Mellifluous Cider

It's a good thing to be a part of a brew club. One of the first real tangible benefits I experienced being a club member was being invited to a cider pressing this last fall. I picked and pressed four 5-7 gallon buckets of perfectly ripe apples from a club member's house. He had dozens of pickers over two weekends and we had right big cider pressing on September 28th.



Those buckets got me 7 gallons of cider after pressing and a few photos. As usual for a brew club meeting there were plenty of tasty beverages in attendance including a biere des bruts, which is definitely something for me to try down the road. 

buckets and buckets

The mix of apples I picked were a bucket each of Jonathan, Jona-Mac, Jona-free and a very sweet Yellow Delicious. We all took turns washing and cleaning off the stems in a big tub before running it through the biggest damn grinder you ever seen. I recall it being at least a 1 hp motor and it tore through those 24 gallons of apples as fast as they could be loaded down the chute. 


We loaded the pomace into a nice wine press one of the members brought over. I found it definitely takes longer to press than to crush. 

That's me on the right. 

I held a gallon in reserve just for drinking. I thought about freezing some for back-sweetening before bottling but I plan on using honey for that when the time comes. 

My OG was about 1.047 which is higher than what some others got, probably due to the higher percentage of yellow delicious I picked and careful ripeness selection. The cider reading I have done said to try and get to about 1.055 before pitching, so I added a pound of honey which brought my 6 gallons to 1.054.

I added Campden tablets that night and waited about 24 hours before pitching with 12 grams of dry Cote Des Blancs.The LHBS was out of pectic enzyme so I didn't get to add it until after fermentation was almost done. Once added it went crystal clear though within a few days. 

My hydrometer says 0.996 which is about as dry as I expected it to go. This puts it in the range of 7.6%. Campden tabs were added at racking to secondary and now it's just a waiting game. I plan to bottle in June 2012 and perhaps carbonate depending on how things taste.

I'll toss out some tasting notes once I bottle and again when carbonated. Right now the gravity sample tastes a bit sour and smells mildly sulfury. Time heals all things however so  I have high hopes for this cider. Next year I hope to do another one about the time this one is ready. 

Until then!