Growing Apples for Homemade Cider

Article Tools

Image Gallery

Print

E-mail

Comments

RSS

Turn the screw slowly to apply pressure to the pulp. A stainless steel, enamel, or plastic pot should be in position beneath the tray to catch the cider flow, with enough capacity on hand to contain at least three gallons of juice. David Crooks, sales manager at Happy Valley Ranch, advises, "Make a quarter- to half-turn at a time and let the juice flow out naturally. Too quick a press results in a cloudy juice, and you'll get less of it." Stop turning the screw when you encounter solid resistance, as what little juice left in the pomace isn't worth overstressing the press frame to get. Expect to take twenty minutes or so each go-around. The final juice blends all the varietal tastes in a way that the first irresistible gush of cider may not.

Custom pressing at a cider mill is a good option for families with lots of apples but no press of their own. Here in Lost Nation, we ask people to call ahead for an appointment to press a minimum of eight bushels of apples into a custom tank. Golfball-size fruit is rejected, as it tends to clog the conveyor leading up to the grinder above the press. You get the juice from your apples, whatever the blend. We charge seventy-five cents a gallon, and another quarter per gallon jug if you need containers. Some mills charge a little more than this, others a little less. Custom pressing is not only an irresistible family outing in the early cold season but one that keeps the colonial tradition of a community mill works alive.

Making Cider: Processing All Those Apples!

At two to three gallons to the bushel, harvesting even a few trees eventually leads to a copious amount of cider. The more select apples go to storage for fresh eating. A considerable root cellar may give you the option of storing end-of-the-season cider apples as well, to be pressed out on a weekly basis through the rest of the winter months. Still, most of us will want to get the job done in two or three press days, and the earlier apples demand it. The question now: what to do with all that cider?

High-volume customers at our mill are good for five gallons of sweet cider every two weeks. My own personal consumption isn't quite there, as the laxative effect of cider on the human stomach sets a limit on this pleasure. One can only drink so much fresh cider! Sweet cider kept cold is good for drinking one to two weeks after pressing (depending on the cleanliness of your press) and perhaps two weeks more for those with some fizz tolerance.

Cider begins to turn fizzy as the natural yeasts in the juice begin to convert the apple sugars to alcohol. We're still a good way from a noticeably alcoholic cider at this point, though many of the charming ladies who come to our mill after church on Sundays suspect me on this. But more on hard cider in a bit. My own preference is to let cider mellow for a few days in either the refrigerator or a cool cellar to enjoy it at its optimum. Carbon dioxide production — an honest man would admit this to be yeast flatulence—kicks into high gear after several weeks regardless of keeping temperature, and then fizzy cider becomes too strong for all but the most obstinate cider head.

RSS | Comments | E-mail | Print