DIY

I racked some hard apple cider yesterday.  Hard cider made at home, even from the best apple juice, is about half the price of a jug of wine.  No sulfites, either; if you have problems with sulfites, you might want to try this.

There are several recipes for hard cider on line and I'm not sure which I like best yet.  It takes up to a month for cider to age properly.

The first time I used bread yeast and the product was OK.  I used barely 1/4 teaspoon of the bread yeast.  This time I used a package of lager yeast.

I used Lucky Leaf Premium not-from-concentrate apple juice the first two times.  I couldn't find any the last time I was in the store so I got a gallon of Apple & Eve even though it was from concentrate.

You can use old wine jugs but they have to be glass jugs and you have to clean them and rinse with boiling water before you put in your juice, sugar and yeast.

Then you use a rubber band to fasten a double layer of plastic wrap across the top, and you punch a hole the whole way through with a nut pick or skewer.

Then you put it somewhere cool in temperature for a week.  You pour off the immature cider into another jug that you've cleaned and sterilized, and put the plastic wrap on top of that.

Then you sterilize the first jug because you'll use it in another week for a second racking.

You can put a pinch of sugar in the second or third setting; the remaining yeast will eat it up and produce carbonation.

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