Pasteurizing

Last night I opened one of my 32 ounce bottles and had to hold the cap on lightly to keep it from overflowing. I put it in the fridge to stop the yeast from multiplying and today I am pasteurizing it.
It had some sediment on the bottom so I racked it off into two 16 ounce bottles.

I think this was a good thing to do for two reasons. First, racking it off will prevent any flavor change that the cider will take on from sitting on it's lees. I did it because the amount of sediment was pretty thick (about a 1/4" or so). I had used fresh pressed apple juice to back sweeten it and this particular bottle got the last of the jug which had sediment in the bottom. It was the bottle that carbed up the fastest, too. So, I think it had quite a bit of natural yeast in that was activated as well. The second reason, was that the bottle from the fridge was cold and I thought it might break if I put it in the 190 degree water. I warmed up the two 16 ounce bottles with hot water before racking the cold cider into them.

Below is a photo of the cider in the 32 ounce bottle (in the foreground) before I racked it off.

I am also running a test on how long it takes the 32 ounce bottle to reach 140 F. I had read this post on HomeBrewTalk which advises this.

I have three bottles in my pressure canner right now. I am only using the pressure canner because it provides a cautionary measure against bottle bombs. I took out the pressure dial so steam can escape. It also gives me a little porthole to view the thermometer in the 32 ounce bottle I have in there. The other two bottles are the 16 ounce ones with the cider.

None of my other bottles of cider are carbonated enough yet. There are two more bottles that I back sweetened with fresh cider and three with honey.

So, I just checked the temp and it has been 7 min. It is up to 178 now. Shoot, I missed the 140 mark. Sorry, now I don't have results to share on how long it took to get there.

I think I will wait the remaining three minutes before I take the bottles out. (10 minutes is the recommended time by Pappers of the HomeBrewTalk forum whose method I am following.)

Now the bottles are out and I checked the temp of the 32 ounce bottle again. It is holding at 178.

Here's the finished product.