Hot apple cider is the cold-lot drink everybody can have: cider simmered with orange, cinnamon, cloves and ginger, carried hot in a thermos, with the bourbon or rum poured by the cup for the adults who want it. It's the drink for a November lot, after the coffee's gone and nobody wants another cold can.
At the lot: Carry it in a preheated thermos or vacuum-insulated dispenser. No stove needed at the lot. Homegating: Keep a pot on the stove on low and ladle it out all game.
Home gear: a large stockpot, a fine strainer, a 1-gallon vacuum-insulated drink dispenser or two 64-oz thermoses
45 MIN
At home, mostly simmering
5 MIN
At the lot
16
Serves
Ingredients
Cider
- 1 gallon apple cider
- 1 orange, sliced into rounds
- 6 cinnamon sticks
- 1 tbsp whole cloves
- 1 tsp whole allspice
- 3 star anise (optional)
- 2-inch piece fresh ginger, sliced
- ¼ cup brown sugar (optional, to taste)
Spike (optional)
- 1 bottle (750 ml) bourbon or dark rum, for 16 pours of 1½ oz
Serve
- 16 cinnamon sticks, for stirring (optional)
Steps
At home
- Pour the cider into the stockpot. Add the orange, cinnamon sticks, cloves, allspice, star anise and ginger.
- Bring it to a gentle simmer over medium heat, then turn it to low, cover it and let it steep for 30 minutes. Don't let it boil, or it turns bitter.
- While it steeps, preheat the dispenser or thermoses: fill them with boiling water, cap them and let them sit for 10 minutes.
- Taste the cider. Stir in the brown sugar if it needs it. Pour out the hot water and strain the cider into the dispenser or thermoses, filled to the top. Cap them tight.
At the lot
- Keep the thermos capped and out of the wind until you pour. Every time it's opened, it loses heat.
- Pour about 8 oz into each cup. For spiked apple cider, add 1½ oz of bourbon or rum to the cup and stir with a cinnamon stick.
Pack for the lot
Lot notes
- Alcohol: 21 and over only. Check your lot's open-container rule in your stadium guide first, because some stadiums and states ban open containers in the lots. The cider itself has no alcohol, so it's for everyone.
Can you make hot apple cider ahead?
Yes. Simmer and strain it the night before, refrigerate it, then bring it back to a simmer in the morning before it goes into the preheated thermos.
How do you keep cider hot at a tailgate?
Use a vacuum-insulated dispenser or a big thermos. Preheat it with boiling water for 10 minutes, fill it to the top with simmering cider and keep it capped between pours and out of the wind; a full jug holds heat far longer than a half-full one. More in how to keep food hot at a tailgate.
How much do you need for 20 people?
At 8 oz a cup, 20 people need about 1¼ gallons, so buy 1½ gallons and use 1½ times the spices. For spiked apple cider, 20 pours of 1½ oz is 30 oz, so 1 bottle (1 liter). You'll need a 2-gallon dispenser or 3 thermoses.
Can you make it without alcohol?
Yes. The batch has no alcohol in it. The bourbon or rum goes into each cup, so kids and drivers drink from the same thermos.
What alcohol goes in spiked apple cider?
Bourbon and dark rum are the usual picks, at about 1½ oz per 8-oz cup. Brandy works the same way.
Straight from the source, next on our cooking list. Beat us to it? Tell us how it went →
