Simple cider recipes

2024 Author: Isabella Gilson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:14

Cider tastes like apple juice, more like beer in strength, more like champagne in density, and can hardly be called non-alcoholic. It is easy to drink, and there are a huge number of different cider recipes.

Choose and cook fruit

Each recipe requires proper pre-preparation of products. The requirements and recommendations in our case are as follows:

1. Apples should not be overly sour or sweet - such fruits will not bring anything but harm, they simply will not be able to achieve the required degree.

2. Apples for making cider at home are better to take late varieties. The fruit should not be underripe, overripe, fallen (trace of impact), and even more so rotten or with a worm.

3. Use only one variety to make cider, because this is the only way you will achieve a pure taste of apple cider.

4. Another important fact: under no circumstances should you wash the fruits, it is only permissible to wipe each apple with a soft cloth. By washing the fruit, you will wash off the natural, wild yeast, which means that you will cause great harm. After all, it is precisely due to these yeasts that the cider willroam.

Standard cider recipe

There are many variations of cider making, but before moving on to them, you must first master the standard, basic version. So, we bring to your attention a classic version of cider making with a small strength, alluring aroma and subtle honey notes.

We will need:

• Apples - 5 kilograms.
• Sugar - 750 grams.
• Clean sterilized jars.
• Cinnamon, star anise, lemon - to taste.

The degree of cider depends on the amount of sugar. In the product prepared according to the recipe below, the classic 7-8 degrees.

Cooking:

1. Do not peel apples, mash them with a meat grinder.
2. Take jars, fill them halfway with applesauce.
3. Sprinkle with sugar at the rate of 150 grams of sand per 1 kilogram of apples.
4. Cover with two-layer gauze and hide in a dark and warm room for 4 days.
5. Shuffle contents daily.
6. At the first sign of fermentation, i.e. when bubbles appear, start collecting the juice.
7. Squeeze, pour into a clean 3 liter jar.
8. Put a medical glove on the throat of the can, making a small hole with a needle in 2 fingers.
9. Hide the jar, but for 2 months already.
10. After this period, the glove should look fallen, the drink should be light, and there should be sediment at the bottom. Filter, pour again and seal tightly. We leave for 3 months already in a cool place so that the drink ripens.

This is such a simple cider recipe. They drink itchilled, pour at a medium distance to allow carbon dioxide to escape. Shelf life - 6 months.

From apple juice

If for some reason it is impossible to make cider from natural apples, then here is a recipe that allows you to do it with the juice of these fruits.

We will need:

• Natural, undiluted juice - 3 liters.
• Sugar - 2 tablespoons.
• Wine yeast - 50 grams.

The cider recipe is simple:

1. Preparing the sourdough. Pour clean water halfway into a glass and add wine yeast and 2 tablespoons of sugar.
2. Stir and leave for an hour to ferment.
3. Pour 3 liters of natural apple juice into a 3-liter sterilized jar and pour the finished sourdough into it.
4. Place a glove with a hole on the throat.
5. After the glove falls, strain the drink, remove the yeast.
6. Pour into a bottle and close tightly.

The benefits of cider are in the preservation of all vitamins and nutrients. The product must be stored in the refrigerator, but the shelf life is short, after it expires, the cider resembles apple cider vinegar.

Cider with honey

Regular apple cider can be ennobled with a subtle honey flavor. We will need:

• Apples - 8 kilograms.
• Vigid natural honey - 1.5 kilograms.
• Water - 6 liters.

Cooking:

1. Cut the fruit into 4 pieces and place them incanvas bag.
2. Tie the bag well and place it in an enameled pan, cover with a wooden sieve and press it all down with a load (you can use a bucket filled with water).
3. Dilute honey in hot boiled water and add to the pan, covering the top with a gauze rag.
4. Hide in a dark cool place for 5 days before the fermentation process.
5. Separate the pulp and pure liquid, pour the first again with honey water.
6. Do the previous procedure again, pouring the resulting drink into different jars.
7. Mix all 3 ciders into one and put away for 9 months.
8. At the end close tightly and place in a cold place for another month.

Without a doubt, the process is very laborious compared to the previous ones, but the result is worth the energy costs.

Cider at home from dried fruits

To prepare a delicious apple drink, you can also use dried fruits, and the result is as if prepared from natural apples or fresh apple juice. The main condition is that the dried fruit must be without seeds and skin. Cooking:

1. Place dried fruits in a clean, preferably glass dish, and fill with clean water in the proportion of 10 liters of water per 1 kilogram of dried fruits.
2. Cover with gauze and leave in a cool place for 5 days before fermentation starts.
3. After the start of the fermentation process, plug the container and leave it alone for a month.

Bottle after a month and place the apple cider in a cool place to store.

Pear drink

Cider doesn't have to be made only from apples, especially if you don't like this fruit. A pear will be an excellent analogue. We will need:

• Fresh pears - 15 kilograms.
• Sugar - 750 grams.

Cooking:

1. Cut the pears in half, cut out the core, make juice from the pulp.
2. Pour into a fermentation container and wrap completely with thick gauze, put in a warm room.
3. As soon as the fermentation process starts after 2 days, add sugar, mix and close with a water seal.
4. In a dark room with an average temperature for 3 weeks, leave to ferment.
5. Drain the sediment, pour the cleared liquid into another container and seal tightly.
6. Leave the bottles in a warm and dark place for 2 weeks.

Pear cider is 5-8 degrees ABV and has a shelf life of one year at 15 degrees.