Hello everyone. I am about to make another cider and had a question regarding honey. I am thinking of skipping the sugar and only using honey. Its a spiced cider so I think it will turn out nice. Has anyone done this before and if so, what were the results? Instead of 2 lbs of sugar did you just do 2 pounds of honey? Whats the best ratio for a 6 gallon batch? Thanks!
One ounce of table sugar would have the same fermentability as 1.34 ounces of honey using NBs’ carbonation calculator algorithm. All honey is not the same though. Some honey will be less or more fermentable per pound because of the variable volume of water in the honey. Using the 1.0:1.34 ratio should be close enough to not notice an ABV variation.
Honey ferments out so well you may not notice any honey flavor especially being spiced.
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Thanks for the info flars. Can you link me that algorithm? I was searching here before I posted but didnt seem to find it. Again… Thank you very much for the assist here.
This is the link to the carbonation calculator. It may be a carbonation calculator but can used for other purposes also.
Useless trivia… cider made with the addition of honey is known as a cyser.
I’ve done it a few times. Because apple juice doesn’t have a whole lot of flavor once the sugar is gone, a 2# honey addition should be quite noticeable, especially if you ferment it dry. If you like dry mead, then you’ll enjoy it. But the apple juice can be pretty tart.
Make sure you use some yeast nutrient or energizer, as both the cider and the honey are a barren wasteland for nutrients if you’re a yeast cell.
What is cider called when the honey completely replaces the added sugar? 
So according to all this info I should be able to use just about 2.75 lbs of honey to get a fairly even crossover. That seems completely doable to me.
Thanks again for all your help guys
That is a very good stuff to bring up about how these two ferment out, Pork Chop. I’ve had an idea to use a RO gizmo to remove the water from the apple juice, then to add back to a desired ABV… I realize you can’t get an unlimited amount of alcohol, yet maybe if you could get to, say 6.5% with a full apple flavor… (you can use your imagination here) Sneezles61
