I'm brewing a Mangrove Jacks cider kit and it has started to stink. The first 2 days were fine, it was bubbling away nicely, no noticeable problems. Yesterday the temperature went a bit high in the brewing room and it was bubbling like crazy..every 2-3 seconds all day and night. Today the bubbling has eased off a little bit, bubbling every 4-5 seconds but now it smells bad. It's a sulfury smell like a mix between rotten vegtables, eggs. Is the batch ruined? Is there something I can do with copper to make it not stink or is this brew always gonna smell/taste rotten? If anyone has any ideas/opinions, I'd love to hear them, cheers.
I'm no cider expert, but fermenting any fruit juice will kick off Hydrogen Sulphide, it stinks! It's often referred to as rhino farts. The fact that you can smell it is probably a good thing, it means it's being expunged from your cider, what you don't want is to bottle while there's still H2S in the cider, you'll never get rid of it (I did this my first time around and had to pretend to everyone that I actually liked the smell of rotten eggs). Leave it for a few days and see if the smell is any better, regular fermentation should be enough to kick it out of solution and out through your airlock.
H2S or rotten egg gas (aka Hydrogen Sulphide to be techy) is a usual by product of cider fermentation, In natural ferments of simple pure AJ it can occur due to low nutrient levels. If you have some add a teaspoon of yeast nutient, if not no problem just wait, Cider making is a looooong sloooow process [like 6 months minimum]
HTH Will