Thursday, March 17, 2016

Scientific Cider - Hume's Fork

Follow the detailed recipe to create a young, strong cider.

Preparation

  1. Make tea in a pot. Drink some, but ensure there's 2 cups worth left over in the teapot. Leave to stew.
  2. Take 0.33 litres of pasteurised apple juice and pour in to a 500ml cup. Add a couple of teaspoons of light brown sugar. Stir in yeast. Cover the cup and leave in a cool, dark place for 24 hours; shaking / mixing it every so often.

Pre-fermentation

  1. Pour 2 litres of apple juice in to a pan and heat to around 50°C. Do not let it boil. Stir in 500g of light brown sugar. Ensure it is all dissolved. Let the juice cool and then pour in to your fermenting bucket.
  2. Remove the teabags from the teapot and pour the tea in to the fermenting bucket.
  3. Pour 19 litres of apple juice in to the fermenting bucket and then give the must a very brief and gentle stir.
  4. Move the fermenting bucket to wherever it is going to stay for the fermentation phase. The temperature should be in the range of 16°C - 18°C. Take a gravity reading. It should have a potential of around 8.25% abv.
  5. Shake up the yeast mixture and then pour it in to the fermentation bucket. Immediately put on the lid and airlock.

Fermentation

  1. Fermentation should start slowly, with very little activity at the airlock. After 48 hours take a gravity reading; hopefully the potential alcohol will have dropped by around 1% abv. Around 72 hours in, however, the fermentation process will really kick off. Airlock activity will peak with bubbles every 6 to 8 seconds.

Racking

  1. Three days after the airlock activity has dropped to 1 bubble every 30 seconds you are ready to rack.
  2. Pour 0.66 litres of apple juice in to a pan and heat to around 50°C. Do not let it boil. Stir in 50g of light brown sugar. Ensure it is all dissolved. Let the juice cool and then pour in to your secondary bucket.
  3. Carefully siphon your cider from the fermentation bucket in to the secondary bucket. The siphoning process will mix it enough to produce a primed product, ready for bottling.

Bottling

  1. Bottle the product from the secondary bucket via tap / racking cane in to 500ml PET bottles and cap, leaving a small amount of head space for carbonation purposes.
  2. Store bottles for 1 week at 16°C - 18°C then transfer them to a colder location or refrigeration for another 1 - 2 weeks. The product is then ready to drink.
  3. Keep the bottles cold-stored for up to 6 months.