First taste of my brew

[dmrevis]

I cracked open a bottle of my first brew of cider today and it was better than i expected. However it was very dry, even after a whole tub of Splenda to back sweeten after the primart fermentation. This suprised me.
I opened a little bottle i'd chilled as a test bottle and as it was fine we opened one of the 2ltr coke bottles i'd also chilled. However as soon as i opened the large bottle all the sediment broke free and clouded the cider. Tasted fine but presentation in the glass was poor.
It didnt happen with the little bottle i'd opened. Any ideas?

 

[falafael]

i think its the bottles themselves, they do the same when they are full of coke, as soon as you open them, all the bubbles come up, personally i never use them, ya better of with a good pint glass bottle like magners!

 

[BrewStew]

According to http://www.fda.gov/ohrms/dockets/dockets/04p0294/04P-0294_EMC-000002-02.pdf

"SPLENDA® Granular product does contain fermentable carbohydrate (maltodextrin) per 0.5 g serving."


Sucralose is 600 times sweeter than sugar, but you can't go and tell someone to put 1/600th of a teaspoon in their tea or coffee, so they bulked it up with maltodextrins which are fermentable.

the Sucralose is unlikely to have been fermented though (at least i hope not! cos from what i've read elsewhere, you could end up with a Hydrocarbon as a result if that source is accurate), but as that makes up such a tiny portion of Splenda i'd be surprised if you can taste the effects.

so that's probably why it's dry.... cos it was fermented!

 

[dmrevis]

As i understood from what i've read Splenda (well i used Tesco's own version for 1/2 the price) was the thing to use to re-sweeten after fermenting. Its not horrible but i just prefer sweeter cider. I'll have to find some better way of sweetening before bottling in future

 

[BrewStew]

hmmm yeah i've read it alot too but never 100% believed it so looked into it.

you can add sugar shortly prior to drinking it to sweeten it up, or even better, mix a little apple juice in with it to get an apply nose and flavour as an alternative. unfortunately both of those are likely to get fermented if left for too long though.

 

[tubby_shaw]

Err, sorry to disagree with any one but,
the maltodextrin in splenda or generic sucralose shouldn't ferment with regular brewing yeasts, if it was we wouldn't get balanced beers.
The dextrins that give us residual sweetness and body in our beers are dextrins produced from malt or maltodextrins.
Beer enhancers such as the ones featured Here have maltodextrin in the formulation for that reason :thumb:
Maltodextrin is fermentable by some yeasts and bacteria but if these "Aliens" ferment your brew you will know by the look and smell of the brew :sick:
All of the above is a bit of an over simplification but basically if you want to use sucralose as a sweetener and don't mind the taste go ahead :thumb:
I have personally used it in ciders to sweeten along with priming sugars on many occasions without problem

 

[BrewStew]

fair enough... i stand corrected :thumb:

i'm curious to know how his cider came out dry though if it's not fermentable :hmm:

 

[tubby_shaw]

Peoples personal tastes
I think that commercial ciders like Tesco, strongbow, old english etc which are described as medium/dry are bloody sweet and woodpecker etc which are decribed as sweet taste like syrup :sick:

 

[dmrevis]

So maybe i simply didnt use enough Splenda?

 

[tubby_shaw]

So maybe i simply didnt use enough Splenda?

It may well be as simple as that, yes :thumb:
If you have some of the cider left try adding a little more splenda to a pint until you get the sweetness that you want, make a note of how much you added, multiply that by 40 (if it was a 40 pint kit) and then add the original amount that you used.
This should give you a good start for your next brew :

 

[dmrevis]

Thats a good idea. I've been adding a little sugar syrup to it if i'm drinking it alone. With a meal the dry-ness is actually quite refreshing though.