newbie hard-cider experiment

[krecneps]

i'm new to the homebrew realm.
back in late october, i decided to try a batch of hard cider using a couple half gallon jugs of organic apple cider- no preservatives/additives. just apples.
i heated the juice, pitched a lalvin yeast with some nutrients and let it ferment for nearly 2 weeks, until it read 1.000 [which was around 8% abv, i believe]
i then racked into a new 1 gallon jug and let it sit.
well, here it is almost 2 months later. i guess i didnt realize it had been so long.
tonight i siphoned the jug into 2 smaller jugs.
upon sampling, it is pretty dry. but there is also sort of a strange unappealing, kind of bland funky flavor. and a little harsh alcoholic taste. if swallowed immediately, it's not very noticeable, but if it's rolled around on the pallet for a few seconds, it's pretty apparent.
just wondering if maybe i aged it for too long, because when i first racked it it tasted okay.
or, could it be the juice i used, or maybe the lalvin d47. or both?
or, should i have stoped ferment before it finished out?
any input would be awesome.
thanks everyone!
spencer.

 

[BierSnob]

Just bottle it when it clears and then age it for about a year. The harsh alcohol flavor should disipate over time.

 

[fatbloke]

Or it could easily be related to a point you made in the first post......

The word "Heated".......

You should never heat apple juice. You get a "cooked" flavour if you do (and no I don't know what the pasteurisation temp might be - or whether it's treated differently from heating to pasteurise it, like ozone or something).

As BierSnob points out, you may be lucky enough for it to age out. Maybe not....

p.s. Oh and ask a moderator/admin to move this from the mead forum to the Cider forum as it doesn't have anything to do with honey/mead.......