:)

[Cazamodo]

I was planning to use a mix of mainly cox/russets, and a few bramleys, and some wilds ive seen about. What can I use to get the PH in scale? Ive read that you can use perciptated(sp?) chalk to raise the PH, and malic acid to Raise the PH. Would I be able to use that mix of apples, and then just adjust the PH accordingly?

[Trunky]

[jason123]

Question: When doing naturally fermented cider, apart from juicing and pressing, is there anything you need to do apart from just getting the juice into an FV and leaving till next spring?

Thats about it.

Mill, press, put under an airlock and wait. No Camden/Sodium Metabislphite unless you intend to use a cultivated yeast.

The only other thing you can do that will help you to make the best cider possible from your available apples is to blend the apples to achieve a juice pH of 3.8. Juice (and subsequent cider) with a pH of more than 4.1 has a tendancy to spoilage whilst much lower than 3.3 tends to be too acidic to be enjoyable. That's simplifying the situation somewhat.

I'd suggest Lalvin EC-71B after Camden (1 crushed tablet per gallon - it's more complicated than that as it's pH dependant, but that rate will 'work') if your juice is too acidic, as it's a yeast capable of acid reduction.

Never use cooking apples - far too acidic.
Avoid wildings - unless pH is acceptable and/or they are high in tannin and your only source of tannin.
If you can't get cider apples then use a blend of as many types as you can, many older varieties are worth using, even Cox's and Russets.

Cheers Trunky,

I've only got wildings and a few garden trees so no cider apples. I'll use the advice on acidity and see what we get.

[jason123]

I know its early, but I'm pressing my apples tomorrow. There only a load of wildings from the roadside, but its all I could get. Still have about 120 kilos I reckon.
I'm planning on doing a 20l FV Eau Naturelle, a 20l FV with an additional bag of DME, a DJ with some fresh / frozen blackberries, maybe a DJ with a load of Ginger and who knows what else. Hopefully there'll be enough.

[jason123]

Had a cracking day pressing apples yesterday, and came away with approx 20 - 25 gallons of juice.
I've got one vessel with between 10 - 15 gallon fermenting away with a couple of youngs champagne yeast and 1 kilo of medium dme boiled in 2 litres water.
One vessel with 5 gallon and 1 pack of the champagne yeast and one vessel eau naturelle. All vessels are sealed and under an airlock. The eau naturelle cider isn't bubbling yet, but that, I expect is normal.

Problem is that I tested the acidity and it came out looking pretty low at maybe as low as 2.8. I couldn't get any of the lalvin yeast as mentioned earlier from my nearest LHBS, so what can I do to help out with lowering the acidity.
Is adding some lactic acid to enhance the malo lactic conversion the way forward?
Or
Should I purchase a pot of precipitated chalk?
Or
Is there a better way?

Cheers for any advice, I suspect Trunky will know exactly what to do, Thanks in advance.

[Cazamodo]

Just pressed 5.5 gal of a mix of russets/cox. And then an extra 2gal of just the cox. Both juice tasted great, the cox was much lighter and a bit sharper. I put campden tabs in all in the morn we pressed them, and added the yeast that night, and have them sitting at a nice 18*C. No signs of fermentation yet, hopefully its just a slow start.

I'm a bit worried about sanitation. I mean you cant sanatise everything from press to fermentation vessels. I kept my barrel and such as clean as possible but it obv has constant openes to air until it was full and we were done.

ones in a barrel with airlock, the other is in a bucket with a clip on lid. Its not completely airtight but should do the trick. I just worry since ive had a few bad batches lately, and hoping these will be ok!

[jason123]

As far as cleanliness goes, the apples arn't exactly sterile when they're pressed, so as long as everything is as clean as you can get it you should be OK. It might depend on the yeast but I chucked in youngs champagne yeast the day after pressing without any campden and it still took a couple of days to really get going.

[Trunky]

[Cazamodo]

Good to know I was over worrying. My PH actually turned out to be 3.4 ish so I was quite lucky!

[jason123]

Had a cracking day pressing apples yesterday, and came away with approx 20 - 25 gallons of juice.
I've got one vessel with between 10 - 15 gallon fermenting away with a couple of youngs champagne yeast and 1 kilo of medium dme boiled in 2 litres water.
One vessel with 5 gallon and 1 pack of the champagne yeast and one vessel eau naturelle. All vessels are sealed and under an airlock. The eau naturelle cider isn't bubbling yet, but that, I expect is normal.

Problem is that I tested the acidity and it came out looking pretty low at maybe as low as 2.8. I couldn't get any of the lalvin yeast as mentioned earlier from my nearest LHBS, so what can I do to help out with lowering the acidity.
Is adding some lactic acid to enhance the malo lactic conversion the way forward?
Or
Should I purchase a pot of precipitated chalk?
Or
Is there a better way?

Cheers for any advice, I suspect Trunky will know exactly what to do, Thanks in advance.

I don't. I often end up with the opposite problem and a pH nearer 4.5.

Anything used for acid reduction in wine will probably be ok Potassium Carbonate in particular is apparently the best thing to use, adjusting the pH before fermentation might be the best time to do it.

A malo-lactic fermentation would happen in the following spring. Using any sulphite (Camden/Sodium Met) will inhibit a MLF.

Cazamodo, sanitation and cider isn't a problem. The pH of apple juice will prevent anything growing in it. I clean and air dry, I don't do anything else.

Thanks anyway Trunky.
The ferment is almost done on the two which I added yeast to, the third which I'm leaving to ferment naturally hasn't even started yet.
I've read the MLF starts in the spring when the temp gets up to about 15 degC or so, but I may bring some indoors and buy a MLF culture and see hhow it goes.

[FenTiger]

In collaboration with a friend, I've just bottled my first ever pressed cider. I've no idea what apples they were - they looked like large eaters but tasted pretty sharp.
We only made about 10 litres and at the moment it looks like grapefruit squash. We went down the route of adding Campden tablets followed by wine yeast, which seems to have worked. If my calculations are correct it's 9.2% and from a quick tasting it's, not surprisingly, very dry and reminds me of the 'rough' that I used to drink in Herefordshire nearly 30 years ago
Encouraged by the first batch we'd like to make some more as we have a lot more apples to use. The stumbling block is the pressing as we used an old book press which was very hard graft and very slow, so we're on the look out for a cider press that we could borrow or hire in East Cambridgeshire Maybe there's a cider club around here (or do such things only exist on The Archers?)?