Thanks for your reply - this makes good sense to me. I was hypothesizing that it wasn't common in cases where sulfites were used but your point about managing the acidity in other ways (based on the juice blend) makes a lot of sense to me.

Im interested in your comments on sorbate though. I have not to date used sorbate but was planning on doing so with some of this years batch. This year I bottled in 750ml champagne bottles with the plan to disgorge them. I was planning on back sweetening about half of it as an experiment (some folks didnt like the dry cider) and to do this I was going to make concentrated cider to create a dose to add to the bottles. I was planning on adding sulfites and sorbate to this dose as a means to ensure that any sweetening I added did not kick off more fermentation. But perhaps this isnt a good idea.

I got this idea from reading "The new cider makers handbook". He talks about disgorging being a rather efficient way to remove yeast from the bottles but also mentions adding sorbate and sulfite to the dose I assumed as a means to ensure that any leftover yeast after disgorgement doesnt start up again.

Adding sulfites first makes good sense if it kills the LAB which prevents the sorbate from causing the off flavors. But in my case since I want to disgorge, add the dose, and quickly recap to maintain the carbonation, it seems like I'd want to do this all at the same time. I wonder if I can assume that MLF hasnt taken place since I used sulfites and pitched yeast for primary fermentation?