How'd ya like THEM apples?

[willk]

Sorry hank - I was boating! Sounds good in Canada

Our summer didn't materialise after the initially promising spring. My crop consists of a lot of small apples - but better than last year (I think I'll be pressing this time). The Jays attacked my dessert apples and I netted the trees today, but the cider fruit remains unmolested. I need an Indian Summer now to make it work - fingers crossed. I'm on the last 30 bottles of the 2014 vintage, so I'm really focused...

[A1an]

Any of you apple lads want to knock me up some apple sauce to go with this bad boy....

[Poly]

I think you will get a bit boar-ed waiting!

[A1an]

I'd take some cider while I wait.

[willk]

mmmmmmmm - cracklin'!

First picking of apples tomorrow AM. Not a great show, but there WILL be cider this year

I have fond memories of dining on Alan's game terrine and a bottle of wine whilst marooned by weather on a Scottish island.

[A1an]

Funny you should mention that, was planning a Wild Boar and Apricot terrine with this lot.

[jambo]

Originally Posted by A1an

Funny you should mention that, was planning a Wild Boar and Apricot terrine with this lot.

Sounds good Alan 👍🍴


Sent from my iPhone using RIB Net

[mick]

Best start forming an orderly Queue then lads 🤗

[Pikey Dave]

We're still eating the venison, best wild venison I've ever had, soooo tender😋


Lions led by donkeys

[willk]

Autumn has overrun me. The first pick of dessert fruit was miserable (because of my negligence) but the late cider crop looks OKish. The pears look good - smaller numbers but bigger fruit. I expect it to be a very average year overall. I spotted some unusual fungi in my "lawn" recently - at first glance I would have said "Chantrelles/Girolles" but they were nasty trash mushrooms.

Beware!

[mick]

Originally Posted by willk

Autumn has overrun me. The first pick of dessert fruit was miserable (because of my negligence) but the late cider crop looks OKish. The pears look good - smaller numbers but bigger fruit. I expect it to be a very average year overall. I spotted some unusual fungi in my "lawn" recently - at first glance I would have said "Chantrelles/Girolles" but they were nasty trash mushrooms.



Beware!

Tha needs to sort those Quicks before winter sets in

[Pikey Dave]

Toasting home grown chillies on the log burner, they grind down to a ferocious chilli powder with a sweet smoky undertone


Lions led by donkeys

[hank]

We have shut down the cider pressing operation for the year and did a little over 600 gallons.

We ran out of our 5 gallon buckets with lids on what was to be our last pressing, so we left 2 pressings worth of apples on the wash table. That night a big black bear climbed up on the table and had a feast and left two nasty offerings.
Off to pick Pine mushrooms and gather Rose Hips.
Cheers from the frozen north
Hank

[willk]

Nice one Hank - I really like the colours in Canadian apples, mine are much more mundane. I recall as a child in the 1970s, a Canadian aunt arrived home with a full crate of those deep red apples - they were a local one week wonder! Simple pleasures - I think we often overlook them nowadays.

I was cleaning up today after my first pressing of dessert fruit - the proper cider apples need another few weeks on the trees. We've had an Indian Summer at last and with the RIB on the hard I've been knuckling down to gardening work. With the slow Fall, we're seeing a nice range of leaf colour, a thing we often don't get. Every now and then I would just stop, look and sniff the autumn smells - magic. Sitting tonight with a glass of the remaining 2014 vintage, looking at 100L of 2016 beginning to bubble in the fermenters. No bears yet....

[hank]

I got a call today asking if we wanted some hard winter apples to press- I thought I had found all the "spare" apples and put our cider pressing gear away
Looks like I'll pull it back out and put it back in service again
cheers
hank

[hank]

We picked somewhere around 600 lbs. of bright red Spartan apples and made another 70 gallons of juice.
the juice was very sweet and very pink.
Now we can put the machine away
cheers
hank

[willk]

The crop is in! 850lbs of "vintage" variety cider apples. The early dessert/cooker crop is fermenting happily - to be joined by this lot in a week or so after those naughty starches have converted into more yummy (fermentable) sugar! They're poor enough specimens TBH, but we have to work with what we've got. No bears yet but I did spot a happy badger snaffling a few windfalls.

[willk]

And I'm finally done - 270 litres of juice that will hopefully translate into 350x75cl bottles of Irish Craft Cider. Fingers crossed...

[hank]

Nice work Willk
Our local blueberry farm has just bought a pressing gadget to make blueberry juice using water pressure. Then they use the pulp to make fruit leather.
The juice mixes well with cider.
cheers
hank

[Bigtalljv]

And here I was excited at my first try! Another week or so and it should be ready to drink, waiting for the carbonation.