so, my first attempt at hard lemonade produced a pretty tasty (and strong) beverage...it wasn't really what I'd call hard lemonade, more like lemonpagne... champagne yeast definitely added some flavor. turned out really sour too, had to backsweeten.

anyway, I tweaked the original recipe and decided to try out this experiment using 4 different yeasts.



the updated recipe I came up with for 4 gals was:

8 cans frozen lemonade concentrate
3# light DME
1# lactose (unfermentable- hoping to keep some sweetness and mouthfeel without having to backsweeten)
1# white sugar
1/2 tsp wyeast nutrient
1/2 tsp irish moss (I had a packet that was free with something I ordered, not sure if it will do anything in this, but won't hurt)

I boiled the DME and lactose in 3 gal of water for 60min. Added the yeast nutrient, irish moss, and white sugar 10min. before the end of the boil. added the frozen lemonade at flameout. chilled and added ice and water to bring my volume to just over 4 gal.

from there I separated the "wort" into 4-1gal glass jugs and pitched 4 different yeasts:

Safale-05
Safale-04
Safbrew-T58 (2 packets because they expired in july)
Saflager-33 (2 packets becuase they expired in april)

the T58 and 33 started fermenting vigorously right away (the 58 needed a blowoff tube), the 04 followed about 1 1/2 hrs later, and the 05 took about 3 hours to really start moving. as of now they have all been steadily fermenting for 48+hrs at an ambient temp of 74F. (it's august and 101F outside, what do you do?). the T58 smells very similar to the last batch I made at this point, the 33 and 05 smell more citrusy, the 04 doesn't really have a strong smell to it yet.

I'll post more in a few days.

-kris

(oh, I have no idea what the OG was because I forgot to get the frackinometer from bake...but I'm more concerned with the flavors created by the use of different yeasts on this anyway.)

Also, I added a new addition to the keezer.