Fall Cider

By Kazetani, August 20, 2014

By the time I decided I wanted to take something to Yule, it was too later to start sake. After some looking at various things, I learned cider wasn’t hard to do and only took a short time.  With that in mind, I attempted an apple cider with a cinnamon and clove taste.

• 1 tsp pectin enzyme
• 1 pack Red Star yeast
• 2 tsp yeast nutrient
• 2 gallons North Coast organic unfiltered apple juice

I mixed that and let it ferment, which seemed to take about 7 days.  I left it another week to make sure, then added a spice mix by dissolving the red hots and sugar in the water, and boiling it with the cloves and cinnamon, then removed the cinnamon and cloves before adding to the cider.

• 3 sticks of cinnamon
• 20 cloves
• 2 Tbsp cane sugar
• 2 Tbsp red hots
• 1c boiling water

After it was bottled and pasteurized, it seemed very dry and unfortunately the spices didn’t seem to come through at all.  I backsweetened each bottle with 2 Tbsp of the same apple juice which made it fairly tasty. Next time, more spice for sure