tree full of pears

[beertrix]

does anyone have a recipe for pear cider? our lasses mams neighbour has a couple of trees full of pears and i think its only right they get scrumped and mad into cider.
thanks
scott

[dave-o]

Have you got a juicer?

[beertrix]

ive got a blender???????????

[mark]

I have a load of pears due to be donated and was also thinking along the line of a perry.
I don't have access to a fruit press though and was not prepared to buy one - not at this stage anyway.
It would take you a mightly long time to put 2 trees worth of pears through a home blender and you would still have the problem of getting the juice out.

I think I am going to make a country pear wine with my donated pears, there are some very simple recipes out there.

ATB

[Trunky]

[mark]

Hi trunky,
Many thanks for a generous offer

Unfortunately (for me anyway) I live on the outskirts of Leeds.
I've been trying to find someone local who could help, but no luck yet. Hence the pear wine idea.

Many thanks again, it's stuff like this that makes fourms so good

[dave-o]

Yeah a blender could be time consuming.

Basically, the process is:

Wait until they are good and ripe (peras tend to be a bit dry until they are properly ripe)
Crush them into small pieces
Squeeze them as hard as possible
Collect the juice
Pasteruise the juice (70c for 15 mins)
Cool and put in FV
Pitch yeast. I'd use Champagne yeast
Ferment
Prime and bottle as usual.

[beertrix]

what do you think about using one of them paint/plaster mixers that attach to a drill? obviously a new sterilised one.

[Trunky]

That's not a bad idea and there is a commercial product available that's a bit like that, http://www.brew2bottle.co.uk/pulpmaster ... re=default

I've pulped apples a variety of ways over the years and the pulpmaster ain't bad. I wouldn't give up on the idea of getting the juice out and if you really wanted to do it then you are going to need a press of some kind. Some timber and a (car) bottle jack would do, low cost and easy.

[Dennis King]

When my Dad was alive he use give me bags of pears from his tree, I used just extract the juice and bung in champagne yeast. Always got a decent sparkling wine.

[Horatio]

I've just crushed 50kgs of pears today. I use a garden shredder that has only ever been used for this task since new. Makes short work of the job. I pick the pears when ripe then leave them to mature for a day or two (this helps bring out the pear flavours), then crush/shred them and leave in sealed buckets overnight to let the tannins drop out. Then I will press them tomorrow to get the juice. You can then either let them ferment natuarrly using the wild yeasts already on the pears or add a camden tab per gallon of juice and leave for a couple of days before pitching your chosen yeast. I use S-04, works a treat.

[beertrix]

cheers for all the info folks its a real help im just trying to work out how im going to make a press using a car jack and ill be brewing again....

[Trunky]

Imagine a frame a bit like a guilotine and you'll have something just right. Cloths to put the pulp in and away you go (hessian or net curtain materail are ok), see http://www.google.co.uk/images?hl=en&sa ... 71&bih=371

[dave-o]

Your simplest one is probably one with two boards (not MDF - i reckon it will break) and two G-clamps:




I'd put the pears (perhapas 5 kilos at a time) in a sack and batter the crap out of it with a baseball bat (or whatever), then put that sack inside this press and squish it.