Looks like it's time for another experiment! Thanks for the question. I'll update the video description with that alcohol percentage. 🍻
@@ThisDadGoesTo11 I've been doing a few straight apple juice ciders with fruit recently, specifically strawberries and blueberries (3 pounds of frozen fruit per carboy) and even adding in some lemon hops along with using the same Mangrove Jack's yeast. The strawberry came out very nice with an excellent flavor. The blueberry I have in my kegerator now - it looks wonderful and tastes decent but it did get a few off flavors that I think came from fermenting it mid-summer and my basement isn't as cool as I would like it. Perhaps I'll try another batch once we move into the fall. You are right about the alcohol percentage - straight apple juice is about 1.050 and not even accounting for the sugars from the fruit, the final product does pack a punch. I might bring that starting gravity down for the next batch for a 4 to 5% ABV range. Enjoy the channel - a lot of the stuff you do is what I do as well and picked up a few good tips and ideas