Is my cider turning to vinegar?

13 years ago

I had about 1/2 gal - 3 quarts of cider in the fridge (bought mid-Oct) that was going bubbly, so I moved it to the basement to finish fermenting into hard cider. All was well til last week, when I decided it was going to blow its top, so I removed the push-on lid (like a milk gallon), added a little sugar to keep the fermentation going, and just covered it with saran held on by a plastic bag, with a pin hole in the wrap. Then the jug didn't swell any more. Now, over the weekend, it's still not swollen, it's bubbling a little, but it smells and tastes slightly vinegary, not as carbonated as on Friday. Don't see a mother forming, but have I just ended up with 3 quarts of vinegar?

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Comments (13)

dgkritch
13 years ago
Maybe.
Not as much fun as hard cider, but still useful!

I'd give it a few more days and you should be able to tell for sure!

Deanna
2ajsmama
Original Author
13 years ago
Seven hours after adding a cup of fresh (crab)apple juice and 1/5C sugar, capping it tightly, it's fermenting again and tastes a little fruity, a little sweet, and a little something else - but not vinegar. I'm going to forget about the "airlock" I tried to make with the Saran (sorry, don't know why I typed "plastic bag" it was held on by a *rubber band*), go back to just burping it a couple times a day (and hope it doesn't explode some night). Maybe we'll have something drinkable by Xmas, though I understand it should be bottled to "mellow" til next year. We still have a bottle of Belgian beer in the fridge we need to open some time we have friends over (or we go somewhere), since it's like champagne - you can't recork it.
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Since it's you I'll answer in this forum because I know you want experience and not just "approved" answers. Are you the one that insisted on fermenting the apples with natural yeasts? If so, you're "lucky", you only have the stuff that makes alcohol in your cider. If I was assured of only the natural yeasts and not the bacteria I'd use the natural yeasts too. If you pasteurized or used camden tablets and threw bought yeast that is why you were lucky, you killed the bacteria. You now need to throw the bacteria that turns the alcohol into vinegar. You should be able to find it by searching homebrew stores for "mother of vinegar". Alternately you can throw some unfiltered unpasteurized natural vinegar from a healthfood store and grow your own culture to inoculate all your bottles with. If you are the one that tempted fate and used the natural yeasts you probably want to tempt it again and use the natural bacteria. In that case expose them to air and hope for the best, but it didn't work the first time so I wouldn't hold your breath. Know you would be taking a crap shoot with the correct bacteria entering and being the one to grow the fastest (a dog in the yard and feeding ecoli to little kids is why I pasteurize my cider). By expose it to air I mean really expose it to the air, put it back in the vat you pressed into and whisk it. This will drive off the CO2 and since you said it was carbonated it may be helpful no matter what method you use, if I'm remembering right the carbonation serves a purpose other than tickling the nose. If I didn't want to expose it to random acts of bacteria I'd siphon it from bottle to bottle letting it slosh before throwing the mother of vinegar. You can test and adjust your own acidity pretty cheaply (again from the homebrew stores). If they don't go by the simple "acid test kit" it would be a "titration kit". You're really lucky you didn't have blow ups if you had those sealed the whole time. The amount of potential alcohol it takes to blow a beer or wine bottle designed to take pressure is not that much and if you plugged fresh cider bottles that tends to finish around 5%, that's a lot of gas. The bubbler tops are not that expensive, you can even use balloons and burp them (and if you want to know some other ways just ask me in the other forum where I'm sure to see it). I wouldn't doubt if now that you've taken the pressure off some of them start fermenting again. BTW, my apple wine came out pretty good. I don't normally drink either but 1 gallon is not going to be anywhere near enough. It has to be 12%-15% and I can't taste the alcohol (I can normally taste any alcohol). For the cheap yeast I used the yeast flavor isn't so bad either. I'm hardening at least 5 gallons this year, probably 10 gallons if I get enough apples.
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John__ShowMe__USA
13 years ago
A 7" (helium quality) party balloon will surprisingly stretch over the mouth of a 1 gal milk or water jug. Cut the finger off a latex glove works too.

I like to know what's going on with my ferments. Especially in my earlier experiments. Now I'm content to burp every so often.

Here is a link that might be useful:
sage721
13 years ago
That is, in fact, another option! HA
digdirt2
13 years ago
Very inventive John!!! LOL

Dave
2ajsmama
Original Author
13 years ago
You've already got the water-filled airlocks - why do you need the latex things ;-) on top?

I've got plenty of non-latex gloves around, I can use one of those, not sure about balloons, and I know we don't have any of John's things. Saran just didn't work.

But you say burping is fine? Doesn't let bad stuff in (no more than leaving it open long enough to pour a sample out does)? Over on Fruits and Orchards, I've gotten advice to stick a length of tubing in through a cork, put the other end in a jar of water.
John__ShowMe__USA
13 years ago
> You've already got the water-filled airlocks - why do you need the latex things ;-) on top?

Curiosity. If an airlock burps I won't really know how much gas has been produced unless capture it in a balloon. There wasn't as much info on fermenting 5 or 6 years ago and I was just experimenting & it's just my nature to question things.

> But you say burping is fine? Doesn't let bad stuff in (no more than leaving it open long enough to pour a sample out does)?

I think there is some contamination risk in burping, but not much if you wait until see bubbles rising through the ferment or collected on the surface. If I get a weaker 'whoosh' on day 6 compared to days 4 or 5 then I might wait several days before burping or don't do again at all. And is not long after bubbles are spotted that the pH is in the lower 4s.

Not even pretending to be an expert on this. Made 'balloon wine' in my freshman dorm closet in 1961 though. (true story)
2ajsmama
Original Author
13 years ago
I found a package of balloons and stuck one on top of the jug - not very full. Fermentation slowing down I guess. Do I need to put a pinhole in it?

Balloons are a lot less $ than what you used ;-)

People on F&O forum are saying it will be clear when it's done. Do you leave it in the primary all the time or siphon it off to secondary?
John__ShowMe__USA
13 years ago
> I found a package of balloons and stuck one on top of the jug - not very full. Fermentation slowing down I guess. Do I need to put a pinhole in it?

No. I don't see any reason to.

> Balloons are a lot less $ than what you used ;-)

I wasn't trying to be controversial. Just trying out diff ideas as they came to my pointy head. The latex gloves and balloons are really all that is needed.

These are the gloves I use:

Just for the heck of it I fed some sourdough starter with flour, raisins & water early yesterday in a 1 gal Ball Ideal jar and stretched a glove over the 4 1/2" mouth. Kinda like 'talk to the hand' LOL
2ajsmama
Original Author
13 years ago
I just racked off the 3 quarts or so into 4 jars today, just loosely capped them with flats and rings. Maybe I'll get the gloves and put those on tomorrow - the gloves I have have powder on the insides and the balloons wouldn't fit over regular-mouth jars.

I'm taking kids to dr for checkups tomorrow - maybe they'll give me 4 non-powdered gloves ;-)?
John__ShowMe__USA
13 years ago
I have more than will use in 50 years. Send me an email through (My Page) here and I'll send you a few to try out.

The exam rooms at my hospital have blue gloves in 3 diff sizes. Just so happens I have two appointments this morning and will check them out.

jt
2ajsmama
Original Author
13 years ago
I looked with my stains and stuff, I was running low on gloves so bought more last month. They're non-latex, non-powdered! So I put 4 on with rubber bands just now.

No fermentation going on any more though - do I need to add some sugar to the secondaries, or just wait for the juice/cider/vinegar(?) to clarify?
John__ShowMe__USA
13 years ago
Scored some blue nitrile gloves at the hospital today. Asked the nurse if could have one & she gave me nine! The wrist bands of the gloves are nowhere near as 'stretchy' as my latex ones. The fingers etc seemed abt identical.

"No fermentation going on any more though - do I need to add some sugar to the secondaries, or just wait for the juice/cider/vinegar(?) to clarify?"

I'll keep quiet for a while and hopefully someone knowledgeable will chime in. It's been a long, long time since I've done any wine making & I didn't really know what I was doing then.

Is my cider turning to vinegar?

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Is my cider turning to vinegar?

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