Apfelwein Recipe using fruit, not store bought juice

[CortneyD]

Hi All!
I've been struggling to find an apfelwein recipe that doesn't use store bought apple juice/concentrate as the primary source of apple. I've got nothing against them, I just have 40+ lbs of frozen and cubed apples from this year's harvest that I really want to use (I have bittersharps and sweets). I have a small food mill so I plan to run at least a portion of the thawed fruit through it to pulp it up (I want to say I'll do all of the fruit this way, but I'm not the Rock and my biceps may not be able to handle all that!)
Does anyone have a fruit-based recipe and/or yeast recommendations? I appreciate the help!
-Cortney

 

[Rice_Guy]

Humm, you have bitter-sharps, I’ll drive over.

Frozen apple is easy to get the juice out of, it seems to just run out with light pressure. For the scale I was at last year I have been freezing for at least two days > thawing > pressing. Note it is possible to partly thaw and pull off a cider which is higher sugar.

Yes you could do a very fast blend/ mix on frozen apple. You will create a cider which takes more effort to clear. Up side with sharps is that tannin is typically in the skin so you can get better tannin levels (my guess from peeling apples to taste the skin is that a percentage also have fruity aromas in the skin/// not all) a typical apple grinder aims for about 1/4 inch particle size,, if you over do the blender you will blind the filter cloth and have a harder time pressing.

This year I have used three yeast. Some with 71B because it is rated at metabolizing 33% of the malic acid, one with SafCider Fermentis/ to try it out, and one with Fresco Renaisance/ to try out a reduced H2S yeast.

Recipe? I use the same recipe on all country wines
0 collect juice and sulphite
1 adjust the pH to 3.2 to 3.5,,, table apple usually is on the mark, sharps can be 2.8 so I blend sweets
2 adjust the sugar to target alcohol, ,,, table apples are typically 1.055 to 1.062 but as noted I can freeze then drain/press off the ice to get a juice that is higher (I like honey) Note that 1.055 makes a shelf stable cider
3 add Fermaid O followed by K per package directions
4 tannin, I am using some crabs (5%) on table apples and have some bitters with the test yeast. Crabs are dry so I soak with cider a week or so in the fridge to get flavor out.
5 today I am garage fermenting at 60 to 50F in plastic with

PM me if you would like to chat. Good to see more apple folks on here, there is a small section of apple folks in Wisconsin Vinters ,,,, I really love crab tannin and have been using it in rhubarb, Briana white grape, etc rather than grape tannin.

 

[Ty520]

the problem with apples, and most country wines in general, is that there isn't enough sugar content in the fruit by itself to get you to wine-level abvs, so you'll either have to resort to chaptalization, and add sugar, which mutes the flavors and aromas...

...or reduce your juice to a concentrate