Apple Juice

The old apple press takes hard hand-cranking

We braved the elements of Storm Babet, which is drowning Cork and southern England, to process the first batch of apples - the equivalent of two fish boxes. We cut the apples, put them through the masher of the old apple press, then chunked them into smaller pieces in the destemmer/crusher, and finally pressed them in the Hydropress before storing them in plastic bottles in the new fridge freezer. (Good timing)

It was hard work but satisfying and the juice is very tasty. We got two five-gallon buckets full - eight 2l bottles and plenty of small bottles. We gave two to the Tinsleys last night.

Today we will continue as we have three more fish boxes full of apples. But this time. we are going to make hard cider. It's essentially the same process as making wine so we'll just use one of the steel fermentation vats. A rule of thumb is to add a teaspoon of yeast per gallon of juice. I happen to have a lot of yeast. 

We've tested much of the equipment now and we love the hydropress but we are not enamoured by the destemmer/crusher. Granted we used it on apples not grapes, but it made such a mess, flinging bits of apple across the room in all directions. It's also quite loud and scary. I'll reserve final judgment until next year's grape harvest. 

On the weather front, parts of the country recorded a temperature of 0C yesterday and today parts of Cork have already measured 115 mm rain - more than a month's worth and it's still raining. 

What a mess!