Apple Cider wine won't begin fermenting

[DeniseHogemann]

Found a great deal on Presidents Choice Apple Cider on Thursday night... 1/2 price - $2.50 a piece. They are 3 liter bottles, not filtered, no perservatives apple cider that only contain apples, spices and concentrated orange juice. I bought the last 5 they had. This equalled to just shy of 4 gallons. This is what I did Thursday night.

3.96 gallons Apple Cider
10 campden tablets - crushed
4 tsp acid blend
1 tsp pectin enzyme
2 tsp tannin

before i added the sugar the sg was at 1.056. Added 6 lbs of sugar that i dissolved on the stove in a little water. Starting SG was now 1.090.
I waited 24 hours (Friday night) to add the yeast - EC-1118 which i followed the directions on the back (2 oz warm water and yeast, wait 15 minutes and add to must). the yeast looked soft but not active at this time but I added it anyway. Left it sit. Saturday afternoon no activity but I realized I didn't add any yeast nutrient. So I added 2 tsps. Now it is Sunday morning and still no activity. I have a brew belt on and the temperature is at 75 degrees.

 

[Runningwolf]

Ok first off why did you add the campdon tablets? I know folks like to add a little bit but you added enough for ten gallons of wine you're trying to stabilize. Unless if your crushing fresh grapes or fruit I don't even believe in adding it at all before fermentation. Any wild yeast you may pick up is weak and a good yeast culture will take over anyways.

I think the other half of your problem is your yeast culture. How warm was the water. 103* max is what you want. I would suggest making another batch in a large container (about 1/2 gallon) add about 1-2 cups of warm water and pitch your yeast. In about 10 minutes add about 1/2 cup of wine. keep doing this about every 15-20 minutes (I have even keep this container in the sink of larger vessal with hot water which speeds up the process). Once this container is nearly full and fermenting you'll have a good strong culture that will help start you apple to go.

 

[ckassotis]

You may be having issues from the over-sulfiting. That is a lot of Campden tablets! Typically you will add ~1/gallon, but you added about 2.5 per gallon. You might try re-pitching the yeast now that it has been a few days. Stir it up real well.

Also, since you are rehydrating your yeast anyway, you might as well go ahead and prepare a real yeast starter. Once you have it rehydrated, take out about 1/2 - 1 cup of your juice and mix it in with the yeast (Not the other way around). Give that 1-3 hours, should start fermenting in the small volume. You can even add a bit of sugar to the small volume. Once you have a nice strong fermentation going, you can add a bit more juice and wait again, or just go ahead and add it now, to the full batch. That should get her going.

 

[SBWs]

Just off the top of my head I'd say it is the 10 Campden Tablets. Normally 1 tablet per gallon is recommended. That means you added 2 1/2 times what should have been added. With that said, Lalvin EC-1118 is a very strong yeast and may overcome the K-meta (Campden Tablets) overdose in time. It's still early but you could try giving it a good hard stir a couple times to drive off some of the extra K-meta.

Did you test acid, if not the pH could be off enough to inhibit fermentation. 4 tsp of acid blend doesn't seem out of whack, but without testing acid or pH you never know what the acid of the cider was to start with.

yeast nutrient is normally 1 tsp per gallon however you should follow directions on container. You may need to add a little more and if you have it some yeast energizer wouldn't hurt.

tannin seems a bit high to me, I've found with tannin a little goes a long way, but here again there are a lot of different makers of this stuff so follow directions on container.

I must type to slow I see two others replied while I was typing

 

[DeniseHogemann]

oops!

Really don't know why I added 10 campden tablets. I read my label on it and it says 1 -2 per 4.5 liters. My only defense is I had a terrible headache but I guess I should have left it for another day. Checked the rest of my ingredients on their packaging and everything is correct. Lessoned learned. Got anothern package of yeast so we will see shortly if it can be started fermenting or if it is lost.

 

[Luc]

Got anothern package of yeast so we will see shortly if it can be started fermenting or if it is lost.

Does not work. Adding just another package of yeast will just add extra yeast that will have the dame problem: too much sulphite.

You need to get rid of the sulphite and there is one solution that does the trick: bind the sulphite with oxygen.
So what you will have to do is to aerate the must.

Take 2 large buckets and splash the must from one bucket into the other. Ansd I mean really splashing with loads of foam forming. That way a lot of oxygen will get in the wine, bind with the sulphite and then the yeast can start their work.
You will have to do this several times: I mean like 10 or 15 times at least.


Maybe you should read this:
http://www.wijnmaker.blogspot.com/2011/12/gisting-wil-niet-starten-stuck.html

Luc

 

[DeniseHogemann]

But it did start. It's 12 hours later and everything is bubbling along happily. I did stir it really good quite a few times in the last couple days before starting and adding the new yeast. We will see if it continues but right now everything looks good.

 

[PCharles]

I'd also suggest adding yeast nutrient. I'd add some at the get go and sprinkle some as fermenting progresses.

 

[DeniseHogemann]

I did add some nutrient and some energizer. How much would you recommend and how often during the fermentation should I add the nutrient? Its really going strong right now. At noon the SG was at 1.040, down from 1.090 at the start.

 

[SBWs]

Denise, Here is a article on yeast nutrients that explains when to add them. There are different nutrients so what and when depends on what you have and where your fermentation is at. I wouldn't add a lot if your fermentation is going that strong.

http://www.grapestompers.com/articles/yeast_nutrients.htm

I think the only time you add yeast energizer is before you pitch the yeast not sure of that maybe someone else will know.

 

[DoctorCAD]

I did add some nutrient and some energizer. How much would you recommend and how often during the fermentation should I add the nutrient? Its really going strong right now. At noon the SG was at 1.040, down from 1.090 at the start.

Its fine...leave it alone. It just took a bit to overcome the excess sulfites.