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Cider Digest #1456
Subject: Cider Digest #1456, 25 July 2008
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #1456 25 July 2008
Forum for Discussion of Cider Issues
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Re: Do we need our own magazine? (Dick Dunn)
Re: Cider Digest #1455, 19 July 2008 ("Rosalind Rogoff")
Musings on cider operations in Pennsylvania (Alan Yelvington)
More Vintage Cider Books Online (Andrew Lea)
Bentonite ("Harry Masters")
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Subject: Re: Do we need our own magazine?
From: Dick Dunn <rcd@talisman.com>
Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 12:42:00 -0600
Alan Yelvington asked:
...
> ...A periodical for the
> cider/perry crowd may be just the thing a lot of us are interested in.
>
> I retire from the military next year and hope to have my own cider
> orchard up in Pennsylvania. I have experience in publishing from some
> time in industry, and I'm wondering how the folks on the forum feel
> about having a magazine (complete with advertising) to speak to the
> cause of cider and perry?
I had a good long look at this a few years ago--I was thinking about how to
extend cider information beyond what the Digest does. I made a false start
and set it on a back burner. It looked like a sound idea then, and I still
believe it is; I just didn't have the energy.
The good part is that you should be able to get enough enthusiastic readers
to keep it going. [The Cider Digest janitor interjects: just for your
reference, the digest currently has 650 subscribers. That number has been
nearly constant for several years, with an average turnover of half a dozen
subscribers per month.] When people tune in to the idea of quality cider,
they tend to go at it enthusiastically and search everywhere for info.
The challenge is getting good writing and editing/review. My experience is
that, with only a couple notable exceptions, the most knowledgable and
experienced cidermakers are among the least likely to want to write,
particularly longer articles.
What could a printed periodical offer? It's between online mailing lists
and books. Compared to the Cider Digest or ukcider, it can offer graphics
(photos, graphs), longer and more in-depth articles, a consistent approach,
useful indexing, and editorial control.
My personal viewpoint is that strong editing would be essential, meaning
you've got to have an editor or editorial board with lots of experience
and knowledge. Publishing incorrect or incomplete information early on
could really work against your main potential advantages. It might turn
out, however, that the senior cidermakers who don't want to write will be
willing to review articles.
Have you thought of something like a mission statement that would circum-
scribe the sorts of articles and (especially) advertising you'd accept?
- ---
Dick Dunn rcd@talisman.com Hygiene, Colorado USA
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Cider Digest #1455, 19 July 2008
From: "Rosalind Rogoff" <contact@sanramonobserver.org>
Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 13:07:41 -0700
Al,
I like the idea of a cider magazine. You could position it with the
wine magazines. You don't need to make it a big, fancy thing like Wine
Spectator, but it should be for wine and beer drinkers as much, if not
more, than for producers.
I don't make cider, but I like to drink it and I'd like to know where to
buy it and what the different brands are like. So I'd be as interested
in the ads as the stories. It would help grow the industry and the
number of cider aficionados.
Roz
Rosalind Rogoff
Editor & Webmaster
San Ramon Observer
www.sanramonobserver.org
------------------------------
Subject: Musings on cider operations in Pennsylvania
From: Alan Yelvington <alany@semparpac.org>
Date: Sun, 20 Jul 2008 19:00:23 -0400
Dick Dunn asked some excellent questions in response to my last post.
Notably, looking at issues on a higher level.
My producing in 2 years is unrealistic based on my own production. I
have plenty of opportunity to purchase fruit locally, so I was hoping to
teeth using purchased fruit. The trouble with this is that I pretty
much disqualify myself from any farmstand provisions, and that pushes me
to being a limited-winery (and the fees).
As far as which varieties will fare well in the area... I have talked
with folks in the area with trees and am purchasing stock from a
northern nursery to hedge my bets. Honestly, I'm more concerned abut
the rootstock than the varieties. I'm going the B.9 and M.9 route and
trellising since I want to try life without ladders. I won't be getting
any younger (magic water from Florida not working), and I'd like to have
4H as a partner. Safety is a big thing. I'm really not that
optimistic about the rootstock/trellising idea, but nothing ventured,
nothing gained. I'm putting in 9 varieties of 3+ trees each (more
Golden Grimes as base) to hedge my bets for mortality and pollination.
I'm a very lucky guy as far as the neighbors go. They are all
supportive, and I'm learning local knowledge from a gentleman up the
road with his old personal orchard (Northern Spy among the trees). The
good news is that fireblight has not proven to be a problem in the area
so far.
Also, there is a great working cider mill in Busti, NY not too far from
me. I''ll be buying juice from him until I have fruit to bring him. If
you're in the area, you should check him out:
http://www.busticidermill.com/index-2.html
The owner is a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farmer, and gave me
a great tour of the cider house along with leads on trade mags and
organizations. Good people.
I'm really glad you mentioned the people angle. I am very grateful for
the moral support of my new neighbors that barely know me. We chose the
area because of the grand-children (not typically part of an orchard
location selection process...) and I have never lived anywhere near the
place before. I have walked and talked with several of the neighbors,
and they are a wonderful bunch. I suspect that I will be lubricating
friendships with farmhouse cider for quite a while :P
I just got back into town from driving out to western Virginia to visit
Diane Flynt's operation at Foggy Ridge Cider (www.foggyridgecider.com).
She's produces a prize-winning product, and is a saint for sharing
knowledge and experience.
I've also attended the workshops that Vintage Virginia Apples
(http://www.vintagevirginiaapples.com) holds in the winter. They are at
the center of a wonderful cider movement in Virginia, and I'm tapping as
much good energy from them as I can.
All good questions Dick, and I plan to take ANOTHER look at my business
plan and inject a lot of the reality that you provided.
On a side-note, I've gotten supporting emails regarding the Cider
magazine idea. I'm going to start keeping track of those comments and
see if I can't pull together something of a pilot newsletter. Folks
that have something to sell should contact me since advertising will be
free in the first edition! (try it, you'll like it...)
Very best regards,
Al
------------------------------
Subject: More Vintage Cider Books Online
From: Andrew Lea <andrew_lea@compuserve.com>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:52:18 +0100
I note with pleasure that our friends at the Internet Archive have
scanned and uploaded two more seminal cider texts in recent months.
One is John Evelyn's classic "Pomona" of 1664.
<http://www.archive.org/details/sylvaordiscourse00eveluoft> It comes
bundled with Sylva, a long discourse on forestry, to which it was
published as an Appendix. Pomona is interesting in that it is what we
would now call a multi-authored work put together by a senior author cum
editor. That is, Evelyn himself wrote the pre-amble, but then invited
many other of his cidermaking friends (notably Dr Beale of Yeovil) to
add their own cider-making experiences. So it's an almost unique
assemblage of (often divergent) views on cider making as it was
practiced in England in the 1660's (though even Connecticut gets a
passing mention!). Or at least, as practiced by well-heeled members of
the then recently created Royal Society, to which many of the
contributors belonged.
This was also a time of great political change
in England (the overthrow of the parliamentarians and the restoration of
the monarchy), and scholars will tell you that the contributors to this
volume are all royalists. Puritan cidermakers (eg Ralph Austen of
Oxford) did exist, but they were not invited to contribute and their
views where mentioned are treated with some sarcasm. Another
interesting message from Pomona is that it is clear that cider was made
throughout southern England, and by no means restricted to the West
Country as later became the case - however, greater praise does tend to
be given to cider from say Herefordshire and Somerset than from further
east in the country.
The second new upload is Hogg and Bull's "The Apple and Pear as Vintage
Fruits" of 1886. <http://www.archive.org/details/applepearasvinta00bull>
This book followed their earlier "Herefordshire Pomona" and goes into
far more detail on specific cider fruit varieties, their cultivation and
the practice of cider making. Bull sadly died before it was published,
and it was completed by Hogg. This book is part of the late 19th century
cider revival set in train by authors such as these who were saddened by
the poor state of English cidermaking and relevant knowledge at the time.
Both books may be downloaded in various formats and may even be printed
and bound (at a cost) from online printers such as Lulu.com. Original
copies of these books are pricey on the second hand market, even when
they appear, so online printing offers a chance to 'own' one at
reasonable cost.
Andrew Lea
- --
Wittenham Hill Cider Page
http://www.cider.org.uk
------------------------------
Subject: Bentonite
From: "Harry Masters" <harrymasters@tiscali.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2008 06:36:36 +0100
Re: Jeremy Kent wrote:
Hi,
Have anyone else used Sodium- calcium- Bentonite to clear hazy cider. If
so how is it applied?
Hello, I was interested to read your questions about the use of
Bentonite. I used it last autumn combined with Lalvin yeast EC 1118
Selection Champenoise, Saccharomyces Byanus. This was supposed to
produce a faster, 'fresher' fermentation. However, the fermentations
have taken longer than usual (still fermenting now in a couple of
cases). I ferment in a few stainless steel 5,000 and 10,000 litre vats,
with no temperature control of vats or barn.
Anybody have any observations?
Thanks.
------------------------------
End of Cider Digest #1456
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