The Cidermaking Year
For the past 6 years, the Cidermaking Year has been a regular feature on UKCider each month – it is where I have recorded my ramblings, thoughts and questions about cidermaking and growing a small cider business in Dorset. To me, it has come to be a work of love as much of practical use – people have followed it and sought me out because of the diary.
Now, the diary and its archived material have been moved to this new blog on my own website. The Cider by Rosie website is the obvious place to continue the ‘tradition’ of the Cidermaking Year - although I continue to post this as an ongoing record to the Cider Workshop as and when I have finished a ‘new installment’.
The latest month can be found below, and click on the month to view the rest of this years diary. The archive has been updated and redesigned into a format you can download. Click here to view the archive.
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The Cidermaking Year December 2009 |
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Put to Bed
The racking of the big tank went as planned. I was much relieved to have removed the 6 tonnes that had been bearing down on the tank's insecure block-work base. However it has been a worthwhile exercise, firstly because all IBCs now contain the same blend and secondly because the racking allowed a large amount of the initial lees to be discarded. I do not intend to rack again until each IBC is required for packaging into bag in boxes. The routine that works well for me, is to transfer 1000 litres from an IBC to the three 400 litre floating lid, stainless tanks in the pressing/packaging room. This achieves a final racking just before packaging and the use of floating lid tanks means that only the required amount of cider needs to be be packaged to meet the ongoing demand.
Barry and Albert had their reservations about the 6000 litre tank when they first saw it, since they reckoned it would be difficult to clean.
Barry favours the 1500 litre Rotoplas tanks ( 60 or 70 of them at the last count! ). These do lend themselves to cleaning. When empty, they can easily be tipped over on their side, then cleaned and tipped upside down to drain. I must confess that I did wonder how I would be able to cope with the monster. Actually it was not too difficult. The worst part of any tank to clean is always the inside top, where the tide mark from the cider leaves its brown sticky residue. As the big tank was filled nearly to the top and because the top is domed, the tide mark occupied a fairly small area. It was a simple matter to reach this through the top manhole and clean off the residue with a sponge cloth. Removal of the lees from the bottom of the tank was more difficult. I had to dangle a pressure washer lance through the manhole. Its pressure jet then had to be repeatedly scanned over the the tank bottom until all the yeasty deposit was dislodged. Clean water was flushed through the tank continually whilst this was going on, until I was satisfied that all of the khaki dross had 
been removed.
With the draught all safely stored in the air-locked IBCs my worries were over in good time to enjoy Christmas. Being a sentimental old fool, I've long hankered for a white Christmas. This year I persuaded Frances that it would be fun to go and find one. We went on a rail tour to Germany. This culminated in steam hauled rides on a preserved line through the snowy Harz mountains, during the Christmas period.
It was every bit as exciting as I had hoped and absolutely memorable. For Frances there was an unexpected bonus. For once, I forgot all about cider and unusually, the word did not pass my lips for days! (I had discovered almost straight away that we were in a cider desert).
In that part of Germany ( the old DDR ) all I could find was apfelsaft and something called apfeltickler which proved to be a carbonated version of the same. However, the hotel was excellent, the wine good and the beer superb, so I'm not complaining and for Frances it was a complete rest from any mention of Big C! This did not actually cross my mind until we were nearly home again. With just 10 miles still to go, we passed a big free house. "'I'm determined to get my stuff in there next year", I said. "Oh", she exclaimed. "There you go. Business as usual!"
A notable exception did occur on the appley front, when we visited a German Christmas market. We came across what could best be described as apple crisps. These thin slices of dried apple proved to be very tasty and made an enjoyable snack. It was amazing how well the flavour and sharpness of the fruit had been preserved in the drying process.
We both agreed that it would be great to have a large bowl of these on our Wassail table to go with all the usual appley eats such as Dorset apple cake and apple fritters etc. We are resolved to give it a go. I anticipate a low oven heat and lovely lingering cooked apple smells in the kitchen next week!
A happy appley New Year to one and all!
Rose.
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Keeving, Casking and Racking
I am enjoying a leisurely winding down period between the end of cider making and Christmas. It is a time of gentle pottering in the ciderhouse finishing off the smaller jobs and cleaning up all the equipment that was used for the main production. St. Em's racks have been pressure washed and her cloths have gone to the laundry. The last traces of juice stickiness have been mopped from the floor and the furniture, restoring the ciderhouse as nice place to be in once again.
Each day has begun with a peep under the lids of the two keeving tubs to view the gradual build up of the pectin gel. This final batch has gone well, with solid layers building up just below the surface in each tub. The big drop to seasonal temperatures has done the trick in delaying fermentation. Not a single bubble had appeared in the 10 days since pressing! Yesterday I decided not to chance things any longer and racked the juice from below the gel. Experience has taught me that it is not necessary to wait for a brown cap to appear on the surface. So long as the gel is well formed, the risk of losing the keeve is lessened by an earlier racking of the juice. On this occasion the keeve proved to be almost too successful. Only 130 litres of the original 180 litres of juice were left after racking from the gel. It was satisfying to see that the act of racking very soon kick started the fermentation. It must have been even more of a close run thing than I had thought.
The juice had been a blend of Dabinett and Brown Snouts, with a smattering of Bramleys for pH reduction. Normally I use Porter's Perfection to achieve balance, but I could not get any this year because they had failed to crop. However, as usual I filled a glass with the juice during the racking, just to see what it was like. It is always a pleasure to see the clear golden product of keeving and to enjoy its beautiful flavour. It is something that never fails to amaze me. When compared with the soup like juice of normal cider at this early stage, it is as though a minor miracle has occurred. I was just as thrilled this year. Even without my beloved Porters, the juice tasted very promising. Following the failure of the earlier 400 litres of Dabinett & Ashmeads to keeve, I am very pleased that this latest batch has worked. I will still be able to supply some bottles of the special product next year, albeit of limited quantity.
Of course the failed keeve will not be wasted. I will keep it as a special dry cider, apart from the main blend. Actually it has allowed me to try something else that has been dear to my heart for some time, a wine barrel cider. Being a great fan of Heck's Port Wine of Glastonbury, allegedly matured in Port barrels, I've been dying to get a red wine barrel and have a go myself. The Dabinett/Ashmeads I now had at hand seemed to be a good candidate for the experiment. All I needed was the wine barrel.
I'd met up with Martin Inwood during the summer when we had each supplied some of our cider to a local sports club event. We subsequently exchanged visits, with Martin kindly helping me with my own cidermaking on two occasions. In due course it was a pleasure for me to be able to go and admire the first class job he had made of building a huge oak beamed twin screw press in his garden. At the same time I was much impressed with his fine array of french oak wine barrels. A few weeks ago Martin went to buy some more of these and thoughtfully added an extra one to his load, in case I would like to have one. His timing was perfect! I now have a hogshead of 'wine cider' gently bubbling at the top of the stairs in the ciderhouse. It is an exciting experiment to run alongside the main production. Can't wait to taste it!
The main blend is still out in the big 6000 litre mixing tank, having now fermented down to about 1005. I've been rather worried about the cracks in the concrete block base that supports it. Every day I nervously see how far I can push my finger into one of the cracks as a way of gauging any further movement. I also check the verticality of the tank with a spirit level. So far so good. It may even have settled down safely enough, since there has been no detectable movement for some time. Nonetheless it will be a relief to get the cider back to the IBCs in the tank room. Looking at the weather forecast, I've decided to make use of the high pressure this Thursday to do the big racking job. Then with the blend safely beginning its winter sleep in the IBCs, I will also be better able to get to sleep at night!
It will soon be time for the CO2 blanketing of the IBCs. Here I've had some really good fortune. Instead of making do with Soda Stream cylinders I now have a proper pub cylinder that should last for years. I had tried to buy one from BOC but they weren't interested in even talking to a miniscule business like mine. Word got round amongst my friends who go to our Local and the Landlord has very kindly given me a newly filled cylinder from his beer cellar! I have fitted a regulator and pressure gauge (only £5 on Ebay), plus a Halfords replacement tyre pump hose, so all is ready for action.
Rose
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Archive for this years Cidermaking Year
Please note that, due to recent copyright infringements of the Cidermaking Year, I feel I must add here that, whilst you may read and download any of the archive for the Cidermaking Year, please do not repost it, or copy it to another website without my express permission to do so. However, this notice will not affect the majority of folk reading the Cidermaking year, so please do enjoy it.