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Originally Posted by mrbright  hi and welcome from watford, likewise trying to find an easy apple to alcohol recipe.moozy can you help? |
Try this recipe mrbright
1. Remove the fruit from your apple tree and wash your apples, discarding all magotty, rotten or mouldy specimens. Do not be tempted to buy apple juice at any point. If you are going to make cider then at least go to the effort of making Cider which tastes of real apples. If you use apple juice you will be dissapointed.
Try to avoid cooking apples which really dont produce a great cider. Other than that, 'desert' apples (eating apples) are all fine. However you may find your cider is oversweet if you just use one particularly sweet variety of desert apple. If this is a problem for you, add some (about 10-20%) crab apples to the pot and you will find they bring the sweetness down very nicely, adding a tart flavour of their own which tastes fantastic.
2. Pulp the apples. There are many ways of doing this. For small volumes you can use an electric kitchen juicer or a blender. The more traditional (and environmentally friendly) method is to stand above a strong bucket half full of apples and hit the apples repeatedly with a heavy object. We tried both and eventually settled on using the blender with a grater attachment so effectively we push our apples through a cheese grater. The traditional method was just too much hard work for us.
Be careful because cheaper models of blenders and juicers have very weak motors which will blow at the slightest siff of a pound of Worcester Pairmains..
3. Now you have to press your apple pulp.
Our home made apple press consisted of four G-clamps and two pieces of old melamine board (an old kitchen work surface).
We wrap apple pulp (with all apple presses you have to pulp the apples before pressing the juice out) in cheesecloth and place it between the boards and start turning the screws. The juice drips out on all four sides into a large shallow tray.
4. Pour your juice into a cleaned and sterilized wooden keg from a home brewery supply store. You should fill the keg to the top. Having an only half-full keg is apparently a sure-fire recipe for vinegar.
5. No yeast needs to be added, traditional cider making relies on wild yeasts, so remove the bung on the top of the keg to let some yeast in. The fermentation starts in 1-2 days and you will see white froth bubbling up through the bung hole. Do not panic at this point.
6. Wait for for several weeks until fermentation stops and then replace the bung
Maturing cider
7. Leave your cider to mature for at least 8 months and then after tasting a sip to ensure it hasn't gone horribly wrong, invite some friends round to enjoy a strong (we got 9% alcohol) sweet and cloudy glass of traditional cider. Remember not to drink and drive.
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