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 This is the 3rd year I have been home-brewing hard cider; however, it's only the 2nd year I've done it successfully. It's really not a hard process, but my first attempt failed due to lack of research.
Hard cider is really just apple wine; if you want more of a true cider, just don't make it as strong. The basic idea behind hard cider is the same as any wine, yeast is added to juice and left to ferment. For those of you who may have never made a wine or beer, let me give you the basics. You are going to need a bunch of equipment and assorted additives that can be made or purchased from a brewing shop.
One of the main parts of the setup is the container which your beverage will ferment in, which is called a carboy. The best carboys are made of glass, but for part of the process you can use plastic; however, you will need glass for the second step. The carboy needs to have some sort of air lock to let bubbles out without letting air in. You will also need some equipment to siphon the cider from one container to another and a hydrometer to determine the alcohol content.
In addition to the equipment, you will also need yeast and the juice that you are going to ferment. Depending on the yeast used, your finished product may have a range of different tastes from dry to fruity. Additional additives will also change the taste of your cider. For additive or other recipe tips you should consult a local brewing shop as there are too many recipes for me to discuss here.
Before brewing, you should first clean and sterilize everything you are going to use. There are a number of products which will work for this, including bleach in low-concentrations. I use a product called iodophor which is mixed with water. After your container is sterilized, fill it with juice, add the activated yeast, and put an air lock on it. For the next 3 to 5 days the cider and yeast will do a lot of bubbling and foaming so make sure you leave room in your carboy. When the bubbling of your cider slows to once every few minutes its time to re-rack it. If your cider is still bubbling after 7 days I would re-rack it anyways.
Re-racking is the term given to the process of siphoning off the cider while leaving the sediment behind. In this process you are moving the cider to a different carboy. The siphoning setup consists of a racking cane, which is just a hard plastic tube that reaches down to the bottom, and some tubing. To begin siphoning I have a squeeze- pump similar to the kind used on an outboard boat engine.
Once you have re-racked your cider, let it sit for about 3 weeks before re-racking it again. After that the cider should sit for 7 or more weeks and be re-racked once again. After this your cider is ready to drink, although it improves with additional aging. In reality, after the second re-racking you could drink the cider, but the more subtle tastes don't develop until it has aged properly.
I like to carbonate my cider and there are a number of ways of doing that. The most common method is to add sugar right before bottling. The sugar reactivates the yeast and makes CO2—if you choose this method just make sure that your bottles can handle the pressure. I prefer to carbonate my beverage by pressurizing it with CO2 when I am done brewing. This is quite easy for me because I choose to keg my cider instead of bottling it.
Once you are done making your cider the only thing left to do is drink it…and I don't need to describe how I did that. However, I will warn you that I've learned first hand that drinking too much cider can give you a heck of a hangover.
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Re: Home-Brewing Hard Cider
