Homemade Apple Cider

I was so, so, so, so excited to make Homemade Apple Cider. I LOVE Apple Cider. It is one of my top reasons that I love the Fall.

The Pinterest Pin for Homemade Apple Cider (See Blog Here)...

This might be the only Pinterest Pin picture that my pictures look better than. Although I wish I had this amazing glass.

This recipe is very easy, it's just very time consuming since you cook it in the slow cooker.

Homemade Apple Cider

- 12 Apples (I used a 3lb bag of macintosh apples, there were 13 apples)
- 4-7 cups of water (I used about 7 cups)
- 1/2 - 3/4 of Sugar (optional) (I used a little more than a half a cup)
- 1 tbsp of Cinnamon (I added more later)
- 1 tsp of All Spice (I added more later)

1. Core Apples and cut into quarters. I just used an apple slicer.

2. Place apples, spices, sugar and water in the slow cooker. Add enough water to cover the apples. This is a little tricky since apples float.

3. Cook apples in the slow cooker for 5 - 6 hours on low. After 5 hours I tasted my cider and it didn't taste very appley, so I decided to put the apples through the food processor, and let the cider cook on high for 1 more hour. I don't recommend this, it will make the final draining process much harder than needed. And it looks pretty gross.

7. Once it's done cooking, put the cider through a cheese cloth and a metal sieve. I did them at the same time, to save time.

8. Then you can take the cheese cloth and squeeze out any extra liquid. 

9. Next you will take the liquid that has been drained and put it through a mesh sieve. My process would have been quicker if I had a bigger sieve, and probably much quicker if I didn't puree the apples.

10. Once all the liquid is through the mesh sieve, you might want to do it one more time. After all that time and all that work, this is the fruit of your labor. Not very much.

11. Enjoy chilled or warm. I prefer it warmed.

This was seriously the best Apple Cider I have ever had, it was just a lot of work. So it was definitely a Pinterest Success, but I might just stick to the store bought Apple Cider.

Since I had all that pureed apple, I thought I would try another Pinterest Pin. This one was for homemade fruit roll ups made with fruit puree. (See here)

Since I already cooked the fruit and pureed it, all I had to do was spray a cookie sheet and then add the puree mix.

Then I put it in the oven for 5-8 hours on the lowest temperature (mine was 170 degrees) and I cracked the door. This will dry out the fruit and it will look something like this. (I think I could have dried them out a little less.)

 Then you can cut the fruit with a pizza cutter and wrap it in wax paper to serve.

They don't look very appealing, but they are actually really good, and my toddler loves them. So any way to get a toddler to eat fruit is great to me. Pinterest Success!