I have just moved into a new home in Scotland and our garden has an apple tree.
It is late August now and a few of the apples are beginning to fall from the tree. The apples left on the tree are of a size comparable to those available in the supermarket. I have eaten one and it was unexpectedly nice. Quite a sharp taste like a Granny Smith apple.
I would like to make cider with the apples and would appreciate if someone could send me a link to a tutorial. I an assuming that a basic 'getting started' guide is available somewhere?
As I understand it, I need to (in the simplest of terms):
* pick the apples
* collect them into buckets
* pulp them up in the buckets with a wooden stick
* press the apples and collect the juice into buckets
* add some yeast to the buckets and wait a day
* pour the juice through a seive into demijohns
* add airlocks to the demijohns
* wait 3 or 4 weeks until fermintation stops
* syphon from demijohns into some old 2L cola plastic bottles (sterilised with campden tablets)
Questions:
* Best commercially available press for £100 or less?
* What type of yeast to use and how much of it?
* Any recommendations of good places to buy all this kit? (press; buckets; demijohns; airlocks; sterilisation tablets; etc.)
* do you recommend adding sugar when bottling?
* what will the alcohol content be? Do I need to do anything to control it?
It is late August now and a few of the apples are beginning to fall from the tree. The apples left on the tree are of a size comparable to those available in the supermarket. I have eaten one and it was unexpectedly nice. Quite a sharp taste like a Granny Smith apple.
I would like to make cider with the apples and would appreciate if someone could send me a link to a tutorial. I an assuming that a basic 'getting started' guide is available somewhere?
As I understand it, I need to (in the simplest of terms):
* pick the apples
* collect them into buckets
* pulp them up in the buckets with a wooden stick
* press the apples and collect the juice into buckets
* add some yeast to the buckets and wait a day
* pour the juice through a seive into demijohns
* add airlocks to the demijohns
* wait 3 or 4 weeks until fermintation stops
* syphon from demijohns into some old 2L cola plastic bottles (sterilised with campden tablets)
Questions:
* Best commercially available press for £100 or less?
* What type of yeast to use and how much of it?
* Any recommendations of good places to buy all this kit? (press; buckets; demijohns; airlocks; sterilisation tablets; etc.)
* do you recommend adding sugar when bottling?
* what will the alcohol content be? Do I need to do anything to control it?
