From apple juice to apple cider

How two colleagues brewed 75 Liters of cider for the SUPERP Apple Festival

For the SUPERP Apple Festival, we asked our beer-brewing colleagues at SynTouch if they could make apple cider. They could. What followed was a project that began with an initial test batch at home and ended with dozens of liters of SUPERcyder and about 230 bottles ready for the festival.

It all started with a question that wasn’t quite right

The original question was simple: Can you brew an apple-flavored beer? Harald, one of our brewers, immediately explained why that wasn’t a good idea. A pronounced apple flavor in beer is considered a flavor defect. So we decided to take a different approach: making apple cider.

As it happened, one of us had been thinking about trying cider for a while. The question was exactly the nudge we needed.

How do you make apple cider?

The process is surprisingly simple. Apple juice naturally contains a lot of sugar. During fermentation, yeast converts that sugar into alcohol and CO2. The first fermentation takes place in a fermentation vessel equipped with an airlock, allowing the CO2 to escape. The cider is then bottled, where a second fermentation occurs. The CO2 dissolves into the cider, creating its natural fizz.

You don’t need many ingredients. It’s precisely that simplicity that makes making cider so accessible.

Taste, Test, and Choose

After the first successful test batch, Camiel and David set to work refining the flavor. They tested and tasted various apple concentrates, both on their own and with colleagues who were willing to participate in the taste test. Each variant yielded a different result: more or less tart, clearer or cloudier, more approachable or, conversely, more pronounced in flavor.

In the end, we chose the version that was the most popular. Not based on theory, but simply based on what tasted best.

Scaling Up to the Large Batch

Using the winning recipe as our starting point, we began the large production batch at the end of July. Two fermentation vats, dozens of liters of SUPERcyder in the making. In addition to the large batch, Camiel and David also made a small, artisanal batch from freshly pressed apples, pressed by hand. It was labor-intensive, but the aroma was by far the most pleasant of all the varieties.

And now: wait

As of this writing, the large batch is fermenting vigorously. The taste test is promising. Cider should have notes reminiscent of a dry white wine, but with more fruit and a hint of sweetness. We expect to be able to bottle the SUPERcyder soon, so that everything will be ready in time for the Apple Festival.

We expect to fill about 230 bottles in the end.

From the first test batch to 230 bottles of SUPERcyder

This project got a little out of hand, but in a good way. What started as a request for a corporate event turned into a serious experiment involving multiple test batches, freshly pressed apples, and two full fermentation tanks. A few concrete lessons:

• Tasting food with colleagues leads to better choices than relying solely on theoretical reasoning.
• Traditional craftsmanship takes more time, but produces something unique.
• Making apple cider is easier than most people think.
• This surely wasn’t the last edition of SUPERcyder. We’re curious to hear what our customers and colleagues think of it at the Apple Festival.

Cheers!