Adding Lemon Juice After Fermentation

[Dhaynes]

My wife and I are getting ready to bottle our first batch of Sketter Pee. It's been in the carboy about two months now. We recently added the two cups of sugar you are suppose to add before bottling. It taste okay but we were surprised at how little lemon flavor there is. Is this normal? Has anyone ever added more lemon juice at this point to bring out the lemon flavor? If so how did it turn out?

I'm a little worried that there might be something a little off. It fermented fine but took a long time to clear even though we followed the recipe and used Sparkolloid as directed. It started clearing pretty fast but then started to develop little white stringy things that were about 1/4" to 3/8" long and hung down vertically. They didn't appear to be mold or anything growing. They looked more like little white strings of coagulated material. These eventually settled out after about 6 weeks and left the SP a beautiful very light yellow. We filtered it just to be safe. It doesn't have any off flavors that I can detect. It just seems pretty bland. Any ideas?


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[Arne]

Sure you can give it a dose of lemon. Be forwarned, tho, it mite cloud it back up and you will have to wait for it to clear again. You can also get a can of frozen welches cranberry and rack a gallon of the s.p. onto the cranberry. Shake it up good and it will give it more flavor and stay clear. You can do the same thing with other concentrates, but a lot of them will cloud it back up. Just some other variations of the same thing. Arne.

 

[reefman]

I have done just that on my last batch of SP. I added a 32 oz. bottle of lemon juice after fermentation, but as Arne mentions, it does have a slight cloudiness to it even after clearing, but it tastes just as good.

When I serve SP, I add a slice of lemon over ice, and the lemon flavor comes back.

 

[Dhaynes]

Thanks for the input! I really like the frozen cranberry juice idea. I think I may split my five gallon batch into 1 three gallon carboy & 2 one gallon jugs. I'll add half a can of cranberry to the three gallon carboy. I'll leave 1 of the one gallon jugs as is and add extra lemon juice to the other. That way I can compare them and decide which one(s) I like best. Should be fun.


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[Arne]

When I add the cranberry, I usually add a full can to a gallon. Try adding to the full 3 gallon and if you need it, you can always add some more. When adding a can of the Welches brand to a gallon, I don't have to sweeten any more. Some of the other brands I have to add more sugar after I add the concentrate. Arne.