bottle conditioning cider

[luis gauthier]

Hi,

While the optimal fermentation temperature for cider is well known, I am wondering if there is an optimal temperature for bottle conditioning cider. I have Claude and Andrew's book but I don't remember having seen information about this topic.

I mostly make méthode ancestrale ciders and for now, usually bottle in spring (temperature 8-10 deg. C). Temperature goes up in summer (no more than 18-20 deg. C I think) and then, temperature goes down again as fall arrives. 

I am wondering if bottle conditionning at a higher temperature (ex : 20 from the beginning) could change something in the process (healthier refermentation or something) or if a lower temperature will do the same thing but slower...

Thank you,

Louis

[Richard Swales]

Reading about different methods of making sparkling wine, and cider, it
occurred to me that "bottle priming" probably the most common way of
making sparkling fermented drinks in the amateur/homebrew world (also
one of the main ways mentioned on Andrew's site) is not generally
included in the lists of methods and doesn't have a fancy French name. I
believe I also read somewhere that it is one of the oldest methods of
producing sparking wine (originally done by wine merchants) and it seems
that it would have been the likely precursor to the traditional method.

Similar methods are: "Méthode Ancestrale" - i.e. bottling just before
the end of fermentation so as to capture the last part of the CO2
released from the main fermentation.

"Méthode Traditionelle" - i.e. sugar (tirage) is added, we wait for it
to get fizzy and then "riddle" it by gradually turning the bottle
upside-down, freezing the yeast in the neck of bottle and then letting
removing it (with the bottle now right way up).

There doesn't seem to be a widely used name for just adding the "tirage"
and leaving it at that.

1) Are we then to assume that the bottle priming method is looked down
upon in the wine world (and if so are there reasons that might apply to
us too)?

2) Are we allowed to invent a good franglais name for it, like "méthode
primée" "méthode tirage" or something like that?

Richard

[Ray Blockley]

Hi Richard, 

There's a lot of folk using the term "Pret Nat" (Pétillant Naturel) to describe bottling on SG before fermentation is complete. It's part of the "minimalist intervention" strategy being adopted by a number of cider / perry makers. 

No idea of that helps as another one to throw into your franglais mix...? 

Ray
Nottingham UK

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[Ray Blockley]

Sorry - "Pet Nat" of course - no idea where the "r" crept in, fat fingers I guess! 

[Johan]

From what I have read/heard the best temps for producing sparkling wine are between 8-12 deg. C. There is some consensus that when bottle fermentation lasts longer bubbles are smaller and mousse better. If you bottle ferment a well over 20 deg. C with additional champagne yeast fermentation will be rapid and mostly over in 2-3 weeks.  However I kinda like more fast bottle fermentation because it's easier to conduct and predict versus colder temps which could leave stuck fermentation in the bottle. Also have not noticed any off flavor in higher temps either.

[Claude Jolicoeur]

Le jeudi 16 avril 2020 07:12:01 UTC-4, Ray a écrit :

There's a lot of folk using the term "Pret Nat" (Pétillant Naturel) to describe bottling on SG before fermentation is complete. It's part of the "minimalist intervention" strategy being adopted by a number of cider / perry makers. 

Yes, pet-nat would be the same as methode ancestrale. It is also what is called bottle-conditioned in UK.

Methode traditionelle is same as methode champenoise and as bottle-fermented in UK.

And yes, it is true the basic add-some-sugar method doesn't have a fancy name... It is also sometimes called bottle-conditioning, but I think mostly in the US. I now call it simply the Basic method...

As of Louis' original question, I guess it is mostly a relation time vs temperature. The lower the temperature, the more time needed to reach the desired sparkle level. For my part, I don't really worry. My cases are stored in the same room where the fermentations are going; where T may fluctuate between 8C and 18C according to season.

[Andrew Lea]

I think here in the UK “Pet Nat” is distinct from “Bottle Conditioning”. They are not the same thing. 

In the first case you bottle before fermentation is complete. In the second case you take the cider to dryness first, and then add a controlled amount of sugar for a secondary fermentation to provide carbonation with the existing yeast.  But in neither case do you remove the yeast, so there’s always some sediment in the bottle.

That’s the way I see it.  

Andrew

Wittenham Hill Cider Portal
www.cider.org.uk

On 16 Apr 2020, at 14:04, Claude Jolicoeur <cjol...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Claude Jolicoeur]

Le jeudi 16 avril 2020 09:47:50 UTC-4, Andrew Lea a écrit :

I think here in the UK “Pet Nat” is distinct from “Bottle Conditioning”. They are not the same thing. 

Andrew, from the official PGI specification for "Traditional Welsh Cider":

Bottle conditioned: a natural carbonation is introduced by bottling the cider
prior to the completion of the primary fermentation. The cider is bottled at a specific
gravity (SG) decided by the maker to give the desired level of carbonation and
sweetness. The more carbonation achieved the less residual sweetness remains.

Bottle fermented: a natural carbonation is introduced by bottling the cider at
the completion of the primary fermentation and inducing a second fermentation by the
addition of fermentable sugar and yeast. Bottle fermented cider has a higher
carbonation than bottle conditioned and is of clear appearance after disgorging. It is
dry to the palate as all sugar is fermented during the secondary fermentation and post
disgorgement dosing is not permitted.

From this spec, bottle conditioned is the same as pet-nat...

Now, does this spec apply to the whole of UK?

[Andrew Lea]

I’m going to stick my neck out and say the definition given in the Welsh PGI is wrong! That’s not the generally accepted definition in the rest of the UK, for instance at the Bath and West Show. And it’s not the sense in which I have ever understood it over the last 40 years. 

I will concede that “Pet Nat” could be regarded as a special case of “Bottle Conditioning”.  But it’s not the only way. The Welsh PGI leaves a glaring hole for those ciders which are carbonated by the addition of sugar but not disgorged. What do they propose to call those? The term “Bottle Fermented” is used to distinguish ciders which are disgorged from those that are not, which are “Bottle Conditioned”.  It’s that simple and always has been.

I wonder if anyone from WPCS is on here these days, to comment what was their thinking around that part of the PGI? This may well be something specific which they wanted to achieve, to differentiate from other UK ciders.

Andrew

Wittenham Hill Cider Portal
www.cider.org.uk

On 16 Apr 2020, at 15:21, Claude Jolicoeur <cjol...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Alex Kroh]

In my opinion, the PGI spec Claude quoted is not how folks (at least in the US) are commonly using these terms. In fact, I’d say they’re backwards! (As most things on opposite sides of the pond seem to be...)

I’ve always taken “bottle conditioned” to mean that carbonation was achieved in the bottle via fermentation, (and usually this would be a secondary fermentation with sugar added.) Pet Nat is a more specific version - during the end of primary fermentation with nothing added to achieve this (hence naturel). So I would say a Pet Nat wine or cider is bottle conditioned, and if anyone cared to know I would further say “using the Pet Nat method.”

Bottle fermented sounds like you’re doing the whole fermentation in the bottle. I would never have a reason to say this as it sounds confusing (and messy).

Alex Kroh

[Matt Moser Miller]

I agree with Alex—for an American, “bottle conditioned” would mean that it was conditioned AFTER primary fermentation had concluded. Also, I think that might be influenced (and maybe this is the case in the UK at large, Andrew Lea?) by brewing nomenclature. In beer, “bottle conditioned” has meant refermented in bottle, with the expectation of a live product and lees present. In the US, you also see “ale on lees” or, occasionally, “refermented in bottle.”

i have to say, the French definitions for various terms annoy me; they’re inaccurate (or, at least, add to confusion). The addition of sugar to create a secondary bottle fermentation was attested to by Merret, in cider, in England, in the 1660s—well before Perignon. This, by any reasonable measure, should be what’s called traditional method. The defining feature—the new practice that Champagne introduced to sparkling wine—was the disgorging, but even that doesn’t seem to have happened until Cliquot in the early 1800s. If they want to put claim to something, it should be that—and the term should be methode champenoise, regardless of where it’s produced. It’s about the METHOD, not the location. A much clearer delineation would be:

Methode ancestrale/pet nat: bottled while still in primary fermentation, undisgorged (depending on level of carbonation).

Traditional method/ methode traditionelle/ bottle conditioned/(something noting Merrit or English cider’s contribution?): fermented dry, then bottled with added sugar to referment, undisgorged.

Methode champenoise: same as above, but with addition of disgorging.

As for wine terms for the “sugar but no disgorging” approach, apparently Prosecco makers sometimes do this (and widely did historically, before the charmat method) and use the term “col fondo,” or “with the bottom.”

To Luis’s original point: I’d think you’d want to keep from refermenting at too high a temperature, lest the heat damage the cider. As long as you have reasonable temps (in the 8-12/40s-60s range), I’d think your conditioning should work fine. If it stalls (even when you bump the temps up to the higher range you mentioned), that sounds to me more an issue of nutrient deficiency or lack of yeast.

For what it’s worth: I’ve never added additional yeast at bottling in the...10 years I’ve been making cider?...and I’ve never not had adequate conditioning. When I rack for bottling, I add a bit of dextrose to increase the yeast population (distinct from the dose of conditioning dextrose immediately prior to bottle fill); if it doesn’t seem to wake up, I delay bottling until I have signs that they’re working.

Matt Moser Miller

Sent from my iPhone

> On Apr 16, 2020, at 11:27 AM, Alex Kroh <alexand...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> In my opinion, the PGI spec Claude quoted is not how folks (at least in the US) are commonly using these terms. In fact, I’d say they’re backwards! (As most things on opposite sides of the pond seem to be...)

>
> I’ve always taken “bottle conditioned” to mean that carbonation was achieved in the bottle via fermentation, (and usually this would be a secondary fermentation with sugar added.) Pet Nat is a more specific version - during the end of primary fermentation with nothing added to achieve this (hence naturel). So I would say a Pet Nat wine or cider is bottle conditioned, and if anyone cared to know I would further say “using the Pet Nat method.”
>
> Bottle fermented sounds like you’re doing the whole fermentation in the bottle. I would never have a reason to say this as it sounds confusing (and messy).
>
> Alex Kroh
>

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[Claude Jolicoeur]

Obviously there is no consensus on the terminology!

My interpretation from the Welsh PGI and also after some discussion with Tom Oliver was:

Bottle fermented for when sparkling is obtained with addition of sugar at bottling time. This cider may then (or not) be disgorged. If it is it then becomes a methode traditionnnelle.

Bottle conditioned for when sparkling is obtained without addition of sugar, and this is same as pet-nat and methode ancestrale. Cider is bottled with SG sufficiently high for insuring sparkle. Again such ciders may be disgorged, although very few producers do this. There is no special name that I know for when this cider is disgorged.

Andrew's interpretation is different:

The term “Bottle Fermented” is used to distinguish ciders which are disgorged from those that are not, which are “Bottle Conditioned”.

If I get you right Andrew, a keeved cider bottled at SG 1.015, fermented in bottle to 1.010, and then riddled and disgorged would then be “Bottle Fermented”?

And in the USA, the term bottle fermented is not used, and bottle conditioned usually refer to the method where sugar is added at bottling, while I think pet-nat would be used if no sugar is added. Hence some confusion...

[Claude Jolicoeur]

Le jeudi 16 avril 2020 12:07:59 UTC-4, Matt Moser Miller a écrit :

Traditional method/ methode traditionelle/ bottle conditioned/(something noting Merrit or English cider’s contribution?): fermented dry, then bottled with added sugar to referment, undisgorged.
Methode champenoise: same as above, but with addition of disgorging.

Matt, although I don't disagree in the principle of this, in practice it doesn't work because no other wine or cider may legally use the term Methode champenoise. The name is reserved for Champagne only - and you'll get sued if you use it for something else.

This is the reason wine producers in other regions had to find another name and in practice it is Methode traditionnelle that is used. In Spain they call them "Cava" which means the same.

So, in reality, Methode traditionnelle is disgorged. Most sparkling wines from regions other than Champagne use that term.

[Per T Buhre]

I am not completely sure about the details but I am quite positive that I have heard producers of sparkling wine claim that the autolyse of the aging lees in the bottle will contribute to the small size of the bottles. So the time in the bottle before disgorging is clearly affecting the result.

/ Pwe

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[Andrew Lea]

Andrew's interpretation is different:

The term “Bottle Fermented” is used to distinguish ciders which are disgorged from those that are not, which are “Bottle Conditioned”.

If I get you right Andrew, a keeved cider bottled at SG 1.015, fermented in bottle to 1.010, and then riddled and disgorged would then be “Bottle Fermented”?

In my view, yes. But a normal keeved cider is “Bottle Conditioned”.  Or, I suppose, according to all the new breed of foodie people, “Pet Nat”.  Personally I’m happy with the old-fashioned terms we’ve been using for donkeys years ;-)

Andrew 

[luis gauthier]

Hi everyone,

Thank you very much for your input. I'm happy to see that my usual botte storage is the most apropriate to insucre a quality refermented in-bottle cider. 

The discussion on the definition of the different in-bottle refermentation methods was also very instructive. For my part, I'll stick with méthode ancestrale (I'm a french speaker after all...). Pet nat seems a bit fancy and also to refers more to the wine world (in my opinion). Bottle conditioned obviously makes it a little to confusing on if the carbonation comes from the contintuity of fermentation in bottle or just the addition of sugar to a dry cider...

Have a good spring!

Louis

[Anders Johnson]

Does anyone have experience just adding sugar, not extra yeast to bottled cider? I have heard people use Bayunus to ensure a solid refermentation, just curious if it is necessary?

[Patrick McCauley]

I've been doing a lot of wild ferments, and not wanting to add champagne yeast or other bottle conditioning yeasts since my ferments have been crashing out at about 1.004-5, and champagne yeast seems to make the final cider too dry and sharp. Since I have had issues in the past with having enough residual yeast left over in the cider to bottle condition(with sugar addition), I froze some semi-fermented, wild cider in the fall. I just add a few ounces of the frozen cider to my bottling bucket, with sugar syrup or honey and it's worked great. It takes a little planning, but now I just keep semi-fermented cider frozen in my freezer for bottling. Sometimes I add a small amount of DAP too. Every batch I've done this way has had a nice sparkle and a small amount of residual sweetness.

Pat McCauley

On Tue, Apr 21, 2020, 6:39 PM Anders Johnson <andersjo...@gmail.com> wrote:

Does anyone have experience just adding sugar, not extra yeast to bottled cider? I have heard people use Bayunus to ensure a solid refermentation, just curious if it is necessary?

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[Claude Jolicoeur]

Le mardi 21 avril 2020 18:39:04 UTC-4, Anders Johnson a écrit :

Does anyone have experience just adding sugar, not extra yeast to bottled cider? I have heard people use Bayunus to ensure a solid refermentation, just curious if it is necessary?

Normally, there would be enough yeast cells alive to make the sparkle if you are patient enough. So adding yeast is not absolutely necessary in most cases. Adding some would however hasten things.

[Max Nowell ( Steilhead Cider)]

We've tried various bottle-conditioning variations of yeast, nutrient and sugar.  We've just about settled on a method.  Our ciders are bone dry to start with, and at least a year old at the time of conditioning.

Using sugar alone (5g/L) often results in nothing happening at all, so we conclude that there's no viable yeast in the cider.

If conditioning does happen, there can be off-notes due to yeast-stress.

We now use 5g/L of sugar, a smidge of nutrients and a minimal dose of Lalvin 118 yeast and it seems pretty foolproof.

We also Pet Nat our "cider nouveau", which is a bi-annual product from our Morgan Sweet tree. 2019's product is now beautifully conditioned after bottling at about 1004 - sparkling, fresh, young, light and yeasty, a bit like Hogarden beer in a way.

[Richard Swales]

Well let's look at the evidence we've collected:

Creating carbonation by putting sugar in and closing the bottle (without
later disgorging) is:

1) Seemingly not widely practiced in the wine world.

2) The usual way to do things with cider, to the extent that it can even
be called the "Basic Method" by one of the world's leading cider writers
and lecturers.

3) Originally done by Merret in cider more than 350 years ago.

So clearly the answer is staring us in the face. This method should be
called the "cider method", or in franglais: "méthode cidricole".

Richard
P.S. This was intended to be a separate thread from Luis Gauthier's one.
They appear together on the google page, though separate in my email
client. I think this was caused by my starting this thread by replying
to his email - sorry to Luis and everyone else for the hijack, I thought
simply changing the subject line would be enough to separate them.

[Claude Jolicoeur]

Le lundi 27 avril 2020 08:34:56 UTC-4, richard a écrit :

3) Originally done by Merret in cider more than 350 years ago.

As you bring this historical point in the discusstion...

Some give credit to Lord Scudamore for the first sparkling ciders, while others say Merret did it...

Is there some definitive historical account as to who should be credited for what?

Claude

[Vince Wakefield]

Some info here

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/sorry-champagne-but-cider-is-the-original-fizz

 

Vince

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[Claude Jolicoeur]

Yes I had seen that one before - and in there it says Merret used the method for wine, not for cider.

Then Scudamore would be the one who did it for cider, and that would have been quite a few years before Merret did it for wine.

Or would it be Digbie? - however he was rather credited for having invented the bottle. There is also a mention of John Beale...

[T Tibbits]

Hello All,

I've had an interest in the history of cider for various reasons and I discovered the following, though it's inconclusive. Sir Kenelm Digby's son published his notes ('closet') which include various recipes for variously cider, apple drink, etc. but there's one recipe related to him by Sir Paul Neile/Neale, a famous founder member of the Royal Society in 1660, whose recipe calls for the pressing of ripe apples into juice, allowing to settle for 24 hours, and then racking into a separate barrel, and this process should be repeated so as to slow the 'working' (fermentation) though the word ferment is also used in the text. In fact the interpretation of Spirits, the cider dying, fermenting and working leaves a little to the imagination. Nonetheless, the advice at the end when the cider is clear enough, it should be bottled, and timings can be a little vague.

I quote:

"When it is clear enough draw it into bottles, filling them within two fingers, which stop close. After two or three days visit them; that if there be a danger of their working (which would break the bottles) you may take out the stopples, and let them stand open for half a quarter of an hour. Then stop them close, and they are secure for ever after. In cold freesing weather, set them upon Hay, and cover them over with Hay or Straw. In open weather in Winter transpose them to another part of the Cellar to stand upon the bare ground or pavement. In hot weather set them in sand."

Clearly if the cider works too much those primitive bottles will break, but the evolution of gas from biologically active cider was known and ways of controlling the fermentation to achieve a pet nat were clearly being experimented with at the time by the UK's leading optic instrument maker (Paul Neile) as well as Scudamore and later Merret adding 'walnuts of sugar'.  I personally think worthy of note is the fact that Neale is effectively astronomer royal, and known for his 35foot telescope and optic glasses (Pepys diary), so presumably has some good experience of working with glass, blowing, grinding, moulding etc, and might therefore be interested in bottle production and strength of bottles.

All of Digby's other cider recipes are much more along the lines of modern industrial cider production - addition of water and even the boiling of apples in water to extract the sugar.

So whilst the sugar priming method is loved by some, the pet nat method (loved by me) also has ancient provenance.

The closet was published in 1669 after Sir Kenelm's death, so it's not clear when Sir Paul Neile related his recipe, but the two were known to each other from 1660, if not well before.

I also understand that it is the surface availability of coal in the Forest of Dean that allowed the production of coke, and hence cinders or slag from the resulting iron that were smelted and resulted in stronger glass able to take pressure as bottles, and there is reference to a glass foundry at Newnham using Sir Robert Mansel's patented glass from pit coal production method. It's also said that James Howell, an employee of Mansel, contacted Digby about a health matter and the pair became friends, allowing the glass making expertise of Howell (himself an Oxford graduate) and Digby's experiments at Gresham College to become connected in the field of cider, but I can't find any reference to that. Mansel's patent was granted in 1611 (though not to him), and it's recorded that he employed glass experts from Venice, Spain and France, so whichever way you look at it, the continent had an influence on bottle making! The civil war (Digby was a royalist) intervened and glass bottle patent was awarded to Digby in 1662, but the period 1633 to 1660 appears to be when the art and mystery of cider bottle production was born. Dom Perignon was born in Dec 1638, so unlikely to have contributed much before 1655.

Would be delighted to hear from others with further information.

Tom

[Andrew Lea]

You will find a good overview of the history of bottle conditioned cider in James Crowden's brilliant book “Ciderland”.

And many of the Royal Society papers on cider by Neale, Beale etc are available online (I think via archive.org but it’s a while since i looked). Evelyn’s Pomona (which also contains their contributions) certainly is though you have to skip past Sylva first https://archive.org/details/sylvaordiscourse00eveluoft/page/n4/mode/2up

Andrew

Wittenham Hill Cider Portal
www.cider.org.uk

On 27 Apr 2020, at 17:59, T Tibbits <tom.t...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[darlenehayes]

As it happens, this particular historical topic has been of much interest to me, so I can offer a few things.

If one reads the transcript of the paper Merret read out to the Royal Society in 1662, available digitally, he speaks of adding sugar to barrels of wine, and at no point mentions either cider or bottles. It is not immediately clear to me how this can be interpreted as inventing sparkling anything, though it is certainly possible that he published something elsewhere that I have yet to find.

There was a paper read out to the RS by Sir Paul Neil in July 1663 that describes bottling a cider before it had quite finished fermentation so that it will become lightly sparkling. He goes on at length about the timing - too early and the bottles will explode, too late and nothing will happen. In that case he suggests the addition of a little sugar, about the size of a nutmeg, to produce a little briskness. This paper was subsequently included in Evelyn's Pomona published in 1664.

Also in Evelyn's Pomona is a set of Aphorisms concerning Cider written by John Beale (a distant cousin of Lord Scudamore) and read before the RS by a friend of his in 1662. Beale, when discussing bottling, states that "...some put two or three Raisins into every Bottle, this is to seek aid from the Vine. Here in Somersetshire I have seen as much as a Walnut of Sugar, now without cause, used for this Country Cider." This is in the context of other sorts of additives, such as crushed mustard seeds. He does not, to the best of my recollection, use descriptors that one might associate with a sparkling beverage. It is clear that he knew Lord Scudamore, and in fact mentions him elsewhere in the paper, but not with the suggestion that Scudamore was adding anything to bottles of cider.

I have not found anything in any other contemporary writings to indicate that Lord Scudamore was a pioneer of the technique. He himself has not left anything in writing about cider beyond farm accounts (kept by his steward) indicating that it was made on the property. There aren't many extant accounts, unfortunately, but in 1668/1669 he paid several local women to bottle cider; there is no indication that sugar was involved, but then I wouldn't have expected to see that noted in accounts that just listed who was paid for which task and how much.

As with many things, what is said on websites is not always completely reliable. There is at least one major cider website that as recently as several months ago (it may well have been changed, though I haven't looked recently) had on a cider timeline the note that Charles I declared in 1656 that he preferred cider to wine, quite the feat for someone executed in 1649.

Darlene

[T Tibbits]

Dear Andrew, Darlene and others,

Thank you Andrew for the useful pointer to Ciderland. I have now procured and read the relevant passages and feel even more enlightened! Certainly my own experiences in technology development (solar photovoltaics) have underlined the need for strict secrecy (Patents are great, up to an extent...) and I can fully appreciate therefore that this field of development, which surely was going on given the number of actors and frankly the social standing of said actors, would likely be shrouded in mystery as there was clearly commercial advantage to having cracked the problem. Hence there seems to be very little literature pointing to the actual moment and place of discovery of bottle glass, and associated ciderfinishing techniques such as priming with sugar or bottling ahead of fermentation ending, more likely in any case that it was an evolution. Indeed, history relates the success of the glass making industry such that before long the Treasury slapped a fairly punitive tax on glass bottle production (1s / doz  = 1d per bottle) which fairly quickly did away with the more marginal and earlier pioneer producers at the end of the 17th Century.  We Brits have used the tax regime to stifle tech development in the world of cider for centuries, it seems!!

I found another well referenced and interesting link on the Gloucestershire Soc of industrial Archaeology, written by none other than a Jim Chapman, about Newnham glass making.

https://www.gsia.org.uk/reprints/2012/gi201236.pdf

best wishes,

Tom

- Artistraw Cider

@ArtistrawCider

+44 1497 831 366

[Richard Swales]

Apologies for that. I just copied that from another poster without checking.

So it seems there are no objections to calling it the "cider method" / "méthode cidricole" then?

Richard

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