The cider corner

[Amobokoboko]

Goodmorning chaps

With the summer just started I came up with the idea of trying to produce my own cider. Ideal refreshment for the odd BBQ.

For the moment I'm searching the web for nice recipes (to figure out which apples to use and to get it well balanced).
As I'm not hailing from a cider country I do need some advice, taste wise to make this a very pleasant quest

The ciders that are available everywhere in Belgium and that I have drunk so far are:

Magners: comes with a sour taste, good refreshing drink but after one or two I prefer to switch to something less sour.

Bulmers: My absolute favorite. Not to sweet, not to sour. Lacks a bit of identity but it's the best we can have here.
Sommersby: Very tasteful but very sweet, a bit too sweet for me.
Savannah Dry: As the name says, very dry, but very enjoyable.

I would like to get some advice which ciders you prefer, so I can google them and see which apples they use. That way I can try to produce something similar and have a nice cider.

 

[Howzy]

Brothers toffee apple cider is good

 

[ZeFrenchy]

Is British cider similar to the one from Normandy and Brittany?
In France you don't really find big brands, it's mostly small farms that produce it.

 

[TRF_stormer2010]

I prefer something more bitter but of the ciders I've tried (mainly bigger brands as we don't really produce in SA at a micro scale) I preferred Savannah dry. It's dry but you can drink it. Generally considered a ladies' drink over here the sweet or sour stuff. We call them 'sletsappies'; slut juice.

 

[Howzy]

Guinness isn't a cider but it's still good

 

[admartian]

I like Isaac's cider or Mac's cider.
Though the best one I;ve tasted is probably Rekordelig.

 

[Amobokoboko]

Rekordlig is my all time favorite. But you can't get it here. I always bring two crates with me when going to the UK
There is some French Cider available here but it's very sour. Not my cup of tea. Cider is indeed a ladies drink but ideal for the summer when watching 3 Nations in the pub.

 

[SelimNiai]

I'm a cider snob. For me a cider, a true cider, has to be made with Apples and be from Somerset or Herefordshire. Its where the best ones are from. I don't like it with pear or any other BS flavour that hipsters drink.

Thatchers Gold is the perfect cider to me but also like Scrumpy Jack and Old Rosie is quite nice.

 

[Amobokoboko]

I also had a scrumpy before, indeed quiet tasteful.
Taste wise do you prefer the more sweeter or sourer ciders?

 

[SelimNiai]

I go for medium dry to medium ciders. I dont want them too sweet either

 

[Getofmeland]

Cheddar Valley Cider is superb, but it will knock you for six, however for me the cloudier the cider is the better, if you can't see through the glass, then it means you will be ****ting through a needle for the next week. Great way to lose weight.

 

[powerfulduck]

The above mentioned are all good ciders, thatchers is one of my fav's. I'd also throw in Cornish rattler I haven't had it for years but I remember it as being nice.

 

[Feicarsinn]

Have you brewed before? As easy as it is, there are a lot of common mistakes that people make first time that can easily be avoided if you're not careful. If you have any questions on that regard, fire away. Cider is pretty easy to brew well, much easier than a lager for example. Also, if you get bored half way you can skip secondary fermentation and have alcoholic still apple juice essentially.

 

[Amobokoboko]

No it's the first time. But I did found a couple of so called easy tutorials and I have been blessed with an awesome recipe for warm apple juice which I will try to ciderize of course ( see it as a limited Xmas edition). If you want to pass me good advice and or tips, please fire away.

at this stage the biggest issue might be to find the correct tools to fermentate the juice.

 

[Feicarsinn]

No it's the first time. But I did found a couple of so called easy tutorials and I have been blessed with an awesome recipe for warm apple juice which I will try to ciderize of course ( see it as a limited Xmas edition). If you want to pass me good advice and or tips, please fire away.

at this stage the biggest issue might be to find the correct tools to fermentate the juice.

Right, well there are two main things you should concern yourself with when brewing: cleanliness and temperature control.

Cleanliness is probably the more important of the two. Remember that you're carrying out an organic process, you want to use your brewing yeast to take sugar and turn it into alcohol. If your brewing equipment isn't extremely clean you can have wild yeasts present that will give you products aside from ethanol, which is bad. With that in mind I'd recommend that you buy some sterilizer and use it to clean all of your equipment before use with a lot of hot water. Also, remember to check that any containers you're using are food grade, or they could again react and give you some dodgy output.

With regard to temperature control, I had a bit of trouble when I used to brew in my conservatory as it'd get very hot in the day and cool at night. Yeast likes to be kept at a pretty constant temperature, not too far off room temp, so if you can keep it in a room without too much variance that'd be optimal.

Aside from that there's not too much you can mess up. Be careful not too add too much sugar though, as you could end up with a "hung" fermentation. You get better the more you do it, practice making perfect and all that.

 

[Amobokoboko]

I'm planning for the first trial batch not to add any sugar as the apple are already quiet sweet.
Tomorrow I'm heading to the store to see if I can get everything that's required.

I got a couple of ideas/ formulas in mind. Do you have any good advice on how to produce a dry cider?

 

[dullonien]

It's taken me a long time to be able to enjoy cider again. I hated it for years, because it was what I drank when I first started going to pubs and clubs at the age of 16. Got ****** on the stuff far too often between the ages of 16-18, and as such the taste of cider always reminded me of feeling like sh*t.

I actually remember the first time we went out on the town as a bunch of lads, too scared to try and get in any pubs, so sending the oldest looking boys into spar to buy some booze. I remember us asking for bottles/cans of lager and him coming out with big bottles of strongbow and Schmirnoff Ice's and WDK blue because they 'panicked, and grabbed the first things they saw', lol. I remember drinking about 1.5 litres of extra strong strongbow in about 90mins, throwing up, then getting on with the night. Eventually we all got drunk enough to stumble into a club later on in the night. The bouncers knew we were under-age as one of them was friends with my mates dad, let us in anyway.

In the last couple of years I've been able to enjoy cider a little more. I still don't love apple cider though, and as such I prefer a nice pear cider on a summers day. Not that Kopparberg sh*t though that tastes like your drinking liquid pear drops, but I find Magners or Bullmers pear ciders nice.

 

[Amobokoboko]

The Peary bottled by Scrumpy is also very nice.

 

[McTallshort]

I'm planning for the first trial batch not to add any sugar as the apple are already quiet sweet.
Tomorrow I'm heading to the store to see if I can get everything that's required.

I got a couple of ideas/ formulas in mind. Do you have any good advice on how to produce a dry cider?

Easy use cooking apples not dessert apples and make sure you use Feicarsinn's advice on cleanliness, sterilize everything!

Ciders are 2 different drinks to me, you have the bottles Bulmers, Gayners etc which I like to drink just above freezing point and then you have the scrumpy west country stuff that you can drink at room temperature like red wine or real ale which does have the side effects of blindness and uncontrolled bed wetting but tastes great.

 

[dullonien]

Old Rosy if you want to get bladdered!