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Does anyone know where I'll be able to find some jugs of apple cider for a decent price? It's about that time of year and I feel like brewing a batch.

Why not talk to the folks at the farmer's market and see if you can strike a deal... or you can take a drive up to the valley.

Yeah the market isn't a bad idea.

The valley for sure, but I'm not up there often. I was thinking about it but not driving up just for the cider... need an excuse for a day trip..

It's too early for apple cider yet. A farmer I know in Falmouth just emailed me to say he is pressing pears on Friday for pickup on Saturday. He usually sells it for $3.50-4.00 per jug (~3.5 l so you can freeze it). If you are interested, PM me and I can send you his email address. Probably have apple cider later in the season, same price.

Thanks, PM on the way...

There is also foote farms in woodville. They press all year and the latest prices that they have are $0.80 / litre for cider. They also have honey at $1.75 / lb

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They could be pressing early apples at this point but if they press all year i'm certain there is a fridge full of apples at .5c somewhere which would suck.

They haven't updated the prices since April 2010, so best to call them ahead of time to find out, also bring your own container!

I visited the Foote family farm on Friday (along with my carboy,) prices for cider is $0.8/liter, and honey is $2/lb (website is out of date.)

Picked 3 bags of Cortland and 2 bags of Macintosh (a few stray Gravenstein in there for the heck of it) a few weeks back at Willowbank U-Pick Farm. Juiced them to fill up the carboy. Added 1kg honey. 1kg+ of brown sugar. 11 cinnamon sticks. 6 Nutmegs (mostly grated). Over half a cup of fresh ground allspice. A handful of cloves. Some champagne yeast to get 'er going. It smells amazing. 1.070 SG.

papercrane wrote:I visited the Foote family farm on Friday (along with my carboy,) prices for cider is $0.8/liter, and honey is $2/lb (website is out of date.)

How does the cider taste? Is it on the sour side or the sweet?

It didn't taste very sour to me, but I don't exactly have a delicate palette. The SG was 1.048, I bumped it up to 1.060 with some sugar and added some yeast. Unfortunately the yeast has been very slow to start fermenting, I'm worried it may all go to waste.

You might need some nutrient. I'm not sure how nutritious apples are to yeast, but you might want to hit it with something. Maybe just DAP, maybe something a little more balanced. I know with my meads, its tough to get the primary going without it.

I figured the fresh pressed stuff at the SS would make decent cider and it's available year round although a bit expensive. Anyhow here's a funny little video on making cider with it

I've got lots of empty carboys in the basement and I'm thinking I should toss a batch of cider or apfelwein into one of them to have on hand for the holidays. Would US-05 be a decent yeast to use? I've got quite a few packs on hand.

NASH wrote:I figured the fresh pressed stuff at the SS would make decent cider and it's available year round although a bit expensive. Anyhow here's a funny little video on making cider with it

I've used that cider before and it turned out great (IMO). I split into 3 when I bottled it - one third primed with sugar (can't remember off hand, but cane I think), one third primed with cider and one third un-primed. The ones primed with cider were my favorite (nice and tart, very sparkling), the ones with sugar were my least favorite. The un-primed ones still ended up slightly carbed.

mgc wrote:You might need some nutrient. I'm not sure how nutritious apples are to yeast, but you might want to hit it with something. Maybe just DAP, maybe something a little more balanced. I know with my meads, its tough to get the primary going without it.

I bought some nutrient on my why home from work and came home to a happy suprise, the air lock was bubbling away nicely. Looks like I was worrying for nothing.