We all love a bit of cider me especially. Its something which to some who have experience of Northern Europe with its exposure to Atlantic fury and tempestuous weather cycles would prove to be a bit of an oxymoron: a region that loves a nice apple based booze to refresh oneself in the middle of Summer.
Brewing cider is very popular in the UK. Many home brew beer but if you can get the apples you can brew more cider before you start to get taxed for it. So it was with delight that my Dad decided to make some cider today.
He performed the process a few years ago which resulted in gallons of cider which matured and grew stronger with age! In the end we were making mulled cider during winter and christmas to use it all.
So again we decided to do it all over again. Same amount of booze for a similar level of fun. For this we called for:
- 1 large plastic barrel (similar to the blue floating barrels in Half Life 2)
- 1 power drill.
- 1 smaller barrel with wooden top.
- 1 custom made blending attachment.
- 1 top loading spin dryer.
- Pillow cases.
Power drill
We call for the power drill because we were unable to use the black & decker leaf blower owing to Dad burning it down. But as one avenue cloese another to inspiration opens and we decided to make a blending attachment and drill a hole in the wooden top.
Spin drier
The next step was procuring a way of extracting the juice from the pulp so initially we thought about using the side loading washing machine in the house but was quickly warned off the idea by Mum.
Another idea was proposed where we would get a cheap 2nd hand top loading spin drier and after that it went like clockwork.
The trick is to pour the pulp into pillow cases and place them in the spin drier. Try and use some kind of plastic lid or plate to stop pulp from spinning out of the cycle. This is what should happen:
More to come over the next six months!
