Ever since my last trip to the UK, I have fallen in love with a good dry English cider. It has become my goal ever sense to re-create a English-style cider using store-bought materials. After adding different forms of tannin and acid, using all sorts of ale yeasts to ferment the juice, and I think I have come up with a great recipe that pretty much anyone can do, getting a quaffable re-creation of a cider one could get across the pond. Finishes dry to off-dry, around 1.002, 6.4% abv. Taste is most comparable to the Samual Smith Organic Cider you can get here in the states.

Graham's English Cider
5 gallons Treetop (or equivalent) Apple Juice
4 black teabags (English or Irish Breakfast)
3 key limes (or one regular lime)
1 pack s-04 yeast
(yeast nutrients as needed)

Directions
Add juice of lime(s) to 3 cups of water, bring to a boil then turn off heat. Steep teabags for 7-10 mins, cool for a few mins then add to carboy. Add nutrients and juice into carboy with an aggressive pour to help aerate the juice. Add yeast, put an airlock on then place in a cool (60F-70F) environment.

Primary for one month, then rack to secondary, topping off with juice. Leave in secondary until crystal clear (usually 2-3 months or so from pitching) then bottle with 4oz priming sugar.

Takes about a month to carbonate, tastes good after 3 months, but just gets better with age. I usually start opening bottles about 5 months after pitching.

Here's a glass after a good amount of aging, so you can see how clear it gets


Just as a note, I've gotten into the habit of just starting a batch of this cider every time I brew using a bit of the same yeast as the beer, and have had great success with WLP005, WLP023, WLP026, WLP028, WLP037, WLP775 and nottingham, however these all seem to take longer to age and clear compared to the s-04, but are all slightly different in flavor profile, I'm sure any other english yeast would work great in this as well.

Cheers!