#7 - Fresh Juice - And still learning

Recently I had a cider making friend share a post on Facebook that the new cidery at Lake Anna, Coyote Hole, was selling fresh pressed unpasteurized apple cider. (Keep in mind that fresh cider is juiced pressed from apples and hard cider is the juice post fermentation.) I was so pumped and that weekend my wife and I drove the hour drive to have lunch on the water and to purchase 2 gallons of fresh juice. Why is this such a big deal you may ask? Why can't you just go purchase juice from the store? Store bought pasteurized juice has either been stripped of certain elements to produce other products and/or the pasteurization strips flavors and aromas. This in turns does not ferment as well as unpasteurized fresh juice straight from the press. Store bought juice after fermentation will lack tastes and tends to be watery tasting.

A couple days later, I made a stop at our local home brew store and picked up 4 packs of yeast and campden tablets. My goal was to split the 2 gallons into 4 half gallon experiments, each with a different type of yeast. I've heard a lot good things from cider makers who have worked with champagne and white wine yeast. I also heard ale yeast can add a certain level of spice to your end product. I picked up one of each and rounded out my selection with the cider yeast that I have been utilizing in my first several batches.

I got home and in my excited I started cleaning and sterilizing all my fermenters, bungs, and airlocks immediately. I popped open the ale yeast and hydrated it in a little water and poured it into one of the fermenters with the juice. The moment I finished pouring the yeast, it hit me, this juice is unpasteurized and unpasteurized juice may contain wild yeast and bacteria from the apples and this could destroy my cider during fermentation. When dealing with unpasteurized juice, you have to crush and drop a campden tablet into the juice to kill all the wild yeast and most of the bacteria. Campden tablets take about 24 hours to work and then the cider maker can pitch the strain of yeast they desire. I had to take a step back and take care of that. I went ahead and pour the juice into their fermenters and crushed campden tablets and dropped the dust into each jug. I sealed each fermenter up and allowed them to sit for 24 hours. The next day, I picked up where I had left off and pitched the yeast.

The next issue I ran into was sealing the fermenters with the bungs and airlocks. The bungs kept sliding up the opening and wouldn't stay sealed. I tried taking a clean paper towel and wiped the bung and the inside of fermenter. Replacing the airlock, it seamed to seal, but when I checked it a few hours later, it had slid up again. I tried to get smart. I separated the bung and airlock and tried pressing the bung into the fermenter first. My hope was that in adding the airlock second, the airlock would push the bung outward press against the inside of the fermenter to seal. As soon as I applied any force the thin plastic airlock broke. A quick snap! And it left a small hole in the bottom of the airlock. It was late at night and I didn't have an extra airlock. The only thing I could think of was wrapping and trying to seal the hole with plastic wrap until I could purchase a new airlock.

The first thing I did the next morning was head back to my local brew store to purchase a replacement airlock. I told the owner what had happened. He just chuckled and shook his head at me. He then mentioned that some wine makers will plug their fermenter with a clean paper towel when they are in a pinch. He didn't recommend doing it, but it was just something he had heard when people are in a similiar situation.

It's been two days since I pitched the yeast now. Two of the four have started bubbling. The other two have been a struggle to keep sealed, but after wiping them down with a dry wash cloth, I finally got them to stick! I am hoping to see their airlocks bubble soon. I plan is to allow these ciders to sit in primary and secondary for longer amount of time than when I ferment the store bought juice. I am so excited for the finished product!