Apple Cider

This is what I posted to an Aussie coeliac list a couple of months ago:

The simple answer is to ferment the juice of apples. That's all cider is: fermented apple juice. Similarly, you can ferment the juice of pears and get perry.

You can do this quite easily by adding a wine or ale yeast, or even a cider yeast, to good quality bottled juice. If you do this, be sure to get juice with no preservatives, as preservatives will most likely prevent fermentation (that's why they are there). Pasteurised juice is OK though. Better cider comes from apple varieties that you can't get in the vege shops though, but I'll tell you about that later.

Note that I said good quality. There has to be some apple flavour there above the sugar, or all you will get is a sharp, tangy alcoholic drink. Try to avoid reconstituted apple juice concentrate (which is what most of the apple juice in the supermarket is). Remember that fermentation will remove all of the sugar, and convert it to alcohol. If you want it sweet, it's hard work. Easier is to make it dry and add some apple juice to your glass :)

For equipment, you need the following:

• a fermenter; e.g. a home brew kit, or a large plastic bucket

• an airlock

The easiest way to go is buy a fermenter from a home brew shop. It will look something like this:

If you're going to get serious about it, you'll also want:

• a hydrometer (measures how much sugar (including fructose) is there)

• a bottle capper (get a bench-top model!)

• a spare fridge, even a dead one, for temperature control

• some glass carboys or demijohns

I've made a nice, crisp, dry cider from the apple juice from Bilpin in the Blue Mountains, NSW. I added a wine yeast (Lalvin EC-1118) that I bought from a home brew shop. First I put the apple juice in a fermenter, then I added the yeast, and screwed the top on the fermenter with an airlock. It fermented for about 2 weeks, then I bottled it in old beer bottles with crown caps. It was quite rough for a few months, but after about 6 months it was nice, crisp and dry.

My best cider to date was made with a mix of bottled juice and cider apples that I put through my fruit juicer. I had to drive to Bilpin to get cider apples, because you can't find them in the shops! Ask your local orchards if they have any, you might be lucky. The varieties I used were:

• Breakwell's Seedling

• Kingston Black

• Foxwhelp

• Michelin

I juiced all the cider apples, and some Gala apples (eating apples, good for sugar), added the bottled juice, and pitched a wine yeast: Lalvin D-47. It fermented for about a month, and rested in a glass carboy for another month, before I bottled it with a little sugar to make it bubbly. After about 6 months in the bottle, it was ready to drink, and tastes like a good wine but with apple character. Approximately 6.5% alcohol by volume.

Here are some web sites about making cider:

Shops that can sell you the equipment and yeast and other bits:

cheers, Ross.

-- Ross McKay, WebAware Pty Ltd "The lawn could stand another mowing; funny, I don't even care"

- Elvis Costello