Well after a two and a half year hiatus we’re finally back at it again. We haven’t officially brewed yet but we do have two carboys going with a split batch of cider (3 gals each) so we can once again hear the beautiful sounds of fermentation.

In the past we’ve been really successful with ciders both in competition and in general enjoyability. It’s funny how I disliked ciders very much until we started making our own. The ultra sweet and syrupy ciders that I had tried in the past turned me off to the style. But once I drank one of our semi-sweet, effervescent ciders I was quickly converted into really liking the style.

The only problem we had with this batch was trying to decide which of our favorites to make. So instead of trying to decide we just made a split batch of our two biggest favorites.

The Come Back Cider duo consists of a Standard Cider and an Orange Blossom Cider.

Standard Cider
3 gallons of favorite apple juice
1 Vial of California Ale Yeast (WLP001)

Orange Blossom Cider
3 gallons of favorite apple juice
1 Vial of English Cider Yeast (WLP775)
16oz Orange Blossom honey

On 03-01-2012 we bottled the come back cider split batch last eve and I’d have to say they both taste pretty great right out of the carboys.

Both Jen and I think the batch fermented with WLP001 came out the best but we’ll have to see once they are both carbonated and have a little bit of time for their flavors to fully come out.  We used our regular trick of bottling conditioning using apple juice concentrate instead of sugar to prime the bottle. 1 cup of priming juice for each 3 gallon batch.

At the end we had roughly 3 gallons of each cider and our final gravities came out to be ….

Common Cider: OG: 1.048 — FG: 1.000 — 6.3% ABV
Orange Blossom Cider: OG: 1.064 — FG: 1.000 — 8.3% ABV 😀

Can’t wait to see how these do in competition cause heavens they’re tasty!