I've got 17L of cider which is coming up on 3 weeks in the FV. I gather minimising airspace is important after fermentation so it should be racked and then either be bottled or otherwise stored to mature rather than leaving in another FV. I'm splitting it with a friend who provided the apples, I have glass bottles ready to go but he hasn't got his together yet and also isn't sure if he wants to carbonate it or not (I do with mine).
I don't own DJs so for the sake of a quid was considering just buying 4 2L Tesco Value water/lemonade bottles for a grand total of about a quid, and storing his in these while he builds up a collection of bottles - maybe a couple of months. I imagine then we'd pour/syphon them back into a bottling bucket to remove additional sediment and bottle as normal.
a)I assume it is absolutely fine to store cider flat for some time and then prime+rebottle later on? The yeast will come back to life? Will maturation time be re-set upon priming or can I mature for a few months flat and then carbonate for a few weeks and consume?
b)Are these type of bottles fine to use? There's no skunking with cider but I assume they should still be kept somewhere dim and clean?
I'm kind of wondering if I might just do this with all of it, use a bunch of these as small DJs and bottle mine after a week or two, and my mate's in a couple of months.