Oztops

[Legion]

I can't remember if I've told you guys about these, but as most of you are going into summer I might show you again.

Due to the ridiculous prices of alcohol here (roughly 3x the price, compared to most of the US) we Aussies sometimes have to... improvise. This is one great product that I have successfully used to keep taxes away from "The Man".

Basically they are just a special cap which has a pressure release valve. This allows you to ferment fruit juice in the bottle without it blowing up. The kit comes with yeast, and all you need to do is put some in some preservative free juice (apple usually, but apple and black current is very nice), put it somewhere warm and wait.

A good trick I have found is to tip about a cup of juice out and add a cup of sugar. This will increase the alcohol % up to about 8%.

The best part about it, apart from the price, is that it actually tastes pretty nice.

A case of alcoholic cider here would cost you around $40-$50. More for fancy stuff. I can make about 3L for $4. And you do not need to worry about cleaning and filling bottles, etc like you do with home-brewed beer, which was always the thing that annoyed me.

It looks like the international kit only has the lids to fit on soda bottles, so you may have to do some cleaning and decanting, but it is still less hassle than bottling individual beer bottles, if you use the largest sized soda bottles.

http://www.oztops.com.au/

[saltypete]

I would never consider home brewing but this looks pretty easy and for 25 bucks I'm gonna have a shot at it. Cheers mate.

Pete

[Legion]

No worries. Just remember the sugar for extra kick.

I was going to say wait for summer, they ferment faster in warm weather, but then I saw you are in QLD. Have fun!

The fruit juice I was using was called Apple Time. You can get it in coles and woolies, but any without preservatives work well enough.

[Badger & Bengall]

I didn't know about this. Thanks!

[Legion]

Canberra?? You will be making fruit popsicles for the next six months!

[spoonman]

Awesome! I've never heard of these before - where were they when I was in high school!?

[saltypete]

Reporting back, I've just opened my first attempt at cider and it is not bad at all. I used a generic apple juice from Woolies and added half a cup of dextrose as well as the yeast. I let it sit for 4 days in the warmest place in the house and then refrigerated it overnight to slow the fermentation right down.
The result was a lightly carbonated cloudy cider that is medium dry and IMO quite comparable to commercial ciders like Strongbow. It's certainly not in the league of the top quality scrumpy's but for the price it is outstanding.
Not knowing the alcohol content however, means that one must be cautious when imbibing but I'm not a big drinker and 1 or 2 glasses is the most I would be likely to consume at one time.
I'm sold on the concept and will be trying a few other recipes like ginger beer and mead.

Pete

[Legion]

Reporting back, I've just opened my first attempt at cider and it is not bad at all. I used a generic apple juice from Woolies and added half a cup of dextrose as well as the yeast. I let it sit for 4 days in the warmest place in the house and then refrigerated it overnight to slow the fermentation right down.
The result was a lightly carbonated cloudy cider that is medium dry and IMO quite comparable to commercial ciders like Strongbow. It's certainly not in the league of the top quality scrumpy's but for the price it is outstanding.
Not knowing the alcohol content however, means that one must be cautious when imbibing but I'm not a big drinker and 1 or 2 glasses is the most I would be likely to consume at one time.
I'm sold on the concept and will be trying a few other recipes like ginger beer and mead.

Pete

Good work!. If you leave it for a bit longer (I was going for about 6 days) the alcohol will be a bit higher and the cider will be a bit dryer. Just experiment and see what you like. Also try the apple/raspberry, and the apple/black current juice. They are really nice. Just about anything works except citrus juice.

My mate made his own alcoholic ginger beer from scratch and it came out great.

[auk1124]

I bought what sounds like a similar American product called EZ-Caps, and I'm working on a couple of jugs of mead right now. But in the meantime I tried my hand at some watermelon wine, turned out pretty darned good:

1 carton Minute Maid watermelon punch (I doubt if this is available anywhere but the US): a blend of watermelon, pear and grape juice
1 1/2 cups sugar (I'll cut back on this next time)
1/2 teaspoon "EZ Caps" yeast (unknown dry wine yeast)

Fermented for 11 days, then chilled. Result is a sweet (maybe overly sweet) carbonated watermelon wine, moderate alcohol content.

Next time I'll cut back on the sugar a bit and ferment a full two weeks, see if I can get it a bit dryer. But the result at 11 days is certainly drinkable.