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Cider Digest #0905
Subject: Cider Digest #905, 18 June 2001
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #905 18 June 2001
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Drip Irrigation (Kelly E Jones)
speaking of carbonation!...(Ace goes wild) (Dick Dunn)
Sweetening cider ("Preben B. Jensen")
Arresting fermentation (Andrew Lea)
Carbonation levels (Andrew Lea)
Cider near Bath (Andrew Lea)
Re: Jim Booth's request for cider destinations (Marc Montefusco)
Vancouver tips please ("David Matthews")
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Drip Irrigation
From: Kelly E Jones <kejones@ptdcs2.ra.intel.com>
Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2001 11:50:36 -0700
Dick wrote:
> I've
> been thinking that some sort of drip arrangement ought to work, but I can't
> get a good handle on what sort of drippers, and how many per tree, I should
> use. Anyone with advice or experience, especially for dry climate?
I've done drip irrigation for winegrapes and ornamental trees. I don't
think the type or number of drippers is all that important. Drippers
are rated in gph, so you just need to figure out what the daily or
weekly water needs of your tree is (maybe that was your question?) and
then choose drippers accordingly. If you have many trees, you may need
to use smaller drippers and run them longer in order for your water
source to be able to supply them. Installing drippers under mulch can
help save water.
Hope this helps,
Kelly
Forest Grove, OR
------------------------------
Subject: speaking of carbonation!...(Ace goes wild)
From: rcd@talisman.com (Dick Dunn)
Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2001 17:40:12 -0600 (MDT)
A few recent articles have touched on level of carbonation. Just this past
weekend I had rather a bad experience with overcarbonation. We were having
a party, so I decided to toss a few varieties of commercial cider in the
cooler with the bottled beer. (No, I'm not out to get my friends. I just
thought some of the commercial ciders might pique their interest.) One that
I chose--which I hadn't tasted recently, but expected to be no more or less
boring than the others--was Ace "California Fermented Apple Cider".
At best, it was a mess. If you're a homebrewer, you know that feeling of
opening a "gusher" bottle? That's what happened. I didn't see the first
one but I heard somebody comment on it and I assumed somebody had handled
the bottle carelessly. I saw the second one. Later I tried a third one
myself when I was near the sink and could handle it carefully. I even let
a fourth one remain calm and completely chilled overnight before I opened it.
ALL the bottles gushed foam as soon as they were opened. If you were so
foolish as to attempt to drink from the bottle, you ended up with the
bulging-cheeks how-am-I-gonna-hold-this-in-and-not-spray-everybody? effect.
I've never seen a commercial beverage so overcarbonated.
So what's the deal? (Poor quality control? At least.) Re-fermentation in
the bottle? Maybe; read on. Could something have happened over time to
bottles that sat on the store shelf too long? Can't tell; there is no
evidence of a date code on the bottle.
It seems like re-fermentation _should_ be unlikely. Ace is adding juice
and concentrate (presumably for sweetening); they're also adding potassium
sorbate and sulfur dioxide. They must know enough to prevent fermentation
from re-starting in the bottle--I would think some combination of filtering,
stabilizing, and letting the sulfite and sorbate get the yeast shut down
and not let them re-start.
And yet nobody in his right mind would bottle a cider with so much carbona-
tion. The cider came out of the bottle cloudier than I'd expect. And the
taste was what I'd call "mean, thin, and sharp". It certainly didn't have
the taste of a cider that had been sweetened after fermentation (the bottle
label indicates about a gram of sugar per fluid ounce). All these points
suggest that what came out of the bottle wasn't close to what went into it.
I did try a rough experiment to "culture" from the contents of the bottle
by mixing some of it with sugar-water. I admit that I wasn't scrupulously
careful, but that dropped from 1.035 to 1.020 in a matter of days, which
pretty strongly suggests there's active yeast in the bottle.
Anybody out there "in the biz" know if Ace put out a bad batch? Anybody
else notice especially exuberant Ace cider recently?
- ---
Dick Dunn rcd@talisman.com Hygiene, Colorado USA
...Simpler is better.
------------------------------
Subject: Sweetening cider
From: "Preben B. Jensen" <lesa@direct.ca>
Date: Tue, 12 Jun 2001 08:19:33 -0700
In the last Cider Digest, David Pickering is discussing his efforts to
halt fermentation.It seems to me that one can achieve essentially the
same effect by adding sugar some time after the fermentation has ceased.
Stopping fermentation is fraught with problems as it is going against
the natural tendencies.The resulting lower alcohol level also makes the
cider less robust in its ability to resist bacterial infection.
In the past, I have added sugar in hope of inducing fermentation in the
bottle. This did'nt always happen and the result was a cider with a
pleasant(I thought at the time) tinge of sweetness.
As time passed, I came around to the belief that dry still cider is the
REAL thing. Besides, it is easier to make that way.
Preben B Jensen
------------------------------
Subject: Arresting fermentation
From: Andrew Lea <andrew_lea@compuserve.com>
Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2001 17:02:18 +0100
David Pickering asked:
> In searching for techniques to bring an early stop to my cider
> fermentation (see Cider Digest 902 - any words of advice anybody?) I
> came across a publication "The Principles and Practice of Cider-Making"
> by VLS Charley from 1949, which is a translation of "La Ciderie" by Prof
> G Warcollier (1928).
> He quotes a "normal" dose of sulphur dioxide as 1.5oz of K.M.S. per 100
> gallons. I guess KMS is potassium metabisulphite but that is a guess,
> and I suppose a French gallon is the same as an English one ie bigger
> than a US gallon. How does one get rid of the SO2 odour from the cider?
It's an English gallon and an English ounce anyway (remember, the book
has been translated and the units converted to Imperial)! This
corresponds to about 100 ppm of KMS (which IS potassium metabisulphite -
so you get the $64000!) or 50 ppm of SO2 (cf. legal maximum generally
200 ppm).
There will be no smell of SO2 because it will all be
bound and none will be free. The biggest problem trying to stop
fermentation using sulphite is that its efficacy is dependent on pH and
on the binding substances produced by the yeast (if you want seriously
hard science about this see the PDF files on my website (Andrew's
publications)). It's impossible to measure these except in a lab and
even then, an actively fermenting yeast (especially a wine yeast like
David uses) will just synthesise more acetaldehyde to mop up the
sulphite and fermentation will continue after a short lag unless the
nitrogen levels are very low.
> There were also some hints that low temperatures of around +1 to -1C
> (ummm... 34 to 30F ?) may be a means of halting fermentation and
> preventing spoilage in the incompletely fermented product I am trying to
> produce - dare I say a Scrumpy style with lots of fruit. Has anybody
> gone down this road?
Although this may work with a wild yeast, it will not do a lot with a
wine yeast in good condition. It may stop for a while but after racking
you run the risk of it starting up again unless you can seriously
centrifuge or filter (see below).
In my experience it is almost impossible to stop a cider fermentation
that's been inoculated with a wine yeast, though you might be successful
if you can centrifuge or filter through a < 1 micron filter to screen out
the yeast. Traditional ways of making naturally sweet part-fermented cider
(as still done in France on a factory scale) rely on 4 key factors:
1. Low nitrogen juices to start with (e.g. from true cider cultivars
grown under low nutrient conditions)
2. Keeving to reduce yeast and nitrogen levels before fermentation
3. Very slow fermentation with a wild yeast at low temperature
4. Frequent racking or centrifugation
I have found that the only way to get such a cider is to decide from the
outset that this is the goal. If you start off otherwise you will be
unable to stop the fermentation and to keep it stable in bottle (and you
certainly don't want exploding bottles!).
An alternative is to sweeten the cider and bottle pasteurise it (details
from the Ag-Canada booklet link on my website.
Andrew Lea
- --------------------------------------
Visit the Wittenham Hill Cider Page at
http://www.cider.org.uk OR
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/andrew_lea
------------------------------
Subject: Carbonation levels
From: Andrew Lea <andrew_lea@compuserve.com>
Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2001 18:44:06 +0100
Concerning previous postings it is certainly an article of faith
throughout the whole beverage industry (not just cider) that the
interaction between carbonation level and temperature has a huge effect
on flavour and aroma perception. You can assume that all the large
cider mfgs will have done market and sensory research to optimise
carbonation levels for each specific product (and they will have taken
the presumed serving temperature into account when so doing!). For
those of us doing 'natural' carbonation the change in flavour of the
same cider as it develops 'condition' and perhaps (in PET) even
'over-conditions', can be a revelation (though admittedly there are
other 'biochemical' effects that come into play here too).
Not so surprising perhaps when you remember that CO2 is a
flavour-active ingredient like many others, and that you need to squeeze
up to 1.7 g/l into a wine or cider even before you reach saturation
(just on the threshold of sparkling). That sub-sparkling amount in
itself can be hugely important in the flavour of a 'still' cider or
table wine (a level below 0.2 g/l typically gives a 'flat' taste). You
need to be around 4 g/l of CO2 (that's getting on for half a percent or
so) before you get to a seriously fizzy state!
No wonder CO2 makes such a difference!
Andrew Lea,
nr Oxford U.K.
------------------------------
Subject: Cider near Bath
From: Andrew Lea <andrew_lea@compuserve.com>
Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2001 18:06:00 +0100
> I will be arriving in Bath area July 13 with my wife and granddaughter (14
> yrs) and traveling north by car to Blackpool, York and then to fly out of
> Glasgow July 27. I love cider and cider making but will have very limited
> attention of my traveling companions to indulge myself attending to the craft.
>
> Recommendations of events and places to visit would be appreciated, and
> also Bed and Breakfasts. Both those cider related and memorable for a 14
> year old girl.
>
> wassail and TIA, jim booth
>
> respond to jameshbooth@worldnet.att.net
>
Check out the following:
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/rob/cider/cidlinks.htm
(unfortunately not all the links are active and not many small UK
cidermakers have websites)
You'd need to take a bit of a detour into Central and South Somerset
from Bath to get to interesting places like Heck's, Sheppy's and
Perry's. If travelling north, check out the Hereford Box for details of
the Cider Museum, Dunkerton's and Weston's. You may just have time to
get a copy of the Good Cider Guide shipped over to you from Dave
Matthews (or from Amazon?)if you act quick! That would be the most
useful.
Andrew Lea
- --------------------------------------
Visit the Wittenham Hill Cider Page at
http://www.cider.org.uk OR
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/andrew_lea
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Jim Booth's request for cider destinations
From: Marc Montefusco <mmontefusco@newworldcider.com>
Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2001 07:49:31 -0400
Without consulting a map, I think it would be possible to swing north from
Bath to Hereford and visit the Cider Museum -- the name says it all. If
you want to see how cider is made in bulk, Bulmer's, in the same general area,
may give tours, and Weston's, a few miles further out in the country, may
also give tours -- I know they have a nice sales shop, and the atmosphere
is great. I'm sure our resident British guru Mr. Lea will have some better
suggestions, but these are from a Yank perspective.
Marc Montefusco
New World Cider
------------------------------
Subject: Vancouver tips please
From: "David Matthews" <Dave.Matthews7@btinternet.com>
Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2001 21:40:08 +0100
Dear All,
This August our annual family holiday takes us from sunny Wales to =
even-sunnier Vancouver, Canada. We'll be staying in the city centre (I =
think that you call that 'down town') for 11 days from the 9th August, =
and then spending 3 or 4 days 'up state' (again, I'm not too sure if =
that's the correct phrase) at Whistler.=20
Can anyone please recommend some places to try some fine Canadian =
Natural Cider?
Thanks,
Dave Matthews
P.S. Oh, by the way, Lyne Down Cider is for sale here in Herefordshire, =
England. The asking price is four hundred thousand pounds sterling. =
Interested? Drop me a line.
------------------------------
End of Cider Digest #905
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