Tuesday, October 30, 2012
...And the Cider?
In a word. Disaster! Ugh, and I was so excited about it.
So what happened? I have a confession to make. On the day I initially made this cider, I was placing the stoppers in the top of the carboy. It is tricky because when the stopper and/or the inside of the opening is wet, the stoppers tend to slide. Well, I had a #6 size stopper and ploop, it went into the carboy. I next tried the #6.5 size stopper and, you guessed it, ploop into the carboy.
My thought... what is a little rubber stopper going to hurt. Fortunately, I had another #6.5, only this time remembered that the air lock actually forces the opening open, leaving it overall larger and not able to fall in. I made that work, and decided to forget about the stoppers in the bottom.
As you may know, it took awhile for this cider to even begin to ferment, and I had an update about a week ago. I was rather excited when I finally saw some fermentation activity.
After another week, I decided it was time to take a gravity reading, and it hit me as I removed the airlock that there may be a problem. The smell of soaked rubber immediately filled the room. The gravity was great, and after taking the gravity I took a reluctant sip of the cider. Yep, nasty rubber taste. I'm not sure this would have ever left, especially with the stoppers still sitting in the bottom.
I expected the stoppers to be eaten up and only half there, with the other halves absorbed into this raunchy solution. Down the drain....
I never want to do this again.
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