Has anyone made a peach hard cider? (from real peaches)
 

Here in Utah I have access to a plethora of real peaches that are super sweet. After all the jams, jellies, preserves, and pies I still have a ton left over and want to make some cider. There's so much sugar I'm afraid of the final gravity. Thoughts?

It would be possible to ferment a normal apple cider, then add peaches to the secondary to get a peachy flavour? You should look up some recipes on here for peach wines, they look pretty good and I've got a few that I'm planning to do on back-log.

Peaches + Yeast nutrient + Yeast = Peach wine....

Freezing helps -- I didn't freeze, but rather ground up the pitted peaches in the blender.

The other suggestion I have read is to boil a banana (No peel) and add the juice to the must to add some Body....

Don't add raw bananas unless you want Bud-Light Peach cider.... Fresh bananas are high in Alpha Amalyse enzyme -- which converts starches to sugars.... and subsequently converts everything that would add "Body" into things that ferment....

Be sure to remove ALL pits before you do this...
Peeling isn't necessary -- and the peels actually add some peach essence...

Yeast wise -- the "Standard" in Jack Keller's website is Montrachet or Champagne yeast. Folks also use EC-1118, and I am sure a Clean fermenting Ale yeast like Nottingham would do great and not create off flavors...

I used Montrachet on #1 batch.... my next batch will be with a slower fermenting Ale yeast or EC-1118... as the hard/fast fermenting wine yeasts seem to blow out all the flavors.... I personally would NOT use bread yeast for the same reason... The whole basement smelled like peaches for 3 days while I was fermenting, but the new wine only had a hint of peach essence....

Thanks

John

So from what I've found out making cider just from peaches isn't a good idea, it's to thin?

You can always add some tannin in.

Why isn't it a good idea?
Lots of people do it just fine.....

Since you already *HAVE* 10-billion peaches, it's a perfect opportunity... Think of it as the Bird in the Hand..... especially vs letting them rot on the ground....

The thing with the Banana is to add a little better mouth feel -- The water off of 1 boiled banana isn't going to make the Peach wine taste like bananas....

Gravity wise -- An exceptionally flavorful ripe peach runs about 17 brix with our "Average" full ripe peaches running at around 13 brix.... Compare this to a "Standard" wine grape that runs around 23 brix..... The peach cider may end up fermenting out at 7% or so -- which isn't super duper high.

You could easily cold crash it early to leave you with a good sweetness + peach flavor and still have 5% alcohol for a decent cider....

The current batch of peach mush fermenting in my basement started out at 13 brix, and I added sugar to bring it up to 15 brix.
I pitched EC-1118 and it is fermenting beautifully right now... Slowly percolating away and *NOT* blowing all the wonderful Peach aroma out of the wine like the Montrachet did.

Thanks

John