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ABC (Apple Butter Cyser)
Made in 2006. This stuff is absolute dynamite!! It was amazingly drinkable at 4 months, incredible at 10, and I can't wait to see what it's like at 3 or 4 years!. See http://www.applebuttercyser.com for Cruz's original recipe. I have followed it to the letter as far as ingredients, but changed the process slightly to encourage a complete fermentation. Read Cruz's notes on his recipe before attempting this. Adjust the amount of cloves based on how 'clovey' the apple butter is that you use.
Recipe Specifications
| Batch Size (Gal): |
6 |
| OG: |
1.171 |
| FG: |
1.021 |
| ABV: |
20.5% |
Ingredients
| Item | Amt |
|---|
| Unfiltered Apple Juice (heat pasteurized) |
5 gal |
| Orange Blossom Honey |
10 lbs |
| Muscovado Sugar (Light) |
5 lbs |
| Dark Dry Malt Extract (Briess) |
2 lbs |
| Apple Butter (from farmers market, not too spicy) |
1 qt |
| Whole Cloves |
9 |
| Cinnamon Sticks |
15 |
| Sunmaid Golden Raisins |
2 lb |
| Wyeast Eau De Vie (3347) Yeast |
Huge Starter |
Process
- I made up 1.5 liters of 1.040 wort from DME for the initial starter on a stir plate.
- Chill, decant, repeat.
- chill and decant starter, then pour off 1 qt apple juice from on gallon, saving for later.
- Add the yast to the 3/4 gallon of apple juice.
- When that is active, heat remaining quart plus 1 gallon of the apple juice in a pot to about 120F
- Stir in the honey, sugar, DME, and apple butter and mix well.
- Transfer to fermenter and add spices and 1 tsp yeast nutrient.
- Oxygenate well
- 24 hours later add 1 tsp nutrient and oxygenate again
- Each of the next 5 days add 1 tsp yeast nutrient and swirl the fermenter thoroughly to degass.
- After 4 weeks, add raisins to secondary and rack ABC onto the raisins.
- After 8 weeks, rack to tertiary. Mine is still in tertiary after 10 months.
I believe that a huge starter and the process of incremental nutrient feeding are keys to a complete fermentation on this. In early '06 a few folks on the HBD B&V forum made ABC and followed the recommendations of the resident 'sages' to withhold the honey and add incrementally to secondary. The idea was that the OG would be too high for the yeast to do the job, so letting it work on a lower OG must and adding more fermentables in stages was supposed to be better. I turned out that the folks who made it had an incomplete fermentation and were unable to get it going again. Their FG was over 1.050. The way that I did it, the yeast tore thru this thing like a freight train, and I think the momentum of such a vigorous fermentation and keeping the nutrient level up helped me to achieve a 1.021 FG.
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