In North America, the raw, opalescent, golden/amber liquid, freshly pressed from apples is called sweet or soft cider. If anything is done to that cider, to modify it in any way, or preserve it, the name changes to apple juice. If the sweet cider is fermented it becomes hard cider. Some call the fermented product apple wine, but regardless of how you ferment it, it's cider, not wine. In the UK and Europe, cider (or cidre) refers only to the fermented product, and until fairly recently, apple juice was little used, and not common in it's natural 'sweet cider' form. Commercially processed 'apple juice' anywhere, frequently from concentrate and clarified with chemical additions and centrifuging, bears no resemblance to the "juice of apples", and should more properly be called "apple drink".

The sweet cider will naturally begin to ferment within a couple of days at room temperature, due to the yeast that naturally occur on the apples and in the air. Refrigerated, it will take a week or more to become noticeably active. To preserve the sweet cider for a longer period, it must be frozen ASAP, or pasteurized. If you're concerned about the E-Coli scare, you needn't be, when it comes to apple juice. The recent cases in the news in the U.S. arose from contamination in large commercial operations with no indication of where that contamination originated. Avoid picking up apples that have dropped in a cow pasture, and you'll avoid E-Coli 0157:H7, which is a bovine intestinal bacteria most likely to be found in meat products. The main concern with apple juice is the naturally occuring yeast that will cause the juice to ferment. In addition, most of the heritage apple types are higher acid than the commercial varieties, and will not support most bacterial growth, except the vinegar bacteria that will feed on the alcohol resulting from the natural fermentation. If you are concerned about the possibility of E-Coli contamination, and don't want to pasteurize your juice, read this report from the July '99 meeting of the Institute of Food Technologists.

It is also worth noting here that if you have an allergic reaction to apple juice (fresh or pasteurized), it may be a sensitivity to yeast. Make your own juice with a home juicer, fresh, washing the apples very well beforehand, paying special attention to the stem and blossom-end depressions, and see if you don't suddenly lose your sensitivity to apple juice!

To pasteurize the cider, heat it in a clean stainless or unchipped enamel pot to at least 185°F (85°C), and no more than 200°F (93°C). DO NOT BOIL. While the cider is heating, scald the caps with boiling water and preheat the bottles in a 'slow' oven. As soon as the cider is up to temperature, fill the warm bottles to overflowing - NO airspace on top - as quickly as possible [temperature should be no less than 165°F [74°C) when capped], tighten down the lid, and let it sit until cooled to room temperature. As the juice cools it will shrink just enough to create the vacuum necessary for preservation. This process will kill the yeast that cause the natural fermentation (as well as most forms of bacterial contamination), and create a relatively oxygen-free environment to preserve the nutritional quality of the juice for an indefinite period. The containers must be glass, with a sealing lid, such as standard canning jars. Heating, filling and cooling times should be as short as possible to maintain the highest possible quality.

For a warm tasty treat on cool fall or winter evenings try Hot Spiced Cider:
To 2 litres of sweet cider, add 1 stick of cinnamon, 6 cloves, 1/4 tsp of allspice and a bit of grated orange peel. Heat just to a simmer in a stainless or enamel pot (not aluminum), and enjoy. Works well with a bit of brandy, Calvados, or hard cider too!

Simple Hard Cider Making

The most important things for good cider making are cleanliness and patience. Keep all your equipment clean, always; use clean sound apples; do your fermenting, racking and bottling in an area free of fruit flies, and don't expect to have finished, drinkable cider in a few weeks. I don't use or recommend the use of sulphites such as Camden tablets, as many have an allergic sensitivity to these chemicals. The addition of sulphite will not 'sterilize' anything, unless you use really extreme amounts, but simply kills some, or most, of the weakest organisms, and the 'false security' is not as useful as care and cleanliness. Use lots of very hot water to clean all equipment, and an occasional bleaching if necessary to remove stains, and after a good post-use cleaning allow everything to air dry completely before storage.

A simple cider is dry cider, with nothing added except yeast. Fermented to stability it will have no sugar left, like a dry wine. If you want a sparkling cider, you must do a fermentation to dryness, then add some form of sugar when you bottle, to achieve a 'bottle ferment' that will produce the additional carbonation necessary (and a bit of bottle sediment as well). A sweet cider can only be had by pasteurizing the cider before it's fermented to dryness, or by fermenting it dry, then pasteurizing it to eliminate any surviving yeast, and adding sugar. If you want a sweet sparkling cider, you might as well go to the liquor store!

If you have any choice, try to use juice that is a blend of at least three varieties. The very earliest varieties are not desirable, although some amount of Gravenstein can be good. The mid-season varieties are fine, but avoid strong aromatics like Red Delicious (also too low acid) and MacIntosh. Late season types work well in a blend, but are generally too low acid to do well alone. Exceptions here are the true cider varieties - mostly old English apples such as Bulmer's Norman, Chisel Jersey, Dabinett, and Tremblett's Bitter, that are rarely palatable as fresh fruit, so are not found much, though there are some around the Valley. Addition of these true cider apples can have a pronounced effect, so go lightly and experiment. If you have access to things like Baldwin, Golden Russet, Grimes Golden, Wagener, and other good flavored later heritage types, good on ya! If all else fails, a reasonable cider can be made with a dessert apple like Goldens, with about 5-10% crab apple added. Generally speaking any combination of 3 or more varieties that tastes good as fresh juice will work, as long as a hydrometer check shows a potential alcohol of 5.5% minimum. Most blends with dessert apples should give 6 - 8%.

To start, put your freshly pressed juice into a clean carboy (a 'primary' fermenter is not necessary or desirable). Have it in as cool a place as you have available. Around 50°F (10°C) is fine - lower is ok, warmer results in too rapid a fermentation for most juice blends with back-yard dessert apples. Dilute about ¼ cup of honey with an equal amount of hot water and add it to the carboy (this insures good clarification during fermentation). Add 1 packet of good yeast (Lalvin EC1118 champagne yeast recommended, as it works well at a lower temp, and is strong enough to 'overwhelm' any natural yeasts present) as per directions on the packet, and cover the opening with a cloth. Leave the airlock off the first few days in case the yeast starts off so strongly the cider foams up to overflowing (more likely the warmer it is), and to allow the oxygen in that the yeast needs at the beginning. When the foaming subsides, or after about 3 days, install the airlock (with the proper amount of water in it), and 'let it be'. Within the first 24 - 48 hrs the airlock should be bubbling, and depending on the temperature, it should take 4 - 12 weeks to totally ferment out. Our experience is that the slower (cooler) fermentation will result in a better cider, and it's much preferred that the temperature be fairly stable day and night, to avoid sucking the water out of the airlock, and provide a constant, uninterrupted ferment. The 220 litre barrels we use, with "fermenting room" temperatures about 40 - 45°F, take 12 - 16 weeks to dryness.

When it gets to the point that you don't see any bubbles in about five minutes watching the airlock, take it off and siphon the clear cider, leaving the sediment. Rinse the carboy well, return the cider to it and replace the airlock. This is called "racking the cider off the lees". If you have a 2nd carboy, simply rack it from one to the other. If the airlock thimble goes back up soon (within 24 hrs), leave it for a week and rack it again. If you want a sparkling cider, bottle right after the second racking. For a crystal clear still cider, rack 3 or more times, but always bottle the finished cider right away if the thimble doesn't come back up within 24 hours.

For sparkling cider, adding 1 litre of fresh, pasteurized, or previously frozen juice (at room temperature), to a 20 litre carboy, will provide enough additional sugar for a good sparkle. Alternatively, add enough white sugar to the carboy to attain a hydrometer reading of 1.010 max. Fill crown-cap type beer bottles or champagne bottles to about ¾ of an inch from the top, cap, and store at a cool room temperature.

Any cider should have 3 - 6 months ageing before use to insure a malo-lactic fermentation, and for sparkling cider, to allow completion of the bottle ferment. Ageing for a year or more imparts definite improvements, and with sparkling cider the time allows the sediment to 'impact' on the bottom so the cider may be carefully poured to leave the sediment behind, as well as allowing finer dispersion of the gas through the liquid, giving smaller, longer lasting bubbles. The suggestion here is that when you're making one year's cider, you start drinking the previous years' stock - this is where the patience is most needed! Most references say that stored cider won't improve beyond 12 - 18 months, but we've had pear cider (perry) that continued to improve for five years, which was the end of the lot.

And see Greg Appleyards' interesting Canadian "experiment" with various yeasts for cider making HERE, or his info on varieties for cider-making HERE

For more detailed and technical information on CIDER-MAKING, visit: Andrew Lea's most excellent site on his small scale traditional English cider-making.

Or The Real Cider and Perry Page, another UK site, not recently updated, but interesting.

You may also be interested in an out-of-print Ag Can pamphlet called Home Preparation of Juices, Wines, & Cider, which contains information on other fruits, and good plans for making your own pressing equipment, though otherwise a bit dated. Check it out HERE, or download a zip copy split into individual pages to suit printing HERE.

And if you really want to get technical about fermenting, try subscribing to the Cider Digest ----- hosted by Talismen Farm

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