Cider Recipe

[solway cropper]

Hilary B is quite right but if you have a fermenting bin with a tap you don't need to mess about siphoning. You probably lose a couple of pints left at the bottom of the bin but that should go on the compost heap as it's full of nice things. I bottle my cider for two reasons: a) it looks a bit unseemly swigging from a demijohn and b) if you add a little sugar you get a secondary fermentation which gives a bit of fizz.

[Scottishnewbie]

Racking is to separate the nice booze from the left-over yeast. When the ferment is done (or nearly done) most of the yeast sinks to the bottom of the fermenting vessel (sediment). If it is left in, you not only have cloudy wine/cider, it also produces some odd flavours, so you siphon off the nice bit into a clean container, and leave the gunk behind. Sometimes this may need doing 2 or 3 times, if it throws much sediment before fermenting is done.
Bottling comes when you are sure there is no more sediment left to sink, and no more fermenting happening.

HilaryB you are fab! Thank you so much. This (for the first time ever) makes perfect sense and now I understand. So I have just finished racking my dandelion wine (courtesy of you I seem to remember?) and it's beginning to look like 'real' wine!

[Hilary B]

HilaryB you are fab! Thank you so much. This (for the first time ever) makes perfect sense and now I understand. So I have just finished racking my dandelion wine (courtesy of you I seem to remember?) and it's beginning to look like 'real' wine!

You are very welcome to what modest knowledge I can offer (including translation of 'technical' terms to 'basic'.)