First Try Cider

[agrtek]

The parent's liked it. Went through about a 1/4 gallon during dinner tonight. I call: Success!!

 

[Jesse17]

As a reminder, here's my recipe:

Juice: 4 gal. Tree Top 100% Juice Apple Cider
1 gal. Florida’s Natural Premium 100% Pure Apple Juice
Yeast: Red Star Pasteur Champagne
Sugar: 2 LBS. Western Family Brown Sugar
Priming: 8 oz. Tree Top apple juice concentrate (116 g. sugar)

Primary: 15 Days 68° F.
Secondary: 21 Days 68° F.

After that, I bottled it with the apple juice concentrate for priming. I opened a bottle on Christmas (Day 10 in bottle) and it was awlful. I had to add apple juice to get it down. VERY dry and tart. No carb at all.

Then today (Day 21 in bottle) it tasted a little better. Very little carb, still quite tart, but you could kind of taste some apple flavor, and it wasn't quite as dry, but still dry.

Though it's still not verry good, I can see the difference in the last 11 days, and can't wait to try it again in a few weeks. It is also 8.2% abv so 15 min. after the bottle I drank today, I'm feeling warm and fuzzy

 

[Jesse17]

You were too late my friend, I added another 2lbs of sugar and liberal squirt of honey and a table spoon of vanilla extract, fermentation is going at a nice rate again (bubbles freely flowing up all sides of the fermenter), now on to x-mas!

Agrtek, How is your cider these days? I'm curious as to how it has conditioned/tastes by now.

Mine (which was very similar to yours before you added the above) has finally mellowed out to the point that I actually like it. I've tried a bottle every 2 weeks or so, and the bottle I drank yesterday, made me chill a six pack for tonight.

It's nicely carbed, which I think counters the dryness well. It has a kind of tart, with a hint of apple, bubbly taste. And I like it quite a bit. In fact, I did my second batch without any sugar, and with Wyeast 4766 because I disliked the dryness so much on this first batch, but now the second batch tastes watery in comparison.

I like the first batch (with 5 gal. juice, 2 lbs. brown sugar, and Pasteur Champagne yeast) well enough that I'm going to do another the same way.

 

[agrtek]

Agrtek, How is your cider these days? I'm curious as to how it has conditioned/tastes by now.

Mine (which was very similar to yours before you added the above) has finally mellowed out to the point that I actually like it. I've tried a bottle every 2 weeks or so, and the bottle I drank yesterday, made me chill a six pack for tonight.

It's nicely carbed, which I think counters the dryness well. It has a kind of tart, with a hint of apple, bubbly taste. And I like it quite a bit. In fact, I did my second batch without any sugar, and with Wyeast 4766 because I disliked the dryness so much on this first batch, but now the second batch tastes watery in comparison.

I like the first batch (with 5 gal. juice, 2 lbs. brown sugar, and Pasteur Champagne yeast) well enough that I'm going to do another the same way.

2 gallons were good and the remaining three I'm calling contamination, they went sour

I have some one gallon jugs now so I'm gonna try some different juices.

 

[waterkc]

I can't wait to give this a try, I am going to shoot for a English Ale Yeast and see what happens. I have always enjoyed woodpeckers Hard Draft Cider. So I am hoping to reproduce something close to that.

Thanks for the info. More to come as I figure it out.

 

[67coupe390]

When I make my "hooch wines" I use an extra cup (per gallon) of sugar to make it more sweet. I also use the 1118 yeast and its good and strong but not as dry. Hope I helped. Have fun!!!