Brewing Hard Cider with a Sourdough Starter (Experiment)

by | Aug 28, 2025 | Doctors Blog | 0 comments

Brewing Hard Cider with a Sourdough Starter (Experiment)

Brewing Hard Cider with a Sourdough Starter (Experiment)

What happens if you ditch the bread oven and let your sourdough starter crash the cider party? Spoiler: it’s fizzy, funky, and a little bit fabulous. A YouTube viewer named Andy dropped the idea in the comments on one of my earlier sourdough beer videos — “How about sourdough cider?” Well Andy, you asked, I brewed. Let’s kick it!

Cider vs. Must – Clearing Up the Apple Confusion

Here in Sweden, we call unfermented pressed apple juice “must.” Once it’s fermented and has alcohol, we call that cider (and to confuse you more, we of course also have non-alcoholic ciders). Meanwhile, across the pond, “cider” often means unfermented juice, while “hard cider” is the boozy stuff.

Confused yet? Don’t worry — just remember this: if it gives you a buzz, it’s cider (unless it’s our NA version). If not, it’s just juice in fancy packaging.

Pizza Beer DrHans Brewery ingridients

The Sourdough Cider Experiment

This all started with a fancy box of local Swedish apple must from Värmdö Musteri. Sure, I could’ve just grabbed cheap juice from the grocery store, but hey — we’re keeping it fancy today (garbage in, garbage out, right?).

The plan?

  1. Fill the iGulu F1 fermenter with 3 liters of apple must.

  2. Pour in a healthy splash of my sourdough starter.

  3. Seal it up and let the magic (or chaos) begin.

And yes — Chewie supervised. He approves of all experiments that result in extra bubbles.

If you’re curious about the gear I use, you can get 20% off iGulu gear using the code DRHAN20 👉 https://igulu.com/?sca_ref=6679834.Gm6UfWKv2R

    Pizza Beer DrHans Brewery Sam Marzano

    Fermentation Schedule & Nerdy Numbers

    You know I can’t resist some numbers, right? Here’s how the fermentation went down:

    • OG (Original Gravity): 1.044

    • Fermentation:

      • 2 days at 23°C / 73°F

      • 2 days at 25°C / 77°F

      • 5 days at 27°C / 78°F

    • Cold crash for clarity

    • FG (Final Gravity): 1.015 (corrected to 1.007 with refractometer magic)

    • ABV: A precise 4.9% (aka “about 5%” — but don’t tell my inner scientist I rounded).

    👉 Pro tip: Want to bump that ABV without dumping sugar or honey? Add a concentrated apple juice pack. Easy boost without losing cider character.

    Pizza Beer DrHans Brewery Tasting the sour beer

    Tasting Notes – Slight Funk but Fantastic

    Pouring it out, I got a hazy cider with just a whisper of head. It smelled like fresh apples… with a little extra something. For the first time in my sourdough brewing experiments, I caught a hint of funk.

    On the palate:

    • Light carbonation (naturally carbed in the fermenter)

    • Clean apple backbone

    • Tart edge, but less sour than my earlier sourdough brews

    • Dry finish with just enough funk to keep things interesting

    Not lambic-level funk, but enough that you know this yeast means business. Honestly? It turned out really refreshing. The kind of cider you can sip in the sun without realizing you’re “sessioning” a science experiment.

      Pizza Beer DrHans Brewery Lab Dr

      Thoughts on Going Natural

      If I had apple trees, I’d probably press my own juice and maybe even let the yeast on the apple peels do the job naturally. You’d get wild yeasts, lactobacillus, and who knows what else joining the party. Could be amazing, could be chaos. But hey — that’s half the fun of brewing.

      Sadly, no apple orchard here. But maybe you’ve tried natural cider fermentations at home? Drop your experience in the comments — I’d love to compare notes.

      Pizza Beer DrHans Brewery Lab Dr

      Wrapping It Up

      So, can you ferment cider with sourdough? Absolutely. Should you? Well… if you like a crisp, tart cider with a touch of wild funk — then yes.

      This experiment gave me a refreshing, drinkable 5% hard cider with a personality all its own. Not a wine, not a beer, not your average cider — something in between. And that’s the beauty of playing mad scientist in the brewery.

      Stick around — because another sourdough cider experiment is already bubbling away, and I can’t wait to see how it compares. Until then…

      DrHans Out! 🍏🍺

      🎬 Watch the Madness Unfold

      Reading is fun, but watching the chaos is even better. See the epic pour, the tasting reactions, and the Multiverse doctors arguing about decimals and science:

      👉 Watch on YouTube

        That´s all beer bitches

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        Webpage: https://drhansbrewery.com
        Contact Email: drhansbrewery@gmail.com

         

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