A first time TC questoin

[nathanrich]

If I were to make a fruit flavoured TC would I make the TC and ferment it out before adding the flavour, whether it be fresh fruit or cordial, and use that to back sweeten it. Or do I ferment the fruit or fruit flavour in with the AJ?

Only thing is I don't want a something too strong in AV or flavour but I do like my cider sweet. So do you think using the fruit or fruit flavour to back sweeten?


Cheers

[bigdave]

I add cordial when bottling. Usually sugar free because I've found that the stuff with sugar in ferments out, over carbonating the bottles but more importantly, ruining the flavour I was adding.

[nathanrich]

If I racked it off into a SV then added in the cordial would it stop any further fermentation?

[oldbloke]

No. If there's any sugar left from the original AJ, or any sugar in the cordial, it'll keep going.
Unless! the cordial contains enough potassium sorbate to knock the yeast out - but that's unlikely, as normally we need to use pot sorbate and sodium metabisulphite *together* to stabilise a brew.

[nathanrich]

There is no potas sorbate. I worked it out that per 300ml bottle there is 4.3 g of sugar in the cordial.

Correct me if I wrong but thats about the size of a teaspoon of sugar. So if I dilute it to a ratio of 2:1 I have a half a teaspoon (ish) of sugar which I could use instead of priming sugar.

However, it wont backsweeten the TC though? So I would still have to use sweetener.

[oldbloke]

Sounds good for carbonating it, but it will be fermented away so yes you need to sweeten - Splenda or similar.