First home brew

dj_trouble1982

My partner as just bought me a cider kit, and rather then rush things I decided to read up a little first. I'm thinking that bottling the cider would be my best option as I go through stages of drinking and not, and also like my beer ice cold. I've already decided I'm going to buy a little bottler before I start. Can u recommend best bottles to use? Is it better to use smaller or larger bottles, glass or plastic etc, and also can I use normal pop/beer bottles (plastic). If I bought replacement lids would this work? Any advice in general would be much appreciated, I'm a fan of ciders like old English and thatchers gold. Thanks for your time.

HBO_Staff

Bottling is often best for lagers and ciders, they can be popped in the fridge to chill them down, and can be easily transported. You don't have to worry about the bottles letting air in, which if you don't make sure your barrel is sealed can cause a problem. Bottles certainly are more flexible, but on the negative side, filling them is a longer job than just syphoning it all over into a barrel! We bottle many brews, and can't recommend the 'little bottler' highly enough, it's one of our favourite gadgets - it is just easy and quick, and really takes the hard work out of filling bottles. You can fill bottles one handed and without spilling any valuable brew!

There are many bottles to choose from, PET plastic is in many ways better than glass, it is safer, cannot shatter if dropped, is lighter and cheaper than glass. There are those that prefer glass, but often people buy based on price and value, so plastic is the most popular. You can get them in 500ml and 1 litre sizes, it's personal preference, and various colours, it's best to get a coloured bottle to protect the contents from light. You can use your old pop/beer bottles, just make sure any bottles you use are suitable for holding pressure, as a general rule, if it had a fizzy drink in before then it is suitable for beer and cider. Screw caps and metal crown caps are available to re-seal them if needed.Our favourites are the PET plastic crown cap bottles, they are exclusive to us here at Home Brew Online and are great - they are cheap, can be re-used many times, and offer the safety and benefits of plastic over glass, but can be capped with a metal crown cap. The beauty of this is that the caps are fitted with a capper and seal the bottles to look exactly like the beer bottles you buy in the shops/pubs, and are opened with a bottle opener in the same way, they just make the bottles look more professional, click on this link to see what you think;

http://home-brew-online.myshopify.com/collections/equipment/products/crown-pet-plastic-500ml-bottles-caps

Most of the ciders are very popular, with repeat cutomers on them all, if you want flavoured cider then the 'on the rocks' range is good, otherwise you could try any, the Autumn Blush premium kit is excellent and also the Brewmaker Cider and we sell a lot of John Bull too. If you scroll down to the bottom of the page on each item there are genuine customer reviews which can help to decide which ones to try based on other peoples experience of them 

dj_trouble1982

Hi thanks for the reply I've signed up for another forum and have been reading into different stuff a lot, I've seen a few more bits on the site I will hopefully be purchasing next week. Really like the look of the bottles and seem pretty cheap to. I'll also be purchasing the fv which comes with the little bottler included. Plus yeast and a few more bits for turbo ciders etc