Cider Recipes

[MrsEggy]

Hello,
I am very new to brewing. My husband and I just brewed our first beer the other day, it's currently in our carboy fermenting. I'd like to start a cider today. Anyone have a fairly easy recipe to get me started? I don't have fresh apples or access to an orchard. So I'll need to buy store bought cider with no preservatives and not pasteurized to make it. (Not exactly ideal)
Thanks for the help.
-MrsEgg

 

[Yooper]

I'm starting a new cider today.

My recipe is:
Apple cider
yeast



Seriously, it's that simple oftentimes. I am using cider that I pressed from fresh tart apples last week, then sulfited and frozen until today. I thawed the juice, put it in a sanitized carboy and added S04 dry ale yeast.

The best tasting cider makes the best hard cider, but sometimes you just have to go with what you can find, so store-bought is fine.

I used my hydrometer to take a sample of the juice, and got 1.048. That's fine with me, and will make a 5.5% ABV cider. If I wanted a higher alcohol level, I would add some sugar to boost up the alcohol. Since sugar ferments out, it doesn't sweeten the finished cider. That comes later, if you want to sweeten it.

I'm not a fan of fermented brown sugar, so I don't use it but others do. Sometimes if a juice is sort of bland, you can add some acid blend to it to provide some tartness, or some powdered wine tannin to give it some "bite"- but often the best place to start is with a basic juice/yeast cider.

 

[5WTFLYBUM]

A week into my first cider. I used 3 gallons of Gravenstien fresh pressed, 2 gallons of mixed variety fresh pressed, 1lb brown sugar, 5 grams of yeast nutrient, and Mangrove Jack's M02 yeast. I also plan to use a can of frozen concentrate to prime at bottling.
FDA mandates that if it is sold in the store it has to be pasteurized if I am remembering right.
Good luck and have fun!

 

[MrsEggy]

Thanks for the help. Today on our way to take my daughter to the pumpkin patch we passed by a local company selling fruit and they had apple cider with no preservatives or additives. I think I got lucky.

 

[ThorGodOfThunder]

My recipe, which is very popular amongst my friends, is simple as well.

Cider
Yeast
backsweeten with brown sugar

I'll give you a little more detail
I press my own cider, mostly staymans, but with a few red delicious. I don't pasteurize or filter (I have a coarse filter I use during the pressing, but it only keeps out big chunks), just plain cider. I pitch a quart-size starter of ec-1118 and let it ferment a little cooler (low 60s) so it stays slow.

I let it ferment dry, then backsweeten with brown sugar to about 1.018 after I've killed off the yeast. I keg so if you want to bottle-carb you'll need to do something else.

Thats it. Its simple and delicious. It tastes like a fresh, tart apple and you can barely taste the alcohol even though it comes in at 6%. It never lasts long.

I don't like juice, I don't like concentrate. I don't care for anything except pure, raw cider.

 

[TheHausofPain]

Do you heat up the raw cider to kill off any bacteria prior to fermentation? I just purchased 6 gal of fresh cider from a local orchard and I am wondering if this is a necessary step.

 

[5WTFLYBUM]

You can heat pasteurize. You don't have to though. You can use Cambden to kill the natural yeasts and such. Then after adding it wait for 24 - 48 hours for it to dissipate. Then you add your sugar, yeast and nutrient. Nutrient and sugar are up to you.