A Fall Tradition: Apple Cider

It’s become a tradition for hubby and me to make apple cider with his parents. Every year at about this time, we head over to their farm for this yearly event. It never fails that the weather starts to turn cold the moment the apples are ready for picking and it just makes it feel so festive. It’s fun to do this every year and we enjoy the home made apple cider! I thought I would share some pictures and some of the process this year.

First thing, pick the apples!

Next, we washed the apples in a big tub of water, but I didn’t get a picture of that. (By the way, it takes BUCKETS of apples to make apple cider- this was just a few apples for picture purposes!)

They have a cider press that you throw an apple or two at a time into the press and then there is a hand crank that chops the apples up and spits them into a bucket below the press.

It takes strong arms to crank that machine! Hubby did most of the cranking, but I did some too!

A close up:

Once the bucket it full, there is a “lid” that goes on top and you twist this bar down on top of it to crush the apples together and this squeezes the juice out.

This is the best time to stick a cup under the flow of delicious apple juice and drink it fresh! YUM! Plus, the apples are cold and that makes the cider cold, too. After that, you dump the cider through a strainer and then into jugs. I didn’t get pictures of this part either. My in-laws can the juice, too and so we have some all year long!

That’s all for now! :)