Making bucket loads of apple cider with a washing machine...

Started by Ernest T. Bass, September 24, 2011, 09:57:22 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Ernest T. Bass

My sister posted about our latest backwards way of doing things... Why can't we ever be normal? Like the people with nice, traditional-looking wood crank cider presses who first run the apples through some sort of messy smasher device, and then transfer the pulp to the cloth-lined basket and squeeze for 20 minutes...  ::)

A good ol' washing machine will make you about 6 gallons in 20 minutes, and do it all in one step. ;D

http://lundkids.blogspot.com/2011/09/homemade-apple-juice-in-washing-machine.html

Unfortunately, a good new washing machine like ours will take a little longer, since you have to wait for the computerized cycle to get to the point where you can start juicing..

I can't take credit for the idea, though; I read about it in an old Mother Earth news article. Thinking about making a YT vid to show it in action..

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!

MountainDon

 [cool]

I need a taste. Think I'll have to hit the farmers market
Just because something has been done and has not failed, doesn't mean it is good design.


Ernest T. Bass

We've been drinking gallons every day--probably more than is good for us...  :-\ I love it when it starts to get a little harder...

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!

Don_P

We'll be pressing the old fashioned way tomorrow. Got a good recipe for apple wine if you ever want to try some, it keeps longer than cider. Or so I've been told, hasn't ever been a real issue here  ;D.

Ernest T. Bass

Yeah, I doubt if our cider stands much of a chance at hanging around as well... I want to just fill up a barrel of it in the house. ;D If you have a recipe handy I would be interested in seeing it, tho. We've just let it do its own thing in the past.

What's your method for pummeling the apples?

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!


Sassy

That is ingenious!  Now, if our apple trees ever start producing enough apples, we'll have to try something like that...  I love apple cider.
http://glennkathystroglodytecabin.blogspot.com/

You will know the truth & the truth will set you free

Ernest T. Bass

Luckily, we have no shortage of apples around here... For some reason they seem to love the soil and grow like weeds. Even the uncultivated and overgrown trees produce huge blemish-free fruit. We could literally make thousands of gallons with the trees that are within a 5-mile radius of here...

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!

glenn kangiser

"Always work from the general to the specific." J. Raabe

Glenn's Underground Cabin  http://countryplans.com/smf/index.php?topic=151.0

Please put your area in your sig line so we can assist with location specific answers.

Ernest T. Bass

Yup! We just picked a bunch of pears--I'll bet they would make good juice with the apples...

We went ahead and made a video of the process yesterday:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nj9z7NbO9mk

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!


Squirl

One of my favorite things on the planet, homemade cider.  I've watched some of the European cider machines that work on the same principle. They are just smaller.  They are actually sold commercially there.  I wonder what the yield comparison is?  I assume the time and effort is significantly decreased.

The best if finding heritage cider apples.  I found a federal park once that had authentic verified varieties from Thomas Jefferson.  It gives a nice sour and bitter flavor to the cider unlike the super sweet of today's apple varieties.  In my opinion, they finish better into a hard cider.

My method is the food processor and home built press.  I am disappointed I don't have time this year.  There are probably 50 apple trees dropping apples along the roads within 5 miles of where I am building.  Good old cider apples too.  Nobody wants them.  Hopefully this time next year I will have a barn setup to take advantage.

I guess it depends on your drinking horizon as to cider vs. wine.  To my tastes a cider is ready to drink at around 3 months, and peaks at about a year.  An apple wine is ready to drink at about a year for me and peaks at 2-3 years.

Don_P

Well, I picked for a couple of hours and got enough for a gallon of cider, our trees and the ones on top of the mountain were spotty and small this year. There's a late apple that's pretty loaded. We did get a late nip this spring and growing conditions were all over the road this summer. I need to ride home through the forest this week. The semi dwarf asian pear made 9 gallons of cider  [cool], 6 gallons is burbling through the airlock and we're working on the rest.

The ag club at State pressed apples as a fund raiser every year, the press was really a grape press. There was an air bag inside a horizontal cylinder that was inflated and squeezed out the juice. I've always thought that was a neat idea. A woodworking aside, I used a panel glue press that had an inflated firehose supplying clamping pressure.

The discussion this year among some friends who made a good batch of wine last year and got enough to brew this year was along the lines of "Wouldn't it be neat to have some wine left from last season to compare to this year's". Hard to keep it around  ;D. The wine recipe I have, I'd like to see others if you have one;
4 campden tablets (sodium metabisulfite)/6gal juice; rest one hr
6.5 lbs sucrose, 1 oz acid blend (or citric acid), 1/2 tsp yeast nutrient, rest 1Hr
Pitch champagne yeast
When it calms down rack it onto 1/4 tsp peptic enzyme + 1 TB grape tannin.
Rack it again after a couple of months onto 1/4 TB ascorbic acid and repeat till its totally clear and done fermenting.
Bottle onto 1/4 tsp ascorbic acid 1TB potassium sorbate + 3 c sucrose (to taste)

Ernest T. Bass

Quote from: Don_P on September 27, 2011, 07:36:50 PM
The ag club at State pressed apples as a fund raiser every year, the press was really a grape press. There was an air bag inside a horizontal cylinder that was inflated and squeezed out the juice. I've always thought that was a neat idea. A woodworking aside, I used a panel glue press that had an inflated firehose supplying clamping pressure.

That's really cool; I read about the airbag press somewhere recently... I was wondering about trying a variation before settling on the washing machine. Our problem has always been how to shred the apples... We've done it with the food processor and a bottle jack press, but it's a sloooooow process...

Thanks for the recipe--sounds great, but a bit more complicated than we usually attempt. ;D

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!

Don_P

This is the press we were using;

The guts of the grinder, a ~4" wood cylinder with a 5/8" bore secured by a roll pin to the shaft and SS "teeth" screwed to the cylinder. The clearance to the box is pretty tight. The hinged hopper flips up on top of the grinder box.

and a side view;


This setup will grind a pail of apples in about a minute.

Squirl

Thanks for sharing that one.  I like the setup.  I've been looking for a crusher better than a food processor.


UK4X4

Will you guys stop already- your making me dribble !

I'm from Dorset originally and grew up on hard cider-

sadly there is none in Colombia for some reason

and so now I'm sat here wondering what gear I have lying arround to turn into a press

In the middle east I just used un pasturised apple juice- some bakers yeast and some sugar

But it has that sweeter manufactured taste- certainly palatable -but misses the natural flavor

mmmmmm what about one of those wood grinding blades on a 4" grinder beneath a 4"plastic tube with the exit angled so the juice flows away from the grinder

Ernest T. Bass

Don't think I've ever seen a wood grinding blade.. ??? Unless I'm thinking something else.

Cool press, Don. Nice, simple and sturdy. Certainly more aesthetically appealing sitting out in the lawn instead of  a washing machine.. ;D Our method's one flaw...

I made a cheaper imitation press to use with a bottle jack, and I just perforated a 5-gal bucket for the strainer basket. Things didn't stay aligned very well, tho..

How difficult is it to remove the compressed pomace when you're done with a batch?

Those apples look too yummy to juice, I'm afraid...

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!


Ernest T. Bass

Wow, never saw that before! Could do some damage... Are they for making log dugout canoes with an angle grinder? ;)

Teeth look a bit small to me, though. I don't think you want to chop/grate quite so thoroughly...

Our family's homestead adventure blog; sharing the goodness and fun!