Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
Cider Digest #0653
1
Subject: Cider Digest #653, 18 March 1997
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #653 18 March 1997
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Re: High alcohol cider, apple jack, and E-coli 0157H in ciders (Terry Bradshaw
)
re: E-coli 0157H in ciders (Dick Dunn)
[Fwd: applejack] (kathy)
acid level (PickleMan)
watery finish in ciders ("Sargent, Ernie")
Send ONLY articles for the digest to cider@talisman.com.
Use cider-request@talisman.com for subscribe/unsubscribe/admin requests.
When subscribing, please include your name and a good address in the
message body unless you're sure your mailer generates them.
Archives of the Digest are available for anonymous FTP at ftp.stanford.edu
in pub/clubs/homebrew/cider.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: High alcohol cider, apple jack, and E-coli 0157H in ciders
From: tbradsha@zoo.uvm.edu (Terry Bradshaw)
Date: Wed, 12 Mar 97 12:58 CST
A few comments on articles in CD #652 from a new subscriber but old brewer:
1)One of the main reasons for increasing the alcohol content of cider is to
extend storage life. A high alcohol environment is inhospitable to most
microorganisms, including acetobacter and E. coli (I'll get to that later).
Cider was fermented historically in order to allow it to keep without
refrigeration. Many apples in many years simply do not contain enough sugar
in them to provide for a good end alcohol level. I see nothing wrong with
"spiking" the sugar level in order to achieve higher alcohol level.
2)Apple Jack: Yes, I have made apple brandy (or more accurately apple jack)
using the freeze method. In order to get a good separation of the ice from
the liquor, however, it should be very cold, around -25F at least, and
colder is even better. Here in Burlington, VT our winters are kept a bit
milder than our inland, higher elevation areas in the state and therefore it
doers not get so cold here as it could. On the one weekend that we had
temps below -27F, I made some apple jack. After separating the ice from the
hard cider, I would estmate my concentration at 4X, given the pre-freeze
volume and the amount that I ended up with. This would give me
approximately 28 percent alcohol in the final product (I started with a 7%
cider). Not only does the alcohol concentrate, but the flavor does too!!
3) E. coli in cider: This issue is already too poorly understood to spread
any more misinformation. Yes, E. coli can multiply rapidly in fresh cider -
as it can in any other juice, on any fresh produce and not nearly as well as
it can in milk or on meat. And since E. coli, in all of its various
strains, is ubiquitous in the environment (you've got a mouthful of it right
now), it can contaminate products which have been pasteurized after the fact
(maybe Mom had a point when
she told us not to drink from the carton). The outbreak of sickness caused
by the virulent E. coli 0157H in the Northwestern US was spread via Odwalla
apple juice which was pasteurized at bottling. Mandatory pasteurization is
a veil of safety at best and will unnecessarily put many cider producers out
of business. What is needed are guidelines for sanitary orchard management
and cider pressing practices. These include and certainly are not limited
to): 1) Not using any fruit that has contacted manure, i.e. drops in a
manured/composted orchard. 2) Not spreading manure or compost when fruit are
on the tree. 3) Washing all fruit which will be pressed for cider. This is
common sense, but do you know that 66% of Norhteastern cider producers in
1992 did not wash and brush their fruit prior to pressing? 4) Cleaning all
bins well between fruit loads. 5) Changing fruit wash water regularly and
possibly adding a sterilizing agent. The list continues, but does not end
when the juice is put on the shelf for sale. The consumer must also ensure
that the product does not become contaminated after opening it.
****************************************************************************
*********
Terence L. Bradshaw
Research Assistant
UVM Apple Team
work: home:
Plant and Soil Science Dept. 7 Hickok Place Apt 1
University of Vermont Burlington, VT 05401
121 Hills Building (802)864-5875
Burlington, VT 05405
(802)656-0490
tbradsha@zoo.uvm.edu
http://www.uvm.edu/~tbradsha/home.html
------------------------------
Subject: re: E-coli 0157H in ciders
From: rcd@raven.talisman.com (Dick Dunn)
Date: 14 Mar 97 16:16:15 MST (Fri)
Andrew LEA <andrew_lea@compuserve.com> writes about the 0157H strain of E
coli in fresh apple juice (note NOT speaking here about fermented cider):
> But please make no mistake about it, this 'new' pathogen is a killer and it
> WILL survive and even multiply in fresh apple juice (as several studies
> from Univ Wisconsin and Cornell have now shown), compared to 'normal'
> E-coli. So we simply can't be too careful. I used to sit on the fence a
> bit about pasteurising fresh apple juice, but now I'm prepared to stand up
> and be counted - pasteurisation of fresh juice for retail sale is an
> absolute MUST!!
While I understand that the 0157H strain is dangerous, I'm concerned about
the conclusion that pasteurization is essential to protect against it.
Herewith, several thoughts, some a bit half-baked...
We're not going to pasteurize fresh apples, of course...so at what point
in the process does the danger of this E coli strain start to become
important? The three most obvious factors seem to me to be (1) presence
of the bacteria in significant quantity when the juice is pressed, (2)
amount of time between pressing and consuming the juice, and (3) temperature
of the juice up to consumption.
Regarding (3), Mr Lea cited a report that "E.coli 0157H is capable of
survival in fresh apple cider at 20 degrees C..." Note that this is the
US sense of "cider" meaning "juice". But why would fresh-pressed juice
be kept that warm? What little I've seen of fresh juice production says
that the producers chill it as much as possible, as soon as possible, so
that it won't start to ferment. (I understand that chilling by itself will
not prevent the bacteria, but it will slow them down somewhat.)
As for (2), the time factor, I wonder that juice producers don't date their
fresh juices with a very short expiration. If the juice is kept cold, and
given a "use before" date of no more than four or five days, how serious is
the E coli problem? (I don't know. I'm not judging; I'm asking.) That
would seem to bring us down to factor (1), the quantity of bacteria present
at the outset.
Folks who know of E coli commonly note that it's found all over the place,
and that we've got it within our own digestive tracts all the time. But
this does not gainsay the fact that a large population of E coli of the
wrong strain in the wrong place is deadly-dangerous. It does appear that
newer, more deadly strains have developed (or have been given a foothold)
in recent years. It is *because* of this (*not* in spite of it) that I
have serious doubts about mandatory pasteurization: I'm concerned that
it could encourage sloppy orchard and press practices, where pasteurization
is applied as a bandage to the final product while the orchards and press-
house become veritable breeding grounds for dangerous bacteria. Although
I haven't seen any final conclusions about the US Odwalla juice E coli
problem of last fall, indications along the way were that the problem was
not just a lack of pasteurization, but bad orchard practice (taking wind-
falls from a dual-use orchard). Moreover, mandatory pasteurization will
be all-too-readily accepted by mass-market producers who already pasteurize
and filter their juices within a micron of their existence anyway, while
it would knock out the smaller producers of unfiltered/unpasteurized juices.
If that seems overly cynical, let me point out that it's consistent with
the effects of US agribusiness in the past decade or two: The handling
instructions for packaged raw poultry are close to what one would expect
for toxic waste. Fresh eggs in many areas are so dangerous that one can
no longer risk making a proper Caesar salad dressing, let alone a proper
egg nog. Raw milk can only be allowed to exist in a short bit of plumbing
between the udder and the pasteurizer; as a result perhaps no more than one
American in 10,000 will ever know the wonder of clotted cream or the full
range of good cheese. I would hate to see the same sort of "progress"
visited upon apple juice.
I guess the bottom line on my response here is: Let's try prevention before
we resign ourselves to the drastic cure--let's find out if proper practices
and handling can avoid the need for universal pasteurization of apple
juice. (Although pasteurization doesn't prevent making cider except for
the matter of using the natural yeast, one ought to consider that if pas-
teurization becomes the norm, more widespread use of fermentation-blocking
preservatives might not be far behind.)
Of course, as cider-makers we would be remiss if we didn't take every con-
venient opportunity to point out to the public that (per the report Mr Lea
quoted) "...alcoholic fermentation of fresh cider is an effective means
of destroying this pathogen..." and is thus a centuries-old solution to a
recent problem!
- ---
Dick Dunn rcd at talisman.com Boulder County, Colorado USA
...Simpler is better.
------------------------------
Subject: [Fwd: applejack]
From: kathy <kbooth@scnc.waverly.k12.mi.us>
Date: Fri, 14 Mar 1997 23:05:01 -0500
My daddy used to let his pear cider (perry) freeze on the back porch and
decant off the remaining liquid from the ice which was discarded.
In the past (long past for you ATF moniters) I have let plastic jugs of
my apple cider freeze and poured off the several cups of remaining
liquid, refrozen and repeated. However, with much oxygenation, it got a
bit of a vinegar tang to the applejack. I bottled the remaining melted
ice as light cider and got away with the low alcohol product.
Wassail....jim booth, lansing, MI with 28gal cidre to blend and bottle
soon...Wanna help wash bottles anybody?
------------------------------
Subject: acid level
From: PickleMan <wrp2@axe.humboldt.edu>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 1997 08:38:23 -0800 (PST)
Hello all,
I have been looking through my books and I have found nothing stating what
amount of acid should be in a cider. I have wine books for wine, but I
think a cider around 5% alc. should have less acid, correct? Any
recommendations?
PickleMan
------------------------------
Subject: watery finish in ciders
From: "Sargent, Ernie" <ErnieS@ios.bc.ca>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 1997 11:46:51 -0800
Hi all -
I'm just in the process of bottling last falls apple cider. The apples
I used were a whole mix of older varieties which were late September
ripeners - usually translates to non-dessert types. These apples
created a juice that tasted really good - the sugar came in at 1.068,
with good tannin and acid. I did a slow cool (13 degrees C) ferment
with a wine yeast (Epernay 2) that leaves a fruity finish (in wine).
The cider had a beautiful nose with really rich and appley/pear flavours
along with some fullness and a good bite. Now however, that I'm ready
to bottle and sparkle, it's lost it's full finish and tastes thin and
watery at the end. Does anyone know what causes this and is there a way
to correct it? I'm really disappointed because I've spent a lot of time
and energy on this cider.
------------------------------
End of Cider Digest #653
*************************
Comments