Recipe Type: Extract
Yeast: Nottingham
Yeast Starter: None
Batch Size (Gallons): 4
Original Gravity: 1.076
Final Gravity: 1.040
Color: Unfiltered Amber
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 3
Tasting Notes: Full bodied, sweet, hint of tartness, and keeps most of cider's original flavor.

So I was at the local orchard the other day, and decided to buy a few gallons of fresh (unfermented) cider to make hard cider. I gave it a taste and enjoyed it so much that I decided I wanted to brew it in a way that keeps as much of the original flavor as possible. Also, this recipe is a huge time saver, as it is ready in less than a week!

4 gallons fresh, unfiltered pressed apples (uv pasteurized)
1 1/4 lbs brown sugar
2 cinnamon sticks

1) Pour 3 1/2 gallons of juice into fermenter
2) Heat remaining half gallon with cinnamon sticks and brown sugar until sugar dissolves properly. Let cool to room temp.
3)Combine mixtures and mix vigorously to oxidize.
4)Hydrate and Pitch yeast.

-Let ferment for about 2-3 days, or until it hits 1.04.
-Bottle it. No need to rack of clear, this stuff is going to be cloudy no matter what you do to it, as it hasn't really fermented that far. it may help, however to give it a day in the fridge to get rid of excess yeast. I didn't do this though.

Let it sit in bottles for a day or so to carb, then bottle pasteurize. I did this by using my sanitize/rinse setting on my dishwasher of 10 minutes, but you can also do it on the stove (see stove-top pasteurization sticky).

Result:
A sweet, hard cider at about 5% abv that keeps a lot of original cider flavor, and is just a tad more tart and dry than the unfermented version. Definitely looks "rustic" due to its cloudiness. Cheers!