2025-05-04

Applejack from Scratch

Where I live, alcohol is ridiculously expensive, so making my own for about 1.37 €/L is worth the effort. This might not end up as the best-tasting wine in the world, but it’s done for the price, not for sipping with your pinky finger raised. Let’s first go through making the wine itself, and then the process of distilling it into applejack.

Fermentation

Here’s what you’ll need. Think of these as a one-time investment for cheap AF alcohol.

  • 25 L fermentation vessel with airlock

  • Food-safe bottles for 19 L

  • Siphon

  • Hydrometer to measure ABV

  • Straining Bag

  • Thermometer (I’ve survived without)

  • A couple of buckets will come in handy

Ingredients

  • 6 kg apples (washed): €8.35

  • 6 kg sugar: €7.50

  • 0.5 kg raisins (natural yeast nutrients): €3.70

  • Wine fermentation kit (yeast, clarifiers, etc.): €5.90

  • 22 g citric acid (if the apples aren’t tart enough): €0.35

Process

Just follow your fermentation kit’s instructions. Most home wine kits are simple — sanitize, mix, pitch yeast, and wait. A few tips:

  • Core and peel the apples for lower pectin content

  • Keep the temperature between 18–25 °C

  • Check gravity regularly to track fermentation progress

Stats

  • Total cost: ~25.80 € → 1.36 €/L

  • Final volume: 19 L of finished wine from 25 L must

  • Alcohol: OG 1.121 → FG 0.994 → ~16.7 % ABV

The Chemistry (for the curious)

Yeast Thrives Under These Conditions

  • pH: 3.8–4.0

  • Temp: 18–25 °C

  • Max OG: 1.120 (don’t push it too much)

ABV Formulas

  • Potential (before fermentation):

    Potential ABV (%) = (OG − 1.000) × 131.25

    Where OG is the original specific gravity.

  • Measured:

    ABV (%) = (OG − FG) × 131.25

    Where OG is original gravity and FG is final gravity.

  • Oechsle scale alternative:

    Potential ABV = °Oe × 0.136 − 2.5

    ABV = (Starting °Oe − Ending °Oe) × 0.136

    Where °Oe is the degrees Oechsle (i.e., the gravity points above 1.000, multiplied by 1000).

SG ↔ Oechsle

  • SG = 1 + (°Oe ÷ 1000)

  • °Oe = (SG − 1) × 1000

Where SG is specific gravity, and °Oe is the corresponding value on the Oechsle scale.

Back-Sweetening

Skip this if you’re planning to jack the wine.

For a sweeter finish, dissolve sugar in a small amount of heated water and add gradually to taste. Here’s a general guide for sweetness levels:

Style g/L Total for 19 L
Dry 0–4 0–76 g
Off-Dry 4–12 76–228 g
Medium-Sweet 12–45 228–855 g
Sweet 45+ 855 g+

After sweetening, stir thoroughly and let it settle before bottling.

Freeze Distillation

This is the fun part. Apple brandy originated from freeze distillation (aka fractional freezing or “jacking”) in colonial times, and the result was nicknamed applejack. Winter cold concentrated hard apple cider into a stronger spirit, and settlers favored it over traditional distillation because it required no fuel; boiling demanded precious resources. Thus was born America’s first native liquor.

Before we continue, let’s clear up the usual concern: methanol. It’s toxic to humans if ingested in large quantities, though regular alcohol isn’t exactly harmless either. Fermentation produces small amounts of methanol (especially from fruit with high pectin content like apples) along with the good stuff. Store-bought wine also contains methanol, it’s completely normal, and producers don’t remove it. The EU allows up to 250 mg/L in wine (400 mg/L in red).

In traditional distillation, methanol can be reduced by discarding the first portion (the foreshot), since it boils at a lower temperature. But because we’re not boiling anything here, freeze distillation doesn’t separate methanol, so we need to know if it’s still safe.

Let’s do the math:

  • Apple‑wine methanol content: typically 20 – 200 mg/L

  • Peeled and cored apples (as here) sit at the low end, but we’ll use the worst‑case 200 mg/L for safety

  • 200 mg/L = 0.2 g/L ≈ 0.25 mL/L (methanol density ≈ 0.79 g mL⁻¹)

  • Toxic methanol dose ≈ 10 mL

  • Therefore: 10 mL ÷ 0.25 mL per L ≈ 40 L of wine (obviously far more than anyone could drink in one sitting)

Even after jacking, where alcohol and methanol are both concentrated about 2× (from ~16.7 % to ~33.4 % ABV), you’d still need to drink 20 L of applejack to reach dangerous methanol levels.

Sounds pretty safe to me, so let’s continue.

What You’ll Need

  • Finished apple wine

  • Food-safe plastic bottles (such as a 1.5 L bottle for 1 L of wine)

  • Freezer with space

How-To

  1. Fill each bottle two-thirds full (to leave room for expansion)

  2. Cap tightly and place in the freezer

  3. Elevate the bottle 15–20°, with the cap pointing slightly down

  4. Freeze for 8–12 hours at -18°C

  5. Once ice has formed around the edges with liquid still in the middle, you’re ready

  6. Over a container, slowly loosen the cap and let the concentrated liquid drain out

  7. You’ll get a 40–50 % yield: e.g., 1 L of wine → ~0.4–0.5 L of applejack

  8. Final ABV: ~33 % (see the table below)

  9. Store in glass or food-safe containers

Max final ABV (%) Equilibrium freezing point (°C)*
10 −4
15 −6.5
20 −9
25 −12
30 −15
35 −19
40 −23
45 −27.5
50 −32

*Temperature at which the first ice crystals appear in an ethanol‑water mix of that strength.

Example: If your freezer (or the outdoor winter air) stays at −19 °C, successive freeze‑and‑skim cycles can push the ABV to about 35 %. If you want to be certain, repeat the cycle once or twice more. Remember that each cycle also concentrates methanol, but the ABV cannot exceed roughly 35 % at that given temperature anyway.

Applejack Cocktail Recipes

Here are some cocktail recipes I found but haven’t tried yet; I’m noting them here for future reference. Each recipe makes a generous ~200 mL pour (about twice the size of a standard cocktail).

Jack Rose

  • 16 cl applejack

  • 4 cl lemon or lime juice

  • 2 cl grenadine

Applejack Sour

  • 12 cl applejack

  • 4 cl lemon juice

  • 3 cl orange juice

  • 3 cl simple syrup

  • 4 dashes aromatic bitters

Nothing else to add; enjoy your cheap hangovers.