It's Apple Season

[komodo]

**** me 100kgs in 30 minutes! Its certainly not there for spiders is it!
How many litres do you get out of 100kgs?

 

[CosmicBertie]

Im currently interested in making cider. My first foray will be using apple juice from the supermarket, but i was wondering what would be the weight of apples for a standard 23L batch? I know it probably depends on the juiciness of the apples, but im just after a rough idea.

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

Depends on juiciness of apples, what you're using to extract juice (juicer, press, etc).

I found with a juicer it's around 50% efficiency, give or take 10% depending on the apples.

So 40-50kg for this batch.

 

[Greg.L]

Im currently interested in making cider. My first foray will be using apple juice from the supermarket, but i was wondering what would be the weight of apples for a standard 23L batch? I know it probably depends on the juiciness of the apples, but im just after a rough idea.

It depends on the apples and the press, somewhere between 40kg and 50kg will give you 23 L, a good press and juicy apples 35kg.

 

[CosmicBertie]

Wow. I guess I ought to try and find a few wild apple trees then....I dont suppose anyone knows of any around Sunbury?

Oh, and whats the deal with picking apples from the side of a road? Is it ninja-style before anyone/cops get you, or is it a free-for-all?

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

Wow. I guess I ought to try and find a few wild apple trees then....I dont suppose anyone knows of any around Sunbury?

Oh, and whats the deal with picking apples from the side of a road? Is it ninja-style before anyone/cops get you, or is it a free-for-all?

Here in Tassie (I'm a Brisvegan) I thought it was covert, so I did it at night. Something rustled the grass near a tree one night (every snake in Tas is poisonous), I defecated myself and I've done it daytime since.

If it's on a private-ish or business property, ask the people there. In Tassie - no one eats fruit and so when you see a tree with lots of windfall, ask - they usually don't care.

 

[Greg.L]

Roadside fruit is traditionally there for the taking if you don't cross the fence.

 

[Ferg]

**** me 100kgs in 30 minutes! Its certainly not there for spiders is it!
How many litres do you get out of 100kgs?

haha yeah the motor is a bit of a beast!
Generally we have about a 60-70% effeceincy but my last batch was a bit less. Not sure if that was down to the apples as they were all quite small due to lack of rain or else we just didn't have the patience that we usually do.. I find with my press I can tighten the screw, leave it a few minutes and tighten again. I think we just couldn't be arsed waiting around for the last drop!

 

[Greg.L]

I found it very variable this year. Some apples were very sweet but only about 50% efficiency, others like sweet alford and grannies were about 70%, very juicy.

 

[Hillbrewer]

My apples are looking good but the crop is much smaller than last year due to frost. At least a smaller crop means the apples ripen better, I'm hoping the sg will go above 1.050. I have heaps of seedling crab fruit this year so I will find out what the cider is like with lots of bitterness from crabs, they also keep the pH down which is good.

Hi Greg,
From what I've researched apple trees produce a decent crop every 2nd year with other years being quite light on fruit.

 

[Greg.L]

Hi Greg,
From what I've researched apple trees produce a decent crop every 2nd year with other years being quite light on fruit.

That's an old post. I have heard that some apple cultivars bear bi-annually, especially cider cultivars, but it doesn't affect me very much because of the problems I have with spring frosts. Most of my trees get frosted every other year which stimulates them to flower very heavily the next year. It is good to have a range of cultivars if you have the room so you get some apples most years. Also if you can let your trees grow big, even a light crop is a fair few apples. Birds also will thin the crop a lot.
Funny but 2012 was a cool year and there wasn't much bitterness in the crabs, this year was a lot warmer and there is a fair amount of bitterness in the cider, even though I probably used less crabs proportionately.

 

[Hillbrewer]

Good to know. I was working down in tas and tried to find side of the road apples to blend with assuming that a wild grown apples wound generally have higher bitterness. I had little success, although I found a number of apple trees, the trees bearing generally had sour fruit. Due to the quantity of apples on the ground I assumed they were ripe. Maybe they were cooking varieties.
I ended up making one small batch which finished primary fermentation 2 weeks ago it tastes dry and sour.

 

[Greg.L]

My cider tastes quite sour at the end of primary, but I pitch Malolactic fermentation culture which takes away the sourness. You can get natural MLF happening if you don't add so2 after primary. If your apples are high acid, MLF is the best bet. For the first couple of weeks after MLF the cider tastes pretty flat but then the apple flavour comes back and you should have a nice cider.

It is quite interesting following the different phases of a cider fermentation. In my initial fermentation I usually get banana/bubble gum aromas from the isoamyl acetate ester. it is sweet then sour as primary finishes. Then MLF starts, the sourness and isoamyl goes, but so does the fruitiness and any biterness becomes more obvious. Finally MLF finishes and the fruitiness comes back to balance the bitterness. For me at temperatures around 20-23C it takes about a month for all that to happen and the cider is ready to bottle condition.

 

[Hillbrewer]

Hi Greg,
Thanks for the info. I didn't add anything after primary so hopefully MLF is taking place. Ambient temp is 20 degrees so I'll leave it for a couple more weeks and then check on it.
Do you use nutrients in your primary? I have a cider fermenting with no nutrients which is going quite slow. Other than taking longer are there any other disadvantages for not using nutrients? I used fresh juice and wanted to keep it as natural as possible.

 

[Greg.L]

Adding nutrients is mainly to avoid the H2S smell, if you don't have any H2S you should be fine. I have never had H2S so I don't add nutrients. This year one of my late, high brix batches stalled with just a little bit of residual sugar, it is quite good just off-dry so it doesn't bother me. It still seems to be fermenting very slowly in the bottles, I don't think there is enough sugar to cause bottle bombs. The extra alcohol must have stressed the yeast and not quite enough nutrients to finish. Some craft cider makers aim to stall their cider by using fruit from low-nitrogen orchards.

 

[Hillbrewer]

Hi Greg thanks for the info.
I did some 'fart' smells during the first couple of days of ferment but they have now disappeared.

 

[MashPaddler]

Didn't get to make cider this year, caught up with renovations but am sampling the first of last years batch now, has a French cider taste, dry but not puckering. Pink ladies granny smiths and crabapples. In the middle of my cider press build, using a machine press as a foundation. Doing the box and boards out of recycled blackbutt timber, will post some progress photos shortly.

 

[Airgead]

Did my yearly cider batch over the weekend. 50kg of apples. Aprox 20% very ripe granny smith, 20% Sundowner and the rest Crips Pinks (better known as Pink Lady). Super ripe apples. The juice came in at 1.052. That means I'm heading for around about an 8% cider.

I filled 2 kegs. One is fermenting with CRU-05 which I have used before for cider, the other is fermenting with 71B which is my go to yeast for meads. I'm interested in the 71B as it can partially digest malic acid which may lead to a smoother cider. We'll see.

Both kegs sitting in the fermenting fridge at 15C.

Cheers
Dave

 

[punkin]

I do believe that's why the cru was reccomended to me, because of it's use to clear up malic acid.

 

[Airgead]

Ahhh indeed. I had forgotten that. Thats' the trouble with only making cider once a year.

I just checked the data sheet. It does indeed degrade malic as well. Interesting to see how the 71b and cru compare acid wise.