# Roadside Apple Cider



## jimmi87 (18/2/13)

Hi all,

I'm new to the site. And in search of information about using unripe apples for cider. I mistakenly used unripe what looked like delicious apples, and its left a harsh floury aftertaste to the unfermented juice. I'm wondering if that will go away after time, or if its just the taste of the campden tablets that i haven't used before. The juice is incredibly sweet however, so it will be a shame to dump it.

How it came about was, I thought it may have just been soon enough to pick some apples and make cider. And with a deadline of leaving for perth in less then 3 weeks time(for six months), I figured it was now or next year.

After tasting apples off 3 roadside trees, and testing with the refractometer scoring ~14 Brix. We picked about 80Kg of apples off 4 trees... with the 4th untasted tree having the most red ripest looking apples, so we concluded that they should be ripe to. The other apples were mainly green, and being small and not my apple trees i had a limited idea what they were and what colour they should be.

So we left juicing the nice 'ripe' red ones until last, so we didn't even try and of the juice.


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## Greg.L (18/2/13)

It all sounds good to me. I'm not sure about the harsh floury aftertaste, could be some of the wild apples were a bit tannic which is a good thing, or maybe some starch which would settle out. The cider always tastes different from the juice so never judge just from the juice. The campden tablets shouldn't affect the taste unless you added too much.The colour isn't very important, brix much more so, 14 is good. Have you tested the juice with a hydrometer? Testing a few apples with a refractometer may be a bit misleading.

The main thing now is to keep it in a well sealed container with minimal airspace and an airlock. Oxygen is the main enemy of cider.


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## punkin (19/2/13)

I checked the trees round where i am a couple of days ago, they are still a couple of weeks off. Apples are neutral to just sharp, it has me wondering whether to pick a few bins early to get some extra sharpness in there?


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## Greg.L (19/2/13)

Acidity is important, makes the cider much safer. I got some pH strips from Brouwland. The postage was a killer but maybe someone in Aus sells them by now. For some reason they read a bit high but if you can get a meter and compare readings for one strip, you can calibrate them. Meters are good but high maintenance. You don't need a high accuracy but if you can get an idea of the pH it is a big help. I have to limit the amount of pear juice because the pH is too high. Roadside apples are seedlings and often more acidic than dessert fruit, cookers like grannysmith usually have good acidity but not if they have been in coldstore.


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## jimmi87 (20/2/13)

Thanks for the advice. As you suggest Greg.L, I believe the taste was starch, as the taste subsided, and left a thick layer of green starch slime on the bottom of the container i had the juice in.

The pH was 3.8-3.9, which i picked up to 4.2. 

SG was 1.044, which I was pleased with.


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