r/cider • u/OldDonD • 3d ago

Ideas for this year's cider

Good people,

Going into my fourth year of annual cider making. My plan is to make 3-5 different 1 gallon batches. Would like to try different ingredients, techniques or methods. Try and fail approach.

Some of my ideas are trying some back sweeting, oak chips, higher starting OG. Maybe apple wine.

Any recommendations on things to try?

Thanks a lot in advance.

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3

u/Complete_Medicine_33 3d ago

Have you messed with tannins at all? If there are any crab apple trees in your area you could juice a small amount of them and add it to the cider.

1

u/OldDonD 3d ago

Thanks for good idea. Not really crab apples around, have tried with tea bags before, might try that again.

Other ideas for adding tannin?

1

u/Complete_Medicine_33 1d ago

You can buy tannins from homebrew websites.

3

u/hehgffvjjjhb 2d ago

Try adding peels, I'm going to make a rosé cider this year with the skins of a bunch of red delicious apples.

There's various recipes on here: Apple Peels: The Missing Ingredient of Hard Cider – PricklyCider.com https://share.google/OfA6WZUwr4EHipTrS

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u/OldDonD 2d ago

Cool!!

2

u/Asleep_Range3657 3d ago

Cherry.

2

u/teamwaterwings 2d ago

One of the best ciders I ever made was just pure cherry juice

1

u/OldDonD 2d ago

Ok settled, one batch with cherry juice. Thanks!

1

u/teamwaterwings 2d ago

Make sure it's 100% pure cherry juice with no preservatives. Preservatives completely prevent fermentation from happening

1

u/SpaceGoatAlpha 🍎🍏🫚🍯🍊🍋🍻🍇🍾🍷 2d ago

That would be cherry wine, not a cider.   And I agree, cherry wine is absolutely delicious.  I have just under 100 cherry trees, and about 50% of the produce goes to making cherry wine or flavoring other batches.   Cherries just have this wonderful combination of acidity and sweetness that always make such memorable flavors.   One of my favorites is to give cherry wine 'the pie treatment', adding flavorings in secondary just as you would to a cherry pie or cherry cobbler; vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, cloves, etc.   🍒🥧🍷     😙🤌

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u/OldDonD 3d ago

Smashed or juice, or how do you usually do?

2

u/Complete_Medicine_33 3d ago

For a one gallon batch one of those quarts you can buy at the grocery store would be plenty

1

u/OldDonD 3d ago

I have some cherries that's been in the freezer for a year or two. Might make some sirup out of those to add.

2

u/Ashmeads_Kernel 3d ago

American oak, ginger, rhubarb, Hungarian oak/vanilla, elderberry, freeze distillation.

1

u/OldDonD 2d ago

Appreciated!

2

u/teamwaterwings 2d ago

I made a fantastic apple champagne one time with EC-1118 by starting with pure cider, then adding apple concentrate in stages up until it was like 10%, then went for really high carbonation

1

u/OldDonD 2d ago

Wow, sounds amazin. Did you go by recipe?