Core and peels base help?

[Jared77]

Been lurking for a while and reading everything I can before taking the plunge.

We make quite a bit of homemade apple sauce and I always save the cores and peels to make apple jelly.

I simmer them with a little bit of apple juice (Matt's brand) to prevent them from scorching in the pot. These are left to simmer the whole time I make apple sauce.

Then I strain off the peels and cores, keep the juice and make apple jelly with it. It's cloudy like fresh pressed apple cider but thin like a juice.

Last night while i was straining off another batch of cores and peels.....well that got the wheels turning. I started to wonder about making apple wine with the juice I just made.

I know Ill need to add sugar but can I use the homemade juice as a foundation? Would it be "applely" enough or should I stick with the off the shelf juice? The picture is the stained juice in case there was any questions.

I assume I'd have to get SG of each batch of juice before adding sugar to get to the recipes target SG since it's fruit and not a commercial mix right?

One last question. I add a couple Cinnamon sticks to the cores and peels when I simmer them to add flavor to the jelly.

Is that going to cause an issue during fermentation or should I leave them out and add them to the secondary like I've seen on a recipe posted on this forum?

Was looking good at the apfelwein recipe or Pappy's Public Cider to do this with. Figure start simple and go from there. Goal is a easy drinking still apple cider/wine/whatever they are called but they sound really good.

Suggestions? Opinions?

I really appreciate the help on this.

P.S. If anybody wants the jelly recipe simply Google Apple Scrap Jelly it's on the Food.com website. Makes a killer PB&J

 

[MrFancyPlants]

I would say add it to some juice and ferment and see how it turns out. I would think the simmering would help to make the sugars more complex and add some body to the finished cider. The cinnamon might become more assertive once the majority of the sugars have fermented out, but you'll also be diluting when you add to the rest of juice for fermentation. So, I would stick to your existing recipe for now and adjust based on the results. I'd try a glass.

 

[SmokeyMcBong]

It might be a good idea to ad some pectic enzyme to your juice. Boiling can set the apple pectins which will make it difficult for your apple wine to clear. If you don't care about cloudiness, don't worry about the enzyme....

 

[Jared77]

I appreciate the heads up on the pectin enzymes. Are those dosed by the gallon?

 

[SmokeyMcBong]

I can't remember the dose right now but it is so much powder per gallon. Google will tell you. But again, that's just for clairity. If you don't care about clear cider, don't even worry about the enzyme...