Hard Apple Cider /Apple Wine 1 gallon Recepies

[wannab1]

After making a few batches of Skeeter Pee and Dragons Blood I'm looking for something else to try. Now I'm not a huge fan of store-bought Hard Apple Cider so I'm looking for a couple of different and interesting recipes I can try side by side.

I have two 1.5 gallon fermenters and several jugs a little over a gallon and then several gallon jugs. Basically I was hoping to finish with an actual gallon. I already have 2.5 gallons and apple juice and just ready to get fermenting.

I should also ask about scaling 5 and 6 gallon apple cider recipes, pretty straight forward or any special things I should know?

 

[user 36973]

I should also ask about scaling 5 and 6 gallon apple cider recipes, pretty straight forward or any special things I should know?

No, it's the same. This is why you have kept good notes on your dosing per gallon (or liter) which makes the scaling easy. The only difference between 5 gallons and 50 gallons is the need for a pump and the tank to be on a mobile platform.

 

[tradowsk]

I have a cherry cider aging right now. 1 gallon of local apple cider and 1 cup of tart cherry juice in primary.

I also did a ginger lemon cider last year. 1 gallon of cider, juice and zest of one lemon, and about 4oz of ginger.

 

[Rice_Guy]

This is a sweet cider:
* many of the hard cider recipes will talk about a blend of apples. What they are trying to do is have sugar to ferment, acid for flavor and tannin for bitter notes. Typical apple will come in at 1.050 to 060. The pH can be all over the place since acid decreases with age of apple, this part of the country is about a month into storage therefore I would drop the pH to 3.3 by adding acid. Your goal for TA is about 0.5% but that can be adjusted after the fact. Tannin is hard to come by. The orchards here have limited bitter sharp (cider) apple so the next best is to hunt out a tannic (bitter) crab apple, ,,, looking at the university collection about 20% are useful therefore if you see some stop and taste to see how bitter they are, ,,, the city here plants crabs under power lines since they don’t get tall enough to grow into them.
* formula; 4 liters of fresh apple juice, pick one kilo (2 pounds) of tannic crabs crush them as with a hammer or mortar, cover the crushed crab with about a liter of apple juice, add pectase 2 or 3 tsp, and campden half a tablet and let the tannins steep into the apple juice for a week in the fridge. The other half campden can go in the reserved apple juice. At five days to a week press the juice off the pulp. Bring everything to room temp and inoculate with Safale 04 which will do 8% alcohol. Ferment as normal.
* finish the hard cider, ,,, add sorbate, back sweeten to 1.005 (dry tart flavor) to 1.010 (sweet refreshing) with frozen organic apple juice concentrate and bottle
* if you don’t find crabs plan to finish the cider at about 1.000

* @hounddawg has a spiced version which he is posting about this week

 

[hounddawg]

This is a sweet cider:
* many of the hard cider recipes will talk about a blend of apples. What they are trying to do is have sugar to ferment, acid for flavor and tannin for bitter notes. Typical apple will come in at 1.050 to 060. The pH can be all over the place since acid decreases with age of apple, this part of the country is about a month into storage therefore I would drop the pH to 3.3 by adding acid. Your goal for TA is about 0.5% but that can be adjusted after the fact. Tannin is hard to come by. The orchards here have limited bitter sharp (cider) apple so the next best is to hunt out a tannic (bitter) crab apple, ,,, looking at the university collection about 20% are useful therefore if you see some stop and taste to see how bitter they are, ,,, the city here plants crabs under power lines since they don’t get tall enough to grow into them.
* formula; 4 liters of fresh apple juice, pick one kilo (2 pounds) of tannic crabs crush them as with a hammer or mortar, cover the crushed crab with about a liter of apple juice, add pectase 2 or 3 tsp, and campden half a tablet and let the tannins steep into the apple juice for a week in the fridge. The other half campden can go in the reserved apple juice. At five days to a week press the juice off the pulp. Bring everything to room temp and inoculate with Safale 04 which will do 8% alcohol. Ferment as normal.
* finish the hard cider, ,,, add sorbate, back sweeten to 1.005 (dry tart flavor) to 1.010 (sweet refreshing) with frozen organic apple juice concentrate and bottle
* if you don’t find crabs plan to finish the cider at about 1.000
View attachment 68197
* @hounddawg has a spiced version which he is posting about this week

you know a lot about commercial food goings on, I am going to try and get some tannic from acorns, dried, acorns were only ate by native Americans by boiling then cooking, to remove the tannic, so by drying them out you could leach it out with PGA, or by grinding the acorn meat,
Dawg

 

[Arne]

you know a lot about commercial food goings on, I am going to try and get some tannic from acorns, dried, acorns were only ate by native Americans by boiling then cooking, to remove the tannic, so by drying them out you could leach it out with PGA, or by grinding the acorn meat,
Dawg

@hounddawg Or maybe (just thinking out loud) boil the acorns, simmer the water down, maybe taste it and see if it has enough of the tannins to be useable. Arne.

 

[Rice_Guy]

I might try extracting acorn tannin with water as in the old fashion coffee pot. I haven’t tried acorn as an ingredient in anything, so I would test acorn grit for flavor as in a canning jar steeping a white wine for a week.
Commercial tannins are available, Scott Labs has several as FT Rouge (a soft tannin) and hard tannins as at the wine toys store.
I think you said “propylene glycol alginate ” PGA is a white powder which forms an acid resistant gel.

you know a lot about commercial food goings on, I am going to try and get some tannic from acorns, dried, acorns were only ate by native Americans by boiling then cooking, to remove the tannic, so by drying them out you could leach it out with PGA, or by grinding the acorn meat,

 

[hounddawg]

I might try extracting acorn tannin with water as in the old fashion coffee pot. I haven’t tried acorn as an ingredient in anything, so I would test acorn grit for flavor as in a canning jar steeping a white wine for a week.
Commercial tannins are available, Scott Labs has several as FT Rouge (a soft tannin) and hard tannins as at the wine toys store.
I think you said “propylene glycol alginate ” PGA is a white powder which forms an acid resistant gel.

PGA=PURE GRAIN ALCOHOL. SORRY, I'm just a country bump can,,,, propylene glycol is what I mix with Ivermectin to make wormer for any dogs not in the collie family,
Dawg

 

[hounddawg]

@hounddawg Or maybe (just thinking out loud) boil the acorns, simmer the water down, maybe taste it and see if it has enough of the tannins to be useable. Arne.

yes that was how my great grandma removed the tannings from the acorns,,, then cook the acorns, after sleeping on it i remembered, they boiled the acorns then thru out the water, they were other things that tannic was good for but i forget, but yes to eat the acorns she boiled then cooked the acorn, but yes the reduced broth will make liquid tannings, and if you've ever tasted a raw acorn super bitter,
Dawg