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Cider Digest #1969
Subject: Cider Digest #1969, 7 June 2015
From: cider-request@talisman.com
Cider Digest #1969 7 June 2015
Cider and Perry Discussion Forum
Contents:
Re: Cider Digest #1967, 1 June 2015 (denniswaller@comcast.net)
Re: Philosophy of cider making, again (Dick Dunn)
Fire cider (Claude Jolicoeur)
Re: Cider Digest #1968, 4 June 2015 (Stephen Wood)
Geneva Tremlett's (Drew Zimmerman)
Fighting the freeze monster (Alan Yelvington)
Re: Historical Query (Yann Fay)
RE: Historical query (Bill Lyon)
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Digest Janitor: Dick Dunn
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: Cider Digest #1967, 1 June 2015
From: denniswaller@comcast.net
Date: Mon, 1 Jun 2015 18:32:17 +0000 (UTC)
Scott:
The number of commercial cider producers in Western WA has increased
significantly in the last two years but it is difficult to find vendors
that dispense draft cider. The only one I know of in the Seattle area is
the Red Hook brewery in Woodinville on the "eastside" of Seattle which
sells a draft cider made for them by a subsidiary in Oregon. They also
sell a hopped cider made by the same company.
Dennis Waller
denniswaller@comcast.net
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Philosophy of cider making, again
From: Dick Dunn <rcd@talisman.com>
Date: Thu, 4 Jun 2015 10:50:54 -0600
I think now I can manage a bit of disdain for Travis's brewery coworkers:-)
He notes:
"the idea that the juice wouldn't even be pasteurized before being
fermented was a huge concepts that they could not wrap their heads
around."
Yes, they are brewers...but haven't they heard of wine? Do they really
think winemakers pasteurize before fermentation? We don't cook wine (or
cider) because we don't want it to taste cooked, among other things. In
coming back to the "philosophy of cider making", at heart it is just
winemaking. Or, is THAT the breakdown with the brewers? that they don't
get the cider-wine connection?
But, more:
"the reliance on sulfites..."
This is a practice with a couple thousand years behind it. And it's truly
a red herring:
"My impression from these discussions was that they saw cider making
as being rather a rather laissez-faire endeavor with the lack of
pasteurization pre-fermentation and the use of what they saw as a
poison in sulfite."
And yet the brewers are deliberately building up a poison in their beers!
What's 100 ppm of SO2 against 50,000 ppm of ethanol?
If you managed to drink a gallon of wine (don't try this at home!), there's
a fair chance it would kill you. But it wouldn't be the sulfite that
poisoned you.
Beer, wine, and cider have in common the need for microbial control. I
can't see that it's "laissez-faire" that we go at it differently than the
brewers do (because we must:-).
- --
Dick Dunn rcd@talisman.com Hygiene, Colorado USA
------------------------------
Subject: Fire cider
From: Claude Jolicoeur <cjoliprsf@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 04 Jun 2015 15:20:19 -0400
In Cider Digest #1968, 4 June 2015,
> Subject: Re: Cider Digest #1967, 1 June 2015
> From: T <travest@hotmail.com>
>
> I did once try to evaporate a portion of the water from some juice to
> raise the potential abv and if I remember correctly, that batch was a
> success. Of course, I didn't approach a simmer, let alone a boil.
Well, you could have gone a step further...
Fire cider is made by boiling the cider until about approximately half
of it is evaporated, hence raising the SG at around 1.140, and then
ferment. This is somewhat similar to ice cider except the concentration
is obtained by heat rather than by freezing. We do this in Quebec on
maple syrup evaporators.
Claude
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Cider Digest #1968, 4 June 2015
From: Stephen Wood <swood@farnumhillciders.com>
Date: Thu, 04 Jun 2015 17:00:00 -0400
To Mr. Sherrer's historical querry -- The old sources vary on the question
of pre- and post-fermentation additives, but any true cider scholar should
at least know the following:
Andrew is right about the leg of mutton or piece of beef, but that was a UK
tradition -- it never spread much beyond the mud-floored cider sheds of
Devon. In in the maritime north of France, cidermakers were accustomed to
throw oysters into the cider fermenter, and a lively disagreement persisted
for almost two hundred years between Normandy and Brittany, about whether
the oysters should be shucked before addition. A bit further south, in the
bits of the Loire valley where apples grew well, folks tossed live roosters
into the fermentation tank, and used Chanterelles for post-fermentation
flavoring. Strangely, neither Basque nor Asturian cidermakers ever fed
their ciders during fermentation, but after tasting the result, they both
developed the tradition of adding small hot green peppers (finely ground) to
flavor the finished cider. It was often called la masquera (maskara in
Basque).
In the new world, innovation reigned. The early Quebecois (unaccountably)
added native worms to the juice, froze and thawed the barrels, and then
added snow fleas with maple sap in the spring of the year. Most of this
cider was used for washing farm equipment. Around Boston, due to the lively
ice/rum/molasses trade with the West Indies, molasses was used at every
stage of cidermaking, including the bitter end. Unfortunately, in certain
areas of mid-19th century western Massachusetts and Connecticut, a slight
terminology confusion about the word (molasses) resulted in the violent
demise of many innocent blind rodents, with no detectable improvement to the
cider. A similar linguistic confusion in rural West Virginia, about "sugar
and honey," led to the tragic wet end of a few unlucky young women. Early
Maryland cidermakers followed the northern French tradition of adding
oysters to the tank, but Maryland cider friendships were destroyed over
arguments about lemon and horseradish. In southern Maine before 1926,
lobster tomalley was the favorite source of protein for fermentation, and
sweet corn for chaptalization; post-fermentation flavoring was mostly
accomplished with mussels and seaweed until the early 1950s. In northern
Maine, potatoes were used for everything (with a bit of pollock along the
coast) -- none of that worked very well. After WW 2, Vermont and traditional
artisanal craft New York ciders (which had always contained maple sugar and
white pine) began to be regularly flavored with torn flannel shirts and
(almost tasteless) short ponytails. Oddly, in New Hampshire, cidermakers
just pressed the best apples they could grow, and more or less left the
cider to make itself. That worked very well for the cider, but no New
Hampshire cidermaker ever made a nickel of profit.
I hope this helps.
Steve Wood.
------------------------------
Subject: Geneva Tremlett's
From: Drew Zimmerman <drewzimmer@comcast.net>
Date: Thu, 4 Jun 2015 16:31:20 -0700
We've been growing this apple at the WSU Mount Vernon research
station for years. It is indeed a fine bittersharp and a fair cropper
as well. The tree has low vigor, but is robust. Ian Merwin from
Cornell was out for a visit last year and we discussed the missID. He
said that they have been calling it "Geneva Tremlett"s
and recognizes that it isn't the true English bittersweet.
Shaun Shephard , an apple identifier in Portland, OR has indicated that
is is most likely Skyrme's Kernel, a Herefordshire cider apple
described in Robert Hogg's "The Fruit Manual",
1884 and also in "The Herefordshire Pomona", 1884 which
has nice illustration of the apple. I tend to agree with Shaun; mystery
solved?
Drew Zimmerman=
------------------------------
Subject: Fighting the freeze monster
From: Alan Yelvington <alany@semparpac.org>
Date: Fri, 05 Jun 2015 19:31:28 -0400
I got hit with 24.4F/-4.2C between midnight
and sunrise on May 23, and sustained a 100%
bloom/bud kill along with injured trees.
http://happydogfarm.com/post/119788536645/over-2-hours-below-26f-the-other-night
-clear
I'm past the phase of deep depression and am
working to heal my remaining trees and come
up with a strategy to fight back next spring.
It's no use belaboring that my planting is on
low ground with cold air drainage
throughout. It's what we own and that's that.
I've read the following paper and am looking
into putting in portable ground
misters/sprinklers to use ground heat
harvested by the installed/underground
irrigation system to raise the air
temperature near the ground.
http://glexpo.com/summaries/2012summaries/weather_risk_management.pdf
(Go to page 8)
An increase of 4F might have left me with
some fruit, and mitigated the damage to the
other trees. The installed pump (20 gallons
/ 76 liters / minute) was sized for drip
irrigation. I'd gladly swap it out for a
higher capacity pump if necessary. There is
no risk of running this well dry.
I'd like to know if any growers have
experience with this tactic, and any tips.
For example: What temperature to start
pumping water? What volume of water per acre
for an effective temperature increase? Have
you combined the sprinklers with another heat
source? (I'm thinking making a T-cap for my
oil-fired side-arm heater and aiming misters
at it to create local steam.
Please share your experience. This season is
more than a loss to me and I have to do
something to fight back in the future.
Best regards,
Al Yelvington
Not-so-Happy Dog Farm
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Historical Query
From: Yann Fay <Yann.Fay@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, 6 Jun 2015 12:21:46 -0400
Curt,
A few years ago I did extensive research on additives and techniques used
throughout history. Sadly, much of the work was lost in a hard drive crash
but I did retain a partial master list of ingredients organized by why the
ingredients were included and what country. These sources were primarily
from the 19th century with some from the 18th and a few older sources
dating all the way to the 16th.
COLOR:
Cochineal (US UK FR)
PRESERVATIVES:
Mustard (US UK FR)
Brandy (US UK FR)
Sulfur (universal)
Leg of lamb (UK)
Jelly from boiled leg of lamb (UK)
Almonds (US UK)
Cloves (US UK)
Boiling (US UK)
Hops (US)
FLAVOR/SUGAR:
Brown sugar (US UK)
Molasses (US UK)
Cryo-concentrated juice (UK GR)
Sugar of lead (UK)
Sugar (universal)
Candi sugar (universal)
Caramel (US UK FR)
Pineapples (US)
Raisins (US UK)
Dried plums (UK)
Catechu (UK FR)
Beech shavings (UK FR- in in wines)
Heat concentration (UK)
Honey (UK)
FINING:
Blood (US UK FR)
Milk (US UK FR)
Isinglass (universal)
Alum (UK)
Bentonite (UK)
Eggs (US UK FR)
Gelatin (universal)
Cold-Crashing (US UK)
FILTERING:
Canvas (US UK)
DE (GR FR)
Asbestos (GR FR)
Cellulose (GR)
Flannel (US)
Hope this helps!
- -Yann Fay
------------------------------
Subject: RE: Historical query
From: Bill Lyon <xlyon@mac.com>
Date: Sat, 06 Jun 2015 11:32:54 -0600
Hi Curt,
I was surprised to find a poem from 1888 that mentioned adding hot
peppers to cider... You can see it here:
https://instagram.com/p/yaWsm1rzoI/?taken-by=cidersnob
Of course, there's no telling how much of that is historical fact and
how much is poetic license...
This and other interesting poems are in "Songs of the Apple Tree With
Kith and Kin" which you can find online or on Amazon, etc.
Bill
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End of Cider Digest #1969
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