Cider Making

[Graham The Builder]

We have been busy today making cider using local apple varieties, pulping them and then pressing them to extract the juice. I thought that for this little exercise I would create a little home made Cider making video which would be easier than post a load of photographs. Basically, we picked 9 half hundred weight bags of apples, ran them through a clean weed shredder a couple of times and then put the resulting pulp/mash into my fruit press. The result was that we know have 21 gallons of cider on the go for next year.

Here is a bottle from last years efforts.

[Curious Brew]

Looks excellent.

How did last year's turn out; taste, strength, etc?

[Graham The Builder]

We didn't unfortunately put a hydrometer in the brew but I would have thought it would be around the 6% mark. We blended 7 or 8 different varieties of apple together to make last year's cider which turned out surprisingly good. We bottled up the cider in April of this year and the cider further improved in the bottle as it got older - the only problem is I have now drunk all last year's vintage. We added no sugar, no proper yeast, no sulphates, no anything for that matter, just pure undiluted apple juice that tuned into a very nice cider. Cider as nature intended it!!

[Curious Brew]

Where abouts in god's own county are you Graham?

[Graham The Builder]

I live in mid Wiltshire. There are quite a few people around the area who make their own cider but to my knowledge there is only one actually registered maker of cider in the whole of Wiltshire.

[Anavrin]

I've just bought a press and pulper, and am looking forward to making some real cider, have you any suggestions on what mix of apples to use?

[Graham The Builder]

Just add as many varieties as possible to get a happy medium. You can use cooking apples, crab apples, eaters and, of course, cider apples. Have fun and experiment with as many type as you can get but I will guarantee that your cider will change in taste from year to year because of the different ratios of sweet and sour apples in your brew.

[Pronay]

Great looking set up you have there, and the cider from last year looks great.

I'd love one of those presses, but they're a little out of my price range at the minute, but I was thinking of making something like this homemade press, with a bottle jack and wooden frame ....... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0fvkiSHOsY

[moobli]

just wondering about a variation by using one of these "jack lelanne" power juicer as it juices and removes the pulp into a seperate container,
you have the juice and then put the pulp into a muslin and squeeze to get the last drops out

just wondering as i have picked one of these up from freecycle

[Mitchamitri]

Does it get the all immportant flavour from the pips??

[Graham The Builder]

Great looking set up you have there, and the cider from last year looks great.

I'd love one of those presses, but they're a little out of my price range at the minute, but I was thinking of making something like this homemade press, with a bottle jack and wooden frame ....... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0fvkiSHOsY

The most efficient way of extracting juice from an apple is to run it through a clean weed shredder a couple of times and then place it in a fruit press to get a maximum yield but you could skip the fruit press bit if you don't have one and place the contents into a clean pillow case that has been suspended above a bucket to catch the juice - you simply let gravity do its work with the odd bit of squeezing as you feel fit. Using the weed shredder reduces any apple to a consistency of wet mash potato if you put it through several times which then releases its liquid content quite easily, as seen in the video. In one batch last year, before we got the weed shredder, we mashed the apples manually using a lump of wood, it was not only inefficient but also bloody hard work! You can pick a decent weed shredder up at a car boot sale for as little as £5.00.

[Pronay]

Great looking set up you have there, and the cider from last year looks great.

I'd love one of those presses, but they're a little out of my price range at the minute, but I was thinking of making something like this homemade press, with a bottle jack and wooden frame ....... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0fvkiSHOsY

The most efficient way of extracting juice from an apple is to run it through a clean weed shredder a couple of times and then place it in a fruit press to get a maximum yield but you could skip the fruit press bit if you don't have one and place the contents into a clean pillow case that has been suspended above a bucket to catch the juice - you simply let gravity do its work with the odd bit of squeezing as you feel fit. Using the weed shredder reduces any apple to a consistency of wet mash potato if you put it through several times which then releases its liquid content quite easily, as seen in the video. In one batch last year, before we got the weed shredder, we mashed the apples manually using a lump of wood, it was not only inefficient but also bloody hard work! You can pick a decent weed shredder up at a car boot sale for as little as £5.00.

Sounds easier than the vid I posted , I'll look into a weed shredder then, thanks

[Mitchamitri]

We use a pulpmaster bucket but are looking out for a shredder. Our cider press is made with 4by2, kitchen worktop, reinforced with drain covers, pressure applied with a 10 tonne bottle jack. A cheese roughly 14” square and 2 inches deep will give approximately 20 pints of cider.

[DREADSKIN]

just got everything off bubbling now. crushed, with a big stick, finished of with the crap pulpmaster, which managed to break towards the end; and then pressed in my drum and scafold construction. ended up with 17 gallons of cider and 4 gallons of pear cider. two car loads!
av a we duke here:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album ... 312&ref=mf

anyone know af anymore apples in the greater belfast area?

[moobli]

just put 22lB of mixed apples through the power juicer
took just over an hour from start to finish includeing washing and coring
ended up with 1.5 gallons of apple juice to which i have just added two teaspoons of super yeast and put to bed in dj.s upstairs


the power juicer had to be stopped and taken apart and cleaned after every 20 apples or so, wasnt to much of a pain as it slots together and rinses under the tap
looking at the results now it is seperating and clearing, by reracking it a couple of times ill end up with a good gallon of pure liquid gold ready to bottle and put away for a year or so
i didnt add any extra sugar as the apples used where golden delicious,breaburns and two big bramleys,so hopefully this will give me a nice original style cider ish