Step 1

Pour water into a large pot. Put it on the stove and turn on the heat. Wash the apples and cut each apple into 4 to 6 pieces.

Step 2

Place the apples, raisins, cloves, anise star, cinnamon sticks, allspice, and nutmeg into the pot with water. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and cook for about 1 hour keeping the liquid at a very low boil.

Step 3

In the meantime prepare the orange by scraping off a thin layer of the orange peel (a microplane grater works best but you can use a regular grater too) and then pressing out the juice from the orange.

Step 4

After about one hour, open the lid and slightly mash the apples using a potato masher. No need to create apple puree, just make sure the apples are slightly broken apart. Add the orange zest and orange juice.

Step 5

Close the lid and continue cooking the hot apple cider for another hour. Once it finished cooking, turn off the heat and let it cool.

Step 6

Strain the hot apple cider. Please refer to the blog post for the step-by-step instructions on how to quickly strain it.

Step 7

Add the apple cider vinegar. Taste and add molasses if desired. When ready to serve, heat it up and add garnishes.