So glad you did this! Cider making is SO friggin easy and you can really get creative. I have experimented slightly with water salts, I found adding more gypsum can increase that apparent apple-crispness. But I've made many great ones without doing that. And of course thank you for the shoutout man!
Cider is just apple juice. Get your apple juice with windfalls from an orchard . Fill fermenter with juice throw in windfalls and leave to ferment . Tap into a barrel , jugs or bottles . The windfalls have the right yeasts to ferment the sugars . No water , no salts , no yeast and no hops . That's it . Apples . Somerset redstreaks, a mix of crabs , cookers and deserts . Try different varieties.
Nottingham is my cider yeast. I haven’t liked the couple times I’ve used Belle Saison and S-04. Just made a seasonal cider where I simmered whole cranberries, cinnamon, and chopped ginger ….strained and added to keg. I stabilize my cider and stop fermentation. I taste the cider and backsweeten with thawed apple juice concentrate and a few ml of 88% acid to tart it up a bit if needed. In the summer I use the basic cider process and add several habeneros that I soak in vodka. I tend to carb that one a bit spritz-y-er because I feel it adds to the overall drinking experience.
This looks wonderful. I’ve done some thing very similar by making a hop extract and just adding a few drops to my glass so that way I could have a holiday spice (cinnamon and cloves) cider a hopped cider, etc., from one batch. Also, I’ve made a super easy graf with dry malt extract and it was super easy and even better with the body and head retention.
Well done Steve, I make between 35 & 40 gallon of 9.6% cider a year from pressed cookers & eaters. Been hopping up to 15 gall for a few years now, tried citra, simcoe, & endeavor, all very well flavoured and recommended. I bottle all, so I back sweeten with xylitol (birch sap sugar), to avoid killing the yeast. Keep up the good work.
I'm gonna try doing cider with Crystal one day! I can really see it working with it's aromas of woods, green, floral and fruity with herb and spice notes of cinnamon, nutmeg and black pepper
Finished a hard cider a few weeks ago and just started another batch on Monday because it’s almost gone! I used Fermentis AB-1 and left it out at room temp to ferment (about 78°). Cold crashed, campden and potassium sorbate to bottom of keg and then racked cider on top. I made a tea of hibiscus and ginger which I added a day later. Great color and flavor! Appreciate all the advice/videos!
In the UK, Tropicana pressed apple juice and Mangrove Jack cider yeast is the simplest way to make tasty hard cider. You do however have to check the OG and maybe add some brewing sugar (dextrose etc) to make sure it gets the 6%+ you want for a good dry cider. One thing I would like to add is that if you leave it for a couple or a few months the flavour gets much better. Thanks for another great video 😀
Just finished making an apple and strawberry cider. So so easy!! 17L juice, 3Kg frozen strawberries. Boil the strawberries in some juice, mash em,strain em and chuck it all in the fermenter with some voss.........that's it. Excellent drink!
I've done one a couple times with just apple juice and 5 or so of those cans of frozen cranberry juice concentrate and champagne yeast, makes a nice 10% sipper that I used for New Years at home a couple years.
Great video as always. I've been doing ciders for years, my wife loves them and happy wife = happy life! I have found that my 3 local supermarket chains cheapest options have no preservatives so $1 AUD per litre for a 20 litre batch. I drop in S04 and a little yeast nutrient. Once it's effectively finished I throw in a half teaspoon each of potassium(or sodium) sorbate and potassium metabisulphate to stop fermentation and stabilise. At this point I find it comes out so dry it might as well be white wine so I will then use about 0.5kg table sugar (adjust depending on the other flavourings), 1kg of frozen fruit and or 1 Litre of either juice, the 2 I have running at the moment will be Guava, the other will be Pineapple, Coconut water and mango. I will throw it all on a pot and cook to reduce the volume and make sure everything is combined then blend and pour into the fermenter through a sieve. I then keg and carbonate. It might sound a bit sweet but in a 19L keg it really just takes it from "so dry it might as well be white wine" to "wow that's really nice and not too sweat" N.B. This is an Australian variant, cider here isn't an Autumn, warming thing, it is a Summer day pre session or BBQ type drink
I made one hoppy cider so far. One of my friends wants several bottles and I’ve got several compliments as well. Planning on doing another batch tomorrow the same way for them and a different way for me. 😁
Cider making is so much fun! My go-to juice is Tree Top and WY1968. Typical OG is 1.053 and FG is right around 1.004. So good, going to DH my next batch with Tettnanger
Great video. I make ciders with store brand apple juice and Nottingham yeast. The nice thing is you can use each bottle of apple juice as a small starter. I pour half of one of them out and pitch the yeast in that quart. Then after 24 hours blend in a couple more bottles with that quart by pouring back and forth a few times. After a week fermenting in all of your individual bottles, I throw them together in a carboy and save, a bottle with 1 quart of yeast and juice in the refrigerator to be the starter for the next batch of cider. Just make sure to leave the cap loose because it will continue to ferment and add pressure. I back sweeten by adding potassium metabisulfate and a day later I add a can of apple juice concentrate. You can add cinnamon, caramel, or any other flavor you want to the keg. You can make cranberry apple cider with store brand cranberry juice cocktail and cranberry juice concentrate.
We live at the end of an orchard. I been brewing ales, lagers and making wine for over 40 years. This will be my fourth season making cider and it has turned out great. I just use straight apples. Scratting and pressing the apples takes a bit of time to get the volume of apple juice required, using apple juice would be faster, I wonder what OG it dials in at? I pressure fermented at 10psi with a generic cider yeast for two weeks, then pressure transfered the 17L of cider into a corny. Its been sitting in the fridge with 10psi CO2 plugged into it whilst its finishing. so far, wee samples have shown its very clear, crisp and appley. Saving it for Christmas and ( if my counterpressure bottle filler arrives before its finished ) I will bottle some to give to friends and store a little for summer. For me its a seasonal thing cos we have so many apples happening at once, my technique is improving each year. Dry hopping is something i had not considered. It was fermented down to 0.998 came in at 6.6% bottoms up.
This is why I homebrew!! You can brew whatever u want to drink!! A beautiful hopped hard apple cider! 🍎 Or a mango lager..or apple barley wine...🍷 or just wine.. Also!! Just used mosaic in my 5gal apple cider too!! Its a great hop for it!! P.S. you can never go wrong with throwing a stick of cinnamon in with it...!!
I did 10 gallons this fall using juice from the final pressing from a local orchard. I didn't pasteurize. I did boil some yeast nutrient to add to both. In one batch I pitched Lallemand Farmhouse and in the other I didn't pitch anything. I left it to ferment using what was already present in the juice. Both fermented out very well without any off flavour. Still have lots. I'm going to do some dry hopping now!
I made cider 2 times. First was with wine yeast and it tasted super sharp at first. After aging for 1 year it was by far the best. Doesnt taste as dry after aging. Second was with kveik in summer and was very good already straight after fermentation. What really helps cider is oakchips!
If you do this again, consider a multiple split batch where you use different hops. I think an intense piney hop would be great, but also like your blanc idea..hell, make a tincture of spruce tips or other flavors to add..everything sounds interesting! Anyway, good episode! Drinking a Bell's Hopslam as I watch..great beer, with great power lol.
Your theory was right, I had some Hallertau blanc for another brew with some leftovers and took up your idea to dry hop a cider with that. It tastes like a delicious dry white wine/cider hybrid!
My favourite yeast is English Ale (usually S-04 or Nottingham) as it tends to leave a bit of residual sweetness. A FG of 1.000 or lower is a bit dry for my taste. Had great success with kveik voss for a fast and dry ferment, stabilise & back sweeten with fresh juice.
I have made cider a few times with T-58 and it always fermented down to 1.000-.998 with no nutrients. Want to try the dry hop with cascade/centennial once my french saison is gone. Yeast strain doesn't seem to matter all that much as its mostly simple sugars - fermented with lallemand ESB and still down to 1.000. Cheers!
Lavlin EC-1118 Champagne yeast is what I use when making cider and it makes a great dry cider with a relatively powerful ABV punch between 6.5 and 7.0%. Might have to try a saison in the future 👍
I haven't gone about adjusting salts in my ciders (interesting idea), but I do adjust pH. I have used the common acid blends of citrus, malic, and tartaric acids. I also have them individually to control the amounts of each one better. When I happen to have phenolphthalein on hand, I definitely do a titration. I adjust carefully and I've never used calcium carbonate to raise the pH, but I do have it on hand on the off chance I would have to make my must less acidic. I like to juice my own apples and always grab a nice mix of sweet to tart apples. I added about 2.5 pounds of honey to my current cider (so technically a cyser) and after adjusting had a pH of 3.4 and I added food grade acid blend in increments of 0.2 g. Also, typically pasteurization isn't recommended for ciders as it can give a cooked potentially off flavor. At least that's what I've learned. Heating can also potentially convert some of the fermentable sugars into not fermentable sugars. You can treat the must with sulfites prior to fermentation but I know a lot of people try to shy away from those. I don't ever pasteurize my must and often I don't sulfite it either. I've never had any issues. Though when I make a cider, it's usually juice, adjust, add yeast all in the same long day. The only time I've ever infected a batch.... it was ABSOLUTELY my fault and NEVER had anything to do with whether or not I pasteurized or added sulfites to my must. MAYBE if my end product was a super low ABV, then pasteurization or sulfites might be required. You may already know this too, but pectic enzyme can help with cloudiness.
My family will pick our own apples in the fall for fresh apple cider but most of the year I use cheap apple juice from Wal-Mart. I tend to make 5 gallon batches as well but one gallon gets hopped. I have been doing this for a few years and love the hopped gallon more (family is not so keen on it). I also add apple juice concentrate on the batches that are not with the fresh picked apples, this give a more apple flavor and a kick in the ABV.
Hey Steve, this reminds me of something me and Francis used to do at Union. We would go to the upper dining hall with our meal swipes and fill up jugs from the apple juice machine then bring them back to our dorm room to ferment them, it would actually come out pretty good for the most part. We used to use champagne yeast, one time we tried adding cinnamon sticks to the fermentation but I think it messed with the yeast because that batch had some off notes. Very low effort brew day, the hardest part was going back and forth to the juice machine with trays full of cups of apple juice to pour into the jugs lol
Gags!! Had no idea you watched my channel, but thats awesome! Cinnamon might have carried through some bacteria into the fermentation, there are lots of textures to hide in, so you'd want to steam them or boil them to sanitize prior to adding to a cider ferment.
@@TheApartmentBrewer haha yeah, I subscribed to your channel years ago when you mentioned you made it, I've watched a few of your videos here and there since then but this one reminded me of the home brewing Francis and I did in college. It's been a long time since I brewed anything, I might have to make something again sometime soon
Awesome video! I love making hard ci der for when I want to brew SOMETHING but don't really have the time for a full brewday. It's also a bit of a budget thing for me too, since the apple juice I usually use is about $2.50-3 a gallon meaning a 6 gallon batch is typically less than $20. I cook for a living at a very wine-focused italian restaurant so I usually have the bartenders save me the prosecco/champagne/sparkling wine bottles that I end up corking and caging. So it's kinda funny: I have some Hallertau Blanc kicking around and I've been meaning to make a nice, fizzy, bottle conditioned cider for New Year's... so thanks for the idea lol.
That's awesome! Great move on using the champagne bottles, those aren't cheap. It definitely is a bit less expensive than your typical 5-gallon batch, even with the dry hops
People have mentioned about juicing apples to make cider. City Stead brews mainly just do mead, wine and ciders. If I remember they said the did one with fresh apple juice and it did not add much to it. I have access to all the crab apples I want in the fall. I am thinking of trying a crab apple cider this fall.
Great video Steve! I always love your top notch radio voice, and detailed explanations. I reckon some Nelson Sauvin would also be a good alternative for hops if you are after some of the gooseberry and white whine character. I'll have to have a smell of the difference between it and Hallertau Blanc one of these days
Nelson sauvin would be very nice as well. I get a bit more tropical fruit from hall blanc though so thats why I prefer it. Nelson is pretty much straight white wine to me
I've made cider 2 weeks ago and s-05 fermented it dry in like 5 days in 70°F and i let it clear up for another week. I only added DAP at the beginning of fermentation. No stalls, no off flavors or aromas, just a basic neutral cider
Just for clarification you need k meta AND ksorb to stabilize. Fun video though! I like running saison yeasts hot for cider for better mouthfeel, also adding 2 or 3 cored and cut up semi tart apples per gallon really ups the apple flavor in the end result
I'm a pure beginner in brewing and I thought that doing a cider first would be a great way to learn before I actually went to beer. I'm currently just doing a 5 gal. of apple juice with a Red Star wine yeast and I'm at the end of my 2 week fermentation and I'll be measuring the gravity and doing a small taste test to see if I want to back sweeten the cider.
Local craft cidery nearby in Denver swears by white wine yeast. They have VERY good stuff and are growing very fast so maybe there’s something there. They also use very high end apples.
I think that may be the way to go, lots of folks on here suggesting wine yeasts for it, but I bet they get a lot of their flavor from the right variety of apple.
hey im very new to brewing my end goal this year is to brew a dogfish head 120 min ipa can you please try it i love your videos and you inspired me to make all kinds of beer id love to see you make this!
I’ve dabbled with cider but I just don’t like them as much as beer. Although I think I’d like it more with the right recipe. I seem to just rush through them because they are so easy and I think it hurts the final product. By the way, that lens looks awesome! Love the bokeh on it! Cheers!
Apple pear and raspberry is nice - pear doesn’t ferment totally dry so not as mouth Puckering - raspberry makes nice flavour and colour addition - us05 or Kviek . Brewed in 5l mini keg under pressure of a 17psi prv (kegland Australia) at ambient - served from same vessel under 12 psi co2 simple and tasty
Go with Safale S04 English Ale yeast or Nottingham those yeasts throw some funky fruity notes with a higher FG reading 1.010 to 1.011 . I have some fermenting now, Plum Doris Cider, blood red plums. Champange yeas trends to ferment to dry.
I can recommend using some sort of Lactic Acid producing Bacteria to convert malic acid into lactic acid. This makes for a rounder sourness in the final cider.
Love the color, looks great. I dry hopped my first cider and it stunk! Lol. I’ve gravitated to apple wines now, last one being juice, honey, and mixed berry jam with saisonsteins monster run hot. Comes out like a cider and tripel love child at 9.5%
If ya give it some age, it will get a lot better and more clear. I'm down to my last bottle of last year's cider, and after 6 months it became a much nicer beverage.
In the industry pasteurization of the juice is extremely rare, sulfites are added if you want to control wild yeast and bacteria, but alot of cider use freshly pressed apples and the bacteria, enzymes and wild yeast of the apple are wanted so pasteurization is a big no no and it will also remove flavors compounds. I learned how to make cider on an industrial scale at school (we had a 60 hour class on cider making after 2 classes on fermentation and 3 on microbiology) so if anyone has questions maybe I can help. I will post videos on my brews as I am an apartment brewer too but they will be in french first since I'm from Montréal.
I tend to not use carapils in general, but this is a cider. If I use barley malt then it becomes something totally different. Plus I'd need some regular pilsner or 2 row to convert the carapils
Hard Apple cider always gives me reflux so I'm gonna make a hard pear cider, was gonna use voss kveik but belle saison sounds interesting. Its almost summer here and my spare room gets to about 26-28°c on a 45°c day so belle saison should handle that well. Calculated it should be somewhere around 6.2% ABV. I'd really like to have the setup to can it with a counter pressure filler but it'll have to go in 500ml swing top bottles with a carbonation drop.
I'm curious to know which apple types were used in the juice, I imagine different types would give a different taste. As an idea, would be interesting to see you add spices to this.
I love making cider! Tree Top is the brand I go for (2 gallons for 9 bucks at Costco) In the summertime, I use kveik voss at extremely high temps to get those orange esthers. Then I carbonate high around 3 volumes of Co2 to get a spritzy, refreshing summer drink. Or I add 3/4 of a pound/gallon of frozen Raspberries. It's pretty tart that way, so you can back sweeten with allulose if you don't want to pasteurize, but I like it tart. Edit note: it's about 6.6% ABV with tree top
I’d like to try this with juicing my own apples but cut the volume in half to approx 2 1/2 gallons. Anyone ever try this and know how many apples would be needed?
Using beer yeast that’s known for a certain character in cider will disappoint, as it can’t make the aromatic compounds, the juice lacks the necessary precursors. There are apparently some cider / wine yeasts that have their own characteristics, maybe that’s worth trying out.
The water chemistry is in built into the apples juice. Simply consider cider making in the same way you would if making wine from grapes. The fruit and the ground and weather it's grown in dictates the character.
@@TheApartmentBrewer . There's been a resurgence in cider production on this side of the pond in recent years. Led by the small scale craft or artisan brewer. Although the tradition tart cider apples are still used many produce their brew from eating varieties resulting in a wide range of tastes and some particularly dangerous drinks. Although it's a real pain to do on a small scale if you can get your hands on free apples ( luckily for me I can) it's worth an attempt at a traditional farmhouse scrumpy.
I love making cider, but I have never thought of adding hops. How about a cider with berry flavouring, they seem to be very popular, at least here in the UK. If I don't want to order my yeast online, I can only get English ale yeast. The only homebrew shop in my area closed down during COVID lockdowns.
So glad you did this! Cider making is SO friggin easy and you can really get creative. I have experimented slightly with water salts, I found adding more gypsum can increase that apparent apple-crispness. But I've made many great ones without doing that. And of course thank you for the shoutout man!
I'm glad I finally did as well, it was well worth it! Thanks for the info on the salts!
Can you elaborate on how much gypsum to add to a cider and how?
Cider is just apple juice. Get your apple juice with windfalls from an orchard . Fill fermenter with juice throw in windfalls and leave to ferment . Tap into a barrel , jugs or bottles . The windfalls have the right yeasts to ferment the sugars . No water , no salts , no yeast and no hops . That's it .
Apples . Somerset redstreaks, a mix of crabs , cookers and deserts . Try different varieties.
Nottingham is my cider yeast. I haven’t liked the couple times I’ve used Belle Saison and S-04. Just made a seasonal cider where I simmered whole cranberries, cinnamon, and chopped ginger ….strained and added to keg. I stabilize my cider and stop fermentation. I taste the cider and backsweeten with thawed apple juice concentrate and a few ml of 88% acid to tart it up a bit if needed. In the summer I use the basic cider process and add several habeneros that I soak in vodka. I tend to carb that one a bit spritz-y-er because I feel it adds to the overall drinking experience.
Good call on Notty! I really like the flavor blending idea you have going on there, thanks for sharing!
I love that you're so experimental and pass on your experience to all us home brewers. Cheers !
This looks wonderful. I’ve done some thing very similar by making a hop extract and just adding a few drops to my glass so that way I could have a holiday spice (cinnamon and cloves) cider a hopped cider, etc., from one batch. Also, I’ve made a super easy graf with dry malt extract and it was super easy and even better with the body and head retention.
Well done Steve, I make between 35 & 40 gallon of 9.6% cider a year from pressed cookers & eaters. Been hopping up to 15 gall for a few years now, tried citra, simcoe, & endeavor, all very well flavoured and recommended. I bottle all, so I back sweeten with xylitol (birch sap sugar), to avoid killing the yeast. Keep up the good work.
I'm gonna try doing cider with Crystal one day! I can really see it working with it's aromas of woods, green, floral and fruity with herb and spice notes of cinnamon, nutmeg and black pepper
A nice noble-derived hop like crystal would be awesome in this!
Finished a hard cider a few weeks ago and just started another batch on Monday because it’s almost gone! I used Fermentis AB-1 and left it out at room temp to ferment (about 78°). Cold crashed, campden and potassium sorbate to bottom of keg and then racked cider on top. I made a tea of hibiscus and ginger which I added a day later. Great color and flavor! Appreciate all the advice/videos!
Ooh that sounds delicious!
In the UK, Tropicana pressed apple juice and Mangrove Jack cider yeast is the simplest way to make tasty hard cider. You do however have to check the OG and maybe add some brewing sugar (dextrose etc) to make sure it gets the 6%+ you want for a good dry cider. One thing I would like to add is that if you leave it for a couple or a few months the flavour gets much better.
Thanks for another great video 😀
Thats true, adding extra sugar will get you that extra alcohol bump. Cheers!
Just finished making an apple and strawberry cider. So so easy!! 17L juice, 3Kg frozen strawberries. Boil the strawberries in some juice, mash em,strain em and chuck it all in the fermenter with some voss.........that's it. Excellent drink!
Lots of suggestions on here for apple/strawberry blends, I am gonna have to try it out sometime!
I've done one a couple times with just apple juice and 5 or so of those cans of frozen cranberry juice concentrate and champagne yeast, makes a nice 10% sipper that I used for New Years at home a couple years.
Wow, sounds very nice!
Great video as always.
I've been doing ciders for years, my wife loves them and happy wife = happy life!
I have found that my 3 local supermarket chains cheapest options have no preservatives so $1 AUD per litre for a 20 litre batch. I drop in S04 and a little yeast nutrient.
Once it's effectively finished I throw in a half teaspoon each of potassium(or sodium) sorbate and potassium metabisulphate to stop fermentation and stabilise.
At this point I find it comes out so dry it might as well be white wine so I will then use about 0.5kg table sugar (adjust depending on the other flavourings), 1kg of frozen fruit and or 1 Litre of either juice, the 2 I have running at the moment will be Guava, the other will be Pineapple, Coconut water and mango.
I will throw it all on a pot and cook to reduce the volume and make sure everything is combined then blend and pour into the fermenter through a sieve.
I then keg and carbonate.
It might sound a bit sweet but in a 19L keg it really just takes it from "so dry it might as well be white wine" to "wow that's really nice and not too sweat"
N.B. This is an Australian variant, cider here isn't an Autumn, warming thing, it is a Summer day pre session or BBQ type drink
Thanks for the info! I really like that backsweetening method!
Champagne yeast is great for a dry cider
Headed to the store after work to pick up 5 gallons of cider. Thanks for the inspiration Steve!🍻
Have fun!
I made one hoppy cider so far. One of my friends wants several bottles and I’ve got several compliments as well. Planning on doing another batch tomorrow the same way for them and a different way for me. 😁
Sounds great!
Enjoyed the vid and your choice of yeast. I have made many a cider and I have found the best results with Saf 05
Cheapest place I i found for apple juice is Walmart.
Got into cider making before beer. Was a great baby step before making my own beer.
It is a really good stepping stone!
Cider making is so much fun! My go-to juice is Tree Top and WY1968. Typical OG is 1.053 and FG is right around 1.004. So good, going to DH my next batch with Tettnanger
Great idea!
I have done this many times, I use 34/70 and ferment cool. I really like dry hopping with vista hops, and put some cinnamon sticks.
Very nice!
Great video. I make ciders with store brand apple juice and Nottingham yeast. The nice thing is you can use each bottle of apple juice as a small starter. I pour half of one of them out and pitch the yeast in that quart. Then after 24 hours blend in a couple more bottles with that quart by pouring back and forth a few times. After a week fermenting in all of your individual bottles, I throw them together in a carboy and save, a bottle with 1 quart of yeast and juice in the refrigerator to be the starter for the next batch of cider. Just make sure to leave the cap loose because it will continue to ferment and add pressure.
I back sweeten by adding potassium metabisulfate and a day later I add a can of apple juice concentrate. You can add cinnamon, caramel, or any other flavor you want to the keg.
You can make cranberry apple cider with store brand cranberry juice cocktail and cranberry juice concentrate.
Great idea!
We live at the end of an orchard. I been brewing ales, lagers and making wine for over 40 years. This will be my fourth season making cider and it has turned out great. I just use straight apples. Scratting and pressing the apples takes a bit of time to get the volume of apple juice required, using apple juice would be faster, I wonder what OG it dials in at? I pressure fermented at 10psi with a generic cider yeast for two weeks, then pressure transfered the 17L of cider into a corny. Its been sitting in the fridge with 10psi CO2 plugged into it whilst its finishing. so far, wee samples have shown its very clear, crisp and appley. Saving it for Christmas and ( if my counterpressure bottle filler arrives before its finished ) I will bottle some to give to friends and store a little for summer. For me its a seasonal thing cos we have so many apples happening at once, my technique is improving each year. Dry hopping is something i had not considered. It was fermented down to 0.998 came in at 6.6% bottoms up.
Very cool!
This is why I homebrew!! You can brew whatever u want to drink!! A beautiful hopped hard apple cider! 🍎 Or a mango lager..or apple barley wine...🍷 or just wine..
Also!! Just used mosaic in my 5gal apple cider too!! Its a great hop for it!!
P.S. you can never go wrong with throwing a stick of cinnamon in with it...!!
Very true!! It's fun to try something a bit out of the ordinary for my channel. Cheers and glad you enjoyed it!
I did 10 gallons this fall using juice from the final pressing from a local orchard. I didn't pasteurize. I did boil some yeast nutrient to add to both. In one batch I pitched Lallemand Farmhouse and in the other I didn't pitch anything. I left it to ferment using what was already present in the juice. Both fermented out very well without any off flavour. Still have lots. I'm going to do some dry hopping now!
Nice idea using the wild yeast to let it do its thing!
I made cider 2 times. First was with wine yeast and it tasted super sharp at first. After aging for 1 year it was by far the best. Doesnt taste as dry after aging.
Second was with kveik in summer and was very good already straight after fermentation.
What really helps cider is oakchips!
Awesome! Glad you enjoyed the video and thanks for the info!
Yeah about time mate …. Great work 👍🏼
Thanks man!
If you do this again, consider a multiple split batch where you use different hops. I think an intense piney hop would be great, but also like your blanc idea..hell, make a tincture of spruce tips or other flavors to add..everything sounds interesting! Anyway, good episode! Drinking a Bell's Hopslam as I watch..great beer, with great power lol.
That would be cool, thanks for watching!
Your theory was right, I had some Hallertau blanc for another brew with some leftovers and took up your idea to dry hop a cider with that. It tastes like a delicious dry white wine/cider hybrid!
That sounds delicious!
Very cool AB and as always, very interesting.
😎👍🏻👍🏻🍺🍺🍺🍺
Thank you! Cheers!
If you look at cider as a holiday drink, it would be fun to experiment with spices such as nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice, etc., with and without hops.
My favourite yeast is English Ale (usually S-04 or Nottingham) as it tends to leave a bit of residual sweetness. A FG of 1.000 or lower is a bit dry for my taste. Had great success with kveik voss for a fast and dry ferment, stabilise & back sweeten with fresh juice.
English yeast is a great idea!
I have made cider a few times with T-58 and it always fermented down to 1.000-.998 with no nutrients. Want to try the dry hop with cascade/centennial once my french saison is gone. Yeast strain doesn't seem to matter all that much as its mostly simple sugars - fermented with lallemand ESB and still down to 1.000. Cheers!
Lavlin EC-1118 Champagne yeast is what I use when making cider and it makes a great dry cider with a relatively powerful ABV punch between 6.5 and 7.0%. Might have to try a saison in the future 👍
Very nice! I saw a lot of recommendations for using a champagne yeast when doing my research
I haven't gone about adjusting salts in my ciders (interesting idea), but I do adjust pH. I have used the common acid blends of citrus, malic, and tartaric acids. I also have them individually to control the amounts of each one better. When I happen to have phenolphthalein on hand, I definitely do a titration. I adjust carefully and I've never used calcium carbonate to raise the pH, but I do have it on hand on the off chance I would have to make my must less acidic. I like to juice my own apples and always grab a nice mix of sweet to tart apples. I added about 2.5 pounds of honey to my current cider (so technically a cyser) and after adjusting had a pH of 3.4 and I added food grade acid blend in increments of 0.2 g.
Also, typically pasteurization isn't recommended for ciders as it can give a cooked potentially off flavor. At least that's what I've learned. Heating can also potentially convert some of the fermentable sugars into not fermentable sugars. You can treat the must with sulfites prior to fermentation but I know a lot of people try to shy away from those. I don't ever pasteurize my must and often I don't sulfite it either. I've never had any issues. Though when I make a cider, it's usually juice, adjust, add yeast all in the same long day. The only time I've ever infected a batch.... it was ABSOLUTELY my fault and NEVER had anything to do with whether or not I pasteurized or added sulfites to my must. MAYBE if my end product was a super low ABV, then pasteurization or sulfites might be required.
You may already know this too, but pectic enzyme can help with cloudiness.
Thank you for sharing!
My family will pick our own apples in the fall for fresh apple cider but most of the year I use cheap apple juice from Wal-Mart. I tend to make 5 gallon batches as well but one gallon gets hopped. I have been doing this for a few years and love the hopped gallon more (family is not so keen on it). I also add apple juice concentrate on the batches that are not with the fresh picked apples, this give a more apple flavor and a kick in the ABV.
Very nice!
Hey Steve, this reminds me of something me and Francis used to do at Union. We would go to the upper dining hall with our meal swipes and fill up jugs from the apple juice machine then bring them back to our dorm room to ferment them, it would actually come out pretty good for the most part. We used to use champagne yeast, one time we tried adding cinnamon sticks to the fermentation but I think it messed with the yeast because that batch had some off notes. Very low effort brew day, the hardest part was going back and forth to the juice machine with trays full of cups of apple juice to pour into the jugs lol
Gags!! Had no idea you watched my channel, but thats awesome! Cinnamon might have carried through some bacteria into the fermentation, there are lots of textures to hide in, so you'd want to steam them or boil them to sanitize prior to adding to a cider ferment.
@@TheApartmentBrewer haha yeah, I subscribed to your channel years ago when you mentioned you made it, I've watched a few of your videos here and there since then but this one reminded me of the home brewing Francis and I did in college. It's been a long time since I brewed anything, I might have to make something again sometime soon
That's awesome! There's a bit a of a tradition of brewing kaps!
Awesome video! I love making hard ci der for when I want to brew SOMETHING but don't really have the time for a full brewday. It's also a bit of a budget thing for me too, since the apple juice I usually use is about $2.50-3 a gallon meaning a 6 gallon batch is typically less than $20. I cook for a living at a very wine-focused italian restaurant so I usually have the bartenders save me the prosecco/champagne/sparkling wine bottles that I end up corking and caging.
So it's kinda funny: I have some Hallertau Blanc kicking around and I've been meaning to make a nice, fizzy, bottle conditioned cider for New Year's... so thanks for the idea lol.
That's awesome! Great move on using the champagne bottles, those aren't cheap. It definitely is a bit less expensive than your typical 5-gallon batch, even with the dry hops
People have mentioned about juicing apples to make cider. City Stead brews mainly just do mead, wine and ciders. If I remember they said the did one with fresh apple juice and it did not add much to it. I have access to all the crab apples I want in the fall. I am thinking of trying a crab apple cider this fall.
Hope it works out great for you!
Love some cider. Would be interesting to add hops.
It adds a really cool element!
I did this recipe over the weekend using nelson sauvin, which REALLY capitalized on the white wine character.
Nice!
Great video Steve! I always love your top notch radio voice, and detailed explanations. I reckon some Nelson Sauvin would also be a good alternative for hops if you are after some of the gooseberry and white whine character. I'll have to have a smell of the difference between it and Hallertau Blanc one of these days
Nelson sauvin would be very nice as well. I get a bit more tropical fruit from hall blanc though so thats why I prefer it. Nelson is pretty much straight white wine to me
I've made cider 2 weeks ago and s-05 fermented it dry in like 5 days in 70°F and i let it clear up for another week. I only added DAP at the beginning of fermentation. No stalls, no off flavors or aromas, just a basic neutral cider
Nice!
Just for clarification you need k meta AND ksorb to stabilize. Fun video though! I like running saison yeasts hot for cider for better mouthfeel, also adding 2 or 3 cored and cut up semi tart apples per gallon really ups the apple flavor in the end result
Thank you for the info! That's a great tip in adding apples at the end!
I'm a pure beginner in brewing and I thought that doing a cider first would be a great way to learn before I actually went to beer. I'm currently just doing a 5 gal. of apple juice with a Red Star wine yeast and I'm at the end of my 2 week fermentation and I'll be measuring the gravity and doing a small taste test to see if I want to back sweeten the cider.
Ciders potentially are the easiest things to make for beginners! Welcome to the hobby!
@@TheApartmentBrewer thank you
Local craft cidery nearby in Denver swears by white wine yeast. They have VERY good stuff and are growing very fast so maybe there’s something there. They also use very high end apples.
I think that may be the way to go, lots of folks on here suggesting wine yeasts for it, but I bet they get a lot of their flavor from the right variety of apple.
“Super easy, should be a short brew day and a short video” 21:48 later 😂 Great Job! Loved the video.
Lol, guilty as charged
Oh and metabisilfite does not kill the yeast, just prevents yeast growth.
I like to use different kveiks for my ciders still trying to find out what strain I like the best.
It's definitely a good option given the fermentation time!
hey im very new to brewing my end goal this year is to brew a dogfish head 120 min ipa can you please try it i love your videos and you inspired me to make all kinds of beer id love to see you make this!
I’ve dabbled with cider but I just don’t like them as much as beer. Although I think I’d like it more with the right recipe. I seem to just rush through them because they are so easy and I think it hurts the final product. By the way, that lens looks awesome! Love the bokeh on it! Cheers!
Thanks man! I'm just happy I can finally film inside without sending the ISO to the moon lol
Interesting change of brew --as its summer over in NZ , have just made a raspberry seltzer, and a boysenberry cider
Sounds delicious!
I will be the first to say northern brewer fixed most of there issues and now ship at a good timely manner.
Yes they did!
Great video.
Please, help me understand, what makes this a "hard" cider?
In the United States, hard cider refers to alcoholic cider and regular cider is alcohol-free cider
@@TheApartmentBrewer thanks.
Here in Argentina, you find regular "sidra" and, very rarely, "sidra sin alcohol".
Apple pear and raspberry is nice - pear doesn’t ferment totally dry so not as mouth Puckering - raspberry makes nice flavour and colour addition - us05 or Kviek . Brewed in 5l mini keg under pressure of a 17psi prv (kegland Australia) at ambient - served from same vessel under 12 psi co2 simple and tasty
That sounds delicious!
Go with Safale S04 English Ale yeast or Nottingham those yeasts throw some funky fruity notes with a higher FG reading 1.010 to 1.011 . I have some fermenting now, Plum Doris Cider, blood red plums.
Champange yeas trends to ferment to dry.
English yeast would be solid for this, good idea!
I can recommend using some sort of Lactic Acid producing Bacteria to convert malic acid into lactic acid. This makes for a rounder sourness in the final cider.
Thanks for the suggestion!
Love the color, looks great. I dry hopped my first cider and it stunk! Lol. I’ve gravitated to apple wines now, last one being juice, honey, and mixed berry jam with saisonsteins monster run hot. Comes out like a cider and tripel love child at 9.5%
I should clarify that it was bad because I dumped a whole ounce of citra in a 1 gallon cider batch yikes
The apple wines sound great! Sorry to hear you had a bit too much dry hopping. I'm not a huge fan of Citra in cider
I use saison yeast for my ciders and meads. Ive never gotten must esters like in a beer
Yeah, makes sense I suppose. I was curious to try it out though
@@TheApartmentBrewer people seem to think you can get those esters in cider or mead though. May be worth further investigation but i dont taste them
If ya give it some age, it will get a lot better and more clear. I'm down to my last bottle of last year's cider, and after 6 months it became a much nicer beverage.
Makes sense! I'll try to package some and save it for later.
My best cyser was made with Belgian saison yeast
In the industry pasteurization of the juice is extremely rare, sulfites are added if you want to control wild yeast and bacteria, but alot of cider use freshly pressed apples and the bacteria, enzymes and wild yeast of the apple are wanted so pasteurization is a big no no and it will also remove flavors compounds. I learned how to make cider on an industrial scale at school (we had a 60 hour class on cider making after 2 classes on fermentation and 3 on microbiology) so if anyone has questions maybe I can help. I will post videos on my brews as I am an apartment brewer too but they will be in french first since I'm from Montréal.
Some fresh vanilla beans, raisins(for tannins), and brown sugar really go a long way with ciders.
Ooh that sounds excellent!
So far I've successfully made 5 × 5 gallon batches = 25 gallons total of hard cider, average ABV 6.5 --7%.
You should add mash of carapils for the head and complexity trust me it's good.
I tend to not use carapils in general, but this is a cider. If I use barley malt then it becomes something totally different. Plus I'd need some regular pilsner or 2 row to convert the carapils
Hard Apple cider always gives me reflux so I'm gonna make a hard pear cider, was gonna use voss kveik but belle saison sounds interesting. Its almost summer here and my spare room gets to about 26-28°c on a 45°c day so belle saison should handle that well. Calculated it should be somewhere around 6.2% ABV. I'd really like to have the setup to can it with a counter pressure filler but it'll have to go in 500ml swing top bottles with a carbonation drop.
I wouldn't recommend Kveik yeast. Atleast pure Hornindal didn't work with the sugars that are in the apple cider.
Pear cider sounds really good actually!
I'm curious to know which apple types were used in the juice, I imagine different types would give a different taste.
As an idea, would be interesting to see you add spices to this.
Would have been nice to know as well! I wish it was on the label. I agree, spices would be nice here
I pressure ferment with Nottingham or London ESB at 15-20psi at near 70°F. It gets dry very quickly, just over a week. Lovely ciders, cheers!
Sounds great!
Granny Smith apples and kveik yeast. Acetaldehyde be damed!
I love making cider! Tree Top is the brand I go for (2 gallons for 9 bucks at Costco) In the summertime, I use kveik voss at extremely high temps to get those orange esthers. Then I carbonate high around 3 volumes of Co2 to get a spritzy, refreshing summer drink. Or I add 3/4 of a pound/gallon of frozen Raspberries. It's pretty tart that way, so you can back sweeten with allulose if you don't want to pasteurize, but I like it tart.
Edit note: it's about 6.6% ABV with tree top
I’d like to try this with juicing my own apples but cut the volume in half to approx 2 1/2 gallons. Anyone ever try this and know how many apples would be needed?
No idea on how many apples you would need, but I also want to try this, so I'll be watching for the response as well!
Using beer yeast that’s known for a certain character in cider will disappoint, as it can’t make the aromatic compounds, the juice lacks the necessary precursors. There are apparently some cider / wine yeasts that have their own characteristics, maybe that’s worth trying out.
Seems like that is the case, I wanted to try it out regardless though haha. I think a dedicated cider yeast may be the way to go next time though.
Low effort and tastes good??? Count me in...but it will have to wait for next year as I play with the new kegerator
Haha nothing wrong with getting it lines up for the new year!
@@TheApartmentBrewer o yea there's a list
But why??
The water chemistry is in built into the apples juice. Simply consider cider making in the same way you would if making wine from grapes. The fruit and the ground and weather it's grown in dictates the character.
Great point!
@@TheApartmentBrewer . There's been a resurgence in cider production on this side of the pond in recent years. Led by the small scale craft or artisan brewer. Although the tradition tart cider apples are still used many produce their brew from eating varieties resulting in a wide range of tastes and some particularly dangerous drinks.
Although it's a real pain to do on a small scale if you can get your hands on free apples ( luckily for me I can) it's worth an attempt at a traditional farmhouse scrumpy.
I love making cider, but I have never thought of adding hops. How about a cider with berry flavouring, they seem to be very popular, at least here in the UK.
If I don't want to order my yeast online, I can only get English ale yeast.
The only homebrew shop in my area closed down during COVID lockdowns.
A fruit-flavored cider sounds great!