Hi, I’m thinking of putting 15 gallons of homemade hard cider into a used beer keg in order to carbonate and serve it. Before I do, I’d really appreciate any suggestions and/or answers to these tw0 questions–
How do I transfer the cider into the keg?
I am planning to add priming sugar to the cider once it’s in the keg to create the carbonation. Will this work?
I’d really appreciate any suggestions/answers/advice that you have. Thanks in advance!
Peter
I assume you are talking about a 15 gallon Sanke keg? The common type used buy Bud/Miller/Coors and most other commercial breweries.
Search the internet on how to remove the spear from the keg. You need to then clean and sanitize the inside. Knowing if you have it cleaned well is the hard part. The soda (conry) kegs are a better option for this.
Yes you can add sugar to carbonate the cider. If the yeast have not reached their alcohol tolerance.
Nighthwawk, thank you! I was talking about a sanke keg. I don’t have access to a corny keg. Do you have any suggestions on how to clean it? It will have previously been used for beer.
You can clean it with a PBW/Oxyclean soak or in a sodium hydroxide solution.
Again, the hard part is seeing inside to tell if it is clean.
With the PBW cleaning, you can put a rag inside and swirl it around to help clean it.
With the sodium hydroxide, just splashing around the liquid after it sits for 4-5 hours will remove everything.
Thank you!
It is difficult to see if Its clean, but a flashlight and telescoping inspection mirror help a lot with this. As recommended give it a good PBW, NaOH or oxyclean soak and take a look.
I sometimes ferment in sankes and I like to place about half a gallon of water in it and boil for 10 minutes while Im brewing sanitize.
