I make my own apple cider, ginger beer, wine, etc. A 3 gallon batch of cider or ginger beer costs about $20 to make; wine is a bit more if you buy concentrated wine grape juice. I probably spend $100/yr on ingredients, but give a lot of it away.
I was in France this summer and you can get decent wine for 3-5 euros a bottle. Americans are conditioned to spend a lot on alcohol as a luxury good.
Years ago, I researched the health implications of alcohol and concluded that I really should drink more. The optimal intake is half a serving per day for women and one serving per day for men.
I loooove cider, and have been tentatively interested in learning to make my own. It's probably not feasible in my current living situation, but do you happen to have any tips or tricks to offer on that? :)
It's actually pretty easy. Buy a large bottle of apple juice (not the cider in the produce section, which has preservatives, but the pasteurized stuff like this:
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Mott-s-100-Apple-Juice-1-Gal/10535477). That way you can do the fermentation in the bottle that it comes in.
You will also need wine yeast. I use Lalvin EC-1118 for cider. It is "hardy" yeast that won't die if the room gets a bit cold.
https://www.amazon.com/Lalvin-Dried-Wine-Yeast-1118/dp/B003TOEEFG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1484349279&sr=8-1&keywords=ec-1118Oxygen will turn your cider into vinegar, so you need an airlock to let CO2 out while preventing oxygen from coming in. You can make an airlock by putting a balloon across the mouth of the bottle and make a tiny pinhole in the top of the balloon. As it ferments, CO2 puffs up the balloon and goes out the hole, but when it's done fermenting, the balloon collapses blocking the hole. Or you can buy a stopper and a real airlock. I like this style for ease of cleaning and a low profile to fit in the fridge:
https://www.amazon.com/SocalHomeBrew-Plastic-Piece-Airlock-Pack/dp/B000E60G2W/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1484349504&sr=8-7&keywords=airlock. The tricky part is finding a stopper with a hole that fits your bottle, but you can buy kits like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Home-Brew-Ohio-Fermenter-Capacity/dp/B00KQN9OSK/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1484349504&sr=8-9&keywords=airlockSo you put the yeast in the apple juice, put the airlock on the top, put the whole thing on your kitchen counter, and wait. It will bubble and get cloudy as the yeast grow, then eventually settle to the bottom. You can add bentonite fining agent at the beginning (basically clay that binds to the dead yeast and makes it settle faster) but it's not necessary. Bentonite makes cider settle within a few days of finishing the fermentation; otherwise it takes a week or two. There is not enough alcohol for it to stay preserved on your counter forever, so I transfer it to my fridge (the whole thing with the airlock) once it stops bubbling. But if you don't have room in your fridge it will probably be fine to wait until bottling.
Once the dead yeast have settled, you can either pour off the clear cider into another container or use tubing as a siphon to transfer it. At this point you have dry, flat cider. If you want to sweeten it, add potassium sorbate to prevent further yeast growth and then add simple syrup (2 cups sugar to 1 cup water, boil to dissolve, cool in fridge) to taste. If you want to carbonate it, skip the potassium sorbate, and add a *pinch* of sugar to each bottle and the yeast will revive and make bubbles. But if you want it sweetened AND fizzy, you will need some sort of CO2 tank. The sodastream things will work, but in the long run it's a lot cheaper to buy a 5 lb CO2 tank and carbonate it by shaking under pressure. But the easiest first try would be either without sugar or without carbonation. I bottle mine in old Perrier bottles, which are designed to take pressure, and they look cool. It should be stored in the fridge once bottled.
If a one gallon batch works well and you want to scale up, walmart sells 3 gallon empty water bottles in the water filter section. At that point, you'd want to invest in tubing and a racking wand so that you don't have to pour from such a heavy bottle.
If you run into problems feel free to PM me.
