I’m thinking of making a batch of hard cider in the upcoming weeks, and had the idea that I might spice it up with some cinnamon sticks in either the primary or secondary. I’m curious if anyone has tried this, how much cinnamon they used, how long they steeped the cinnamon, etc.?
Thanks in advance for any thoughts you may have!
I tried it a couple years ago. I put in one 2-inch cinnamon stick per gallon, and was not happy with the results. Considering how well cinnamon goes with apple in pie, and how well it goes in mulled cider, it was surprising how badly it pared with hard cider.
This.
The flavors of baked/cooked apples (carmelization) are in my mind what go so well with cinnamon/allspice/nutmeg, etc.
Fermented apples are very different. Its like expecting something that goes well with grape juice (can’t think of anything!) to go well in wine as well.
Thanks for the thoughts. The reason I ask is that once upon a time, I’d made a mead from spiced apple cider and it was one of the best batches I’d ever made. But I’m not married to the idea of spicing the apple cider. Maybe I’ll just drop the idea for now and give it a shot in a test batch some other time.
Don’t get discouraged, I’ve had both bad and good examples.
I would make a non-spiced batch, bottle part of it ‘clean’ and then transfer the rest to secondary and spice. This way you get to try both versions.
All of this makes me wonder what would happen if I tried this with a Belgian beer yeast… not that I actually plan to do it.
I’ve done cinnamon sticks in cider before. I have warmed half my cider with the cinnamon to kind of mull it then took the sticks out for fermentation. This year I let the sticks go in the fermenter and it still came out decent. I also added some whole cloves to off-set the straight-up cinnamon flavor. Gives a nice warming effect.
