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First hard cider

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mhafer5723

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I'm looking to make a hard sweet Apple cider in the coming week and want to see if anyone has a good recipe I'm looking to do a 1 gallon batch. I'm getting a gallon of cider from my local farm. Any help will be appreciated

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But true "cider" is not very alcoholic. You don't add sugar to apple juice. You simply add yeast - or allow wild yeast to make a "scrumpy". It should compete with beer.
 
darigoni said:
Have you checked out this website?

http://howtomakehardcider.com/

If you want it to be sweet, it's either going to have to be high alcohol (exceeding the limit of the yeast) or you will have to use chemicals to stabilize and then back sweeten.
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Cider doesn't reach alcohol levels that exceed any yeast's limits. Sweet cider is done as you said - stabilize and sweeten at bottling time. If you want both carbonation and sweet you need to take other measures - kegging, non-fermentable sweetener (Xylitol etc) or bottle pasteurizing.

That web page is what got me started a few years back. I'd heard that it had been hacked a year or so ago, hopefully it's clean now. But the author covers the subject in excellent detail for a beginner.
 
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My other question is if I do 1 gallon of cider can I add corn sugar in the fermentation?

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At some point, if you add honey to the fermentation, you are talking about a Cyser and not Hard Cider. I guess I would make Hard Cider, stabilize, and then add honey to bring up the sweetness level to your liking.
 
Thank you for the advice that is what I'll do worry about sweetening later

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mhafer5723 said:
Thank you for the advice that is what I'll do worry about sweetening later

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Click to expand...

If your biggest interest is making something that taste good. And has a little bit of mouthfeel. Then adding honey is the way. Adding sugar could also taste good. But at your gravity it will be extremely watery.
Ans as correctly stated above Added honey will be a mead. Added sugar, a cider. Although technically I believe a mead needs to have 51, or more % of the sugar from honey to be a mead.
 
and cider doesn't need a gram of added sugar to be a cider. Bottom line, if you have good juice pressed from apples that were grown for cider and not for table apples then adding sugar simply spoils the juice. And if the apples were grown for table apples than adding sugar won't improve the cider. It'll just boost the ABV. If that's what you want that's fine but cider is a session drink. It should be low in alcohol (about 5 or 6%). When you up that to about 10- 12% you are making a wine, not a session beverage. Cider competes with beer not with wine. :3some:
 
If the cider's not pasteurized, then just leave it on the counter for a couple of days, wait for the fizz, then drink it. :-) Also quite a tasty drink. Fizzy, sweet, and easy to make.

In the past, I've done a cider somewhat like my meads; add yeast (IIRC I used a yeast marketed to cider), nutrient, ferment, then bottle condition. Nothing complex or refined. That batch came from a local farmer, and it was a decent hard cider; the sugars fermented out and it had a tartness that I like, but wasn't a perfect taste for me. I wanted something with a richer mouthfeel.

Hard ciders need a blend of apples that you won't have in your farm cider; it incorporates apples that have astringent and bittering properties as well as the sweet. I know my above method was pretty ad-hoc. I've been waiting for my cider apple trees to mature so that I can get a better blend of fruits to play more, so I can really get a good technique. I plan to spend a good deal of time blending the juice presses before fermenting, to get the proper ratio for my personal tastes.

Honey or sugar will work to sweeten. Local honey will add flavors to the final drink, sugar will stay out of your taste buds.
 
I just checked my cider today and it smelled I used a gallon of pasteurized but non preservative local cider and the yeast was cote do Blancs does this yeast make cider smell bad?

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Did you rehydrate the yeast? Use temp control? Feed it nutrients? If no. Then yes>
 
Hi mhafer5723,
Some yeasts will produce a great deal of hydrogen sulfide - (smells like rotten eggs) and all yeast will produce hydrogen sulfide if you stress the yeast. The production of hydrogen sulfide - in my book - always highlights poor planning and poor protocol. OK - but you can help remove the gas by de-gassing the cider... If that does not work you may want to rack the cider through copper scrubbing wool (Goes without saying but you need to sanitize the scrubber first). Not certain , but I think your choice of yeast is one that is listed as a "moderate" rather than a "low" producer of hydrogen sulfide. For cider - and others may disagree - I would recommend 71B. That yeast has a special affinity for malic acid... it converts about 40% of the malic in apple juice into a less harsh lactic acid....
 
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