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Cider Digest #1425
Subject: Cider Digest #1425, 8 December 2007
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #1425 8 December 2007
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Re: Harpoons, Macs, and Macro Ciders (Ben Watson)
New UK apple book ("Siloam Orchards")
Help needed to "unstick" a stuck fermentation ("George Katz")
re: stirring the pot ("info")
2008 Upper Mississippi Mash-Out ("Crist, Jonathan")
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Subject: Re: Harpoons, Macs, and Macro Ciders
From: Ben Watson <bwatson@chelseagreen.com>
Date: Sun, 2 Dec 2007 09:25:10 -0500
Yikes. I knew I was poking the proverbial bear when I expressed
myself on the new Harpoon cider and related issues. Just to clarify
where I'm coming from, here are a few thoughts prompted by postings by
Charles Jolicoeur, Gary Awdey, etc. I don't expect everybody to agree
with me -- just want to make my opinions clear.
Any time a cider gets critiqued, there seems to be a reflexive need to
suggest that the critic is being somehow too snooty or highbrow. And
the fact that Harpoon didn't have a table in this year's Cider Salon
(not my decision, by the way -- they never contacted me), perhaps
reinforced this impression. Let me make it plain: I believe that the
cider community is very much a "big tent," and should be open and
open-minded about anyone doing anything (at least people who are making
a product using 100% fresh pressed juice, which is what I define as
"real cider").
I have absolutely no dog in this fight, if it even is a fight. I wish
the guys at Harpoon all the success in the world -- may they live a
thousand years! But at the same time, I see definite limits to how much
"macro" ciders (even those produced by "micro" breweries) can benefit
the world of what we call "craft" cider. (I prefer to use the terms
"artisanal" or "farmstead" cider, because these terms are already well
established among small-scale cheese producers, and they strike me as
relevant to cider producers, as well.)
When the "draft" ciders like Woodchuck and Cider Jack and Hornsby's, et
al. first came on the market, the feeling was that they were going to
benefit smaller craft cidermakers by doing a lot of the promotional
heavy lifting and establishing cider as a market category. To some
extent, that's proven true. But, as the debate went even then, the
problem is that they were defining the market for a product that was
being made from concentrate, stablized and uniformly sweet, carbonated,
and wine-coolerish. Again, there's nothing inherently wrong with that
- -- if that's what you want to buy -- but it arguably makes it harder to
sell a drier or more tannic cider. A rising tide does not float all
boats, in this regard at least. And mass-marketing an undistinguished
and bland cider arguably does more harm than good, regardless of
whether people like the stuff or not.
The one respect in which it does help is in providing a market for
surplus apples -- that helps local orchards, which are really on the
ropes. My point was only that it would be better (from a quality
standpoint) for Harpoon to contract with a few orchards and buy a
variety of apples based on their ability to make a good hard cider
(maybe emulate aspects of the system that Bulmer and other macro
cideries use in the UK). Paul Correnty reportedly starting talking to
the Harpoon folks 15 years ago; if they had done their homework on
apples that are really well suited to making cider, then they would
have all the fruit they can use right now, from contracted growers,
and would probably be the undisputed industry leader in the US "draft"
cider category . . . because they would be using distinctive fruit that
tastes like something when you ferment it out. We can still argue about
fresh juice versus concentrate, but the bottom line is that local apple
growers would be getting a better price for their fruit if they were
growing specialty varieties (even superior "value-added" organic Macs,
etc) than if they were selling "surplus" fruit, of whatever leftover
dessert variety -- not just Mac. Compare a juice made from a mix of
organic apples and unsprayed wild apples with Veryfine apple juice, and
you get the idea. I'm sure Harpoon is probably buying the apples for a
low price, which is fine as a business model -- but it doesn't
guarantee a distinctive-tasting cider.
I have nothing against McIntosh, and have used limited quantities in
my own ciders. And Claude, as usual, is correct -- there's nothing
inherently wrong with Macs, if they are grown appropriately in a
particular climate and soil. But most people are not sourcing them from
the St. Lawrence Valley or the other regions where they are really
exceptional, and so ciders that depend heavily on the "watery" Macs
that prevail will be uninteresting. Terry Maloney's Organic Mac cider
is a red herring here, because he is stopping fermentation and
micro-filtering it while the cider still has a lot of sweetness and an
appley taste -- I'm talking about a cider fermented to off-dry or
dryness.
Finally, to Dave's comment about why more microbreweries are jumping on
the cider bandwagon. The main factor is . . . yeast. I know Morgan
Wolaver and have talked with him several times over the years about
the prospects of producing a macro/draft cider made from fresh-pressed
juice through the Wolaver's Organic/Otter Creek Brewery in Middlebury,
VT. The problem is that doing so requires a dedicated and completely
separate facility, because beer guys (understandably) do not want any
whiff of cider yeasts messing with their products and creating "cidery"
or unpredictable overtones in the beer. So it's not as simple and
straightforward as I once thought.
In some respects, I guess we are all "cider snobs" -- myself included.
We all bring our own preferences and prejudices, acknowledged or
otherwise, to the table. But I think it is important that we
"discriiminate" (that's not a dirty word) and analyze what's what, the
pluses and minuses of different varieties and production techniques,
etc. Otherwise, how do we improve or learn anything? A lot of the
people on the Cider Digest (both producers and "critics") are having a
good effect on the state of cider in America. Whether anyone is making
money on it is another question -- but the increase in quality over
the past few years is undeniable, and very encouraging. I hope that the
kind of improvement will be evident in Harpoon's cider in future, and
that they make a long-term commitment to tweaking their assumptions
and their product, just as all of us "amateurs and artisans" are doing.
Ben Watson
Francestown, NH
------------------------------
Subject: New UK apple book
From: "Siloam Orchards" <mail@siloamorchards.com>
Date: Mon, 3 Dec 2007 12:52:11 -0500
Info on a recently released UK book titled The Northern Pomona , Apples
for Cool Climates is available at www.northernpomona.co.uk This is a
master work of primarily UK apples by Linden Hawthorne, with detailed
descriptions and histories, magnificently illustrated by Bridget
Gillespie, with many unique recipes and also grower info. Large format
coffee table hardcover.
Eric Hambly, Siloam Orchards, Uxbridge Ontario
------------------------------
Subject: Help needed to "unstick" a stuck fermentation
From: "George Katz" <geodeb@bigplanet.com>
Date: Mon, 3 Dec 2007 20:49:35 -0500
As this is our first post on Cider Digest (after lurking for a year), we
want to express our appreciation to all for the questions and answers posted
on this Digest over the years, and to Dick Dunn for all his work in keeping
the Cider Digest operating. Reading the posts has proven to be an
invaluable education in cider for us newbies. Couldn't ask for a better
school, or better teachers, -- hope no tuition charges are pending:-).
Alas, we must have missed a lesson, however, because it appears that one
of our last cider batches has a stuck fermentation, and we could use some
help to unstick it. We're in south central Pennsylvania, which apparently
hasn't seen a true cider apple in a local orchard for the last 50 years or
more (or so the local orchards we've visited have suggested), so we're
relegated to using sweet dessert fruit (and trying to blend the resulting
cider with smaller batches of higher tannin cider when we can get sufficient
quantities of appropriate fruit somewhere to make the latter).
About a week ago, we pressed enough single variety local dessert apples
for 7 gallons of fresh juice. Starting gravity in a 5 gal. glass carboy was
1.068 at 60 degrees with a PH of 3.81. We sulfited, per the Long Ashton
chart on pg. 40 of the Proulx and Nichols Cider Book, to approximately 200
ppm, waited 24 hours or so, and pitched the yeast we were going to try this
year, Lavlin EC1118, per package instructions, and affixed an air lock.
After about a day, we noticed some activity in the air lock, e.g. a bubble
rising in the water in it every 4-5 minutes. A very thin ring of fine
bubbles also formed where the top of the cider met the edge of the carboy.
After five days, however, neither the airlock activity nor the ring of
bubbles increased (or diminished), even when we moved the carboy. We also
noticed that the cider looked like it was beginning to clear (or at least
visibly lighten) and we saw a lot of sediment on the bottom of the carboy
that was not originally visible through the glass. [In contrast, another
carboy of cider, with the same gravity, PH, sulfite and yeast, with some of
the extra juice from the same apple pressing plus a couple of others local
sweet varieties, started "cooking away" almost immediately after the yeast
was pitched, is still uniformly opaque (probably had sediment but we can't
see it), and shows no sign of slowing yet -same as two batches last fall].
To see if the yeast was actually still alive in the first carboy and get
things moving, we added yeast energizer per package instructions (1/2
teaspoon per gallon) yesterday. Well that thing immediately reacted like
the baking soda and vinegar rockets we tried to make in 5th grade (before
they were deemed to be too dangerous for kids)-massive foam, bubbles, rapid
(airlock) percolation and mess on the floor (and fortunately, just like the
rockets, no lift off :-)). Problem is, after several hours it returned to
the original state - thin ring of bubbles, an airlock bubble every 4-5
minutes, and nothing else, so the yeast energizer didn't fix it for long.
So, what does this ultra low level of activity mean? Could the cider be
fermenting despite the absence of lots of visible activity in the carboy,
since the yeast seems alive and the carboy contents seem to be clearing?
If, as we more likely suspect, something is wrong, what could the problem be
and how, if at all, can it be cured?
Any insights and advice from the great teachers on this Digest would be
greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance.
George and Deb Katz
Harrisburg, PA
------------------------------
Subject: re: stirring the pot
From: "info" <info@holmbergorchards.com>
Date: Thu, 06 Dec 2007 02:44:08 GMT
Thank you. All of you who found my opinion worthy of a
reply. Thanks esp. to Josh Klatt. As a Peter
Mitchell grad myself, welcome to the club. I am sure you are now
chuckling at many a cidermaker's secrets.
Mr. Dunn - Considering my commercial experience
and my bachelors in horticulture, I do not accept your unstated
premise that organic fruit is lower in nitrogen than "conventional"
apples. We have not applied any source of N or P to our
"conventional" orchard in 40 years. My grandfather used to apply
chicken manure from our farm to our trees, ("very high
compost"...organic?...) but stopped in the late sixties. We had
too many green macintosh. All 5 strains we grow.
Even a "green" cidermaker knows that there are more ways to
control a fermentation than yeast
and FAN. Rate=temp. Glycol is my hero.
So is my DE filter. Simply: there are many processes that
a commerical cidermaker uses that most homebrewers do
not.
Carry on,
Russell
Russell Holmberg
------------------------------
Subject: 2008 Upper Mississippi Mash-Out
From: "Crist, Jonathan" <Jonathan.Crist@bsci.com>
Date: Thu, 6 Dec 2007 12:53:32 -0600
Finally, a homebrew contest with a best-of-show award for cider makers.
A coveted, custom-carved wooden chalice will be presented for the BOS
cider, mead and beer at the 2008 Upper Mississippi Mash-Out, Jan. 25-26
in St. Paul, Minnesota. One of the larger homebrew contests in the
country, the Mash-Out provides prizes along with every medal. Check out
the infamous "Eis-Anything" category, and NEW this year there are two
categories for first time entrants (1060+ OG and 1060- OG). Entries are
accepted Jan. 1 - 12. The contest is sponsored by the St. Paul
Homebrewers Club and the Minnesota Home Brewers Assn. Check out all the
details on the Website at: http://www.mnbrewers.com/mashout
Jonathan Crist
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End of Cider Digest #1425
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