Can I juice my apples?

[Jennifer Patterson]

Hi there, another newbie here. My freezer is filling up fast, and my apples are just starting to ripen. I have multiple varieties of cold climate apples. The Honeycrisp and Dolgo are ripening now, the Chestnut crab will be starting in a week or so, then there are the Sweet Sixteen, Haralson, and Hazen, plus the old tree that was here when we moved in which is best after it a light frost in late September.

Here is my dilemma, these all ripen at separate times, and right in the middle of my busy season at work. I don't have an apple press. Well, I do, but it's huge and with everything ripe, at different times it doesn't work so well. Wish it was smaller for small batches. I am wondering if I used my juicer and then froze the juice if it would work to make wine with later this winter? I know with grapes and other fruit it's better to use them with the skins on for extra flavor, does that hold true for apples? OR should I see if I can find space for a second freezer and freeze the apples whole?

Thank you
JennyP

 

[crooked cork]

Welcome to the site Jenny.
i would juice label and freeze for later.
i have made apple wine several times with juice only no skins and it worked just fine.

 

[Jennifer Patterson]

Welcome to the site Jenny.
i would juice label and freeze for later.
i have made apple wine several times with juice only no skins and it worked just fine.

Thank you

 

[Johny99]

Welcome to the site Jenny.
i would juice label and freeze for later.
i have made apple wine several times with juice only no skins and it worked just fine.

Ditto, it works fine and lowers the stress in the fall. I tried freezing whole apples once. What a mess as they thaw!

Does sound like you have a nice cider or wine blend available.

 

[Scooter68]

Yup Agree, in fact that's why I bought an Omega Juicer. Only had enough apples for a one gallon batch because I use the rest of the OUTSTANDING juice for Hard Cider and Fresh Apple juice.

So, Absolutely that's what I'd do. And mixing both tart and sweet apples is the recommended route with more tart than sweet in the mix.

Unfortunately for us this year no apples at all. While we were gone for 3 weeks something raided our apple trees, (3 of them) I found one (1) apple. Sigh.

 

[Jennifer Patterson]

Ditto, it works fine and lowers the stress in the fall. I tried freezing whole apples once. What a mess as they thaw!

Does sound like you have a nice cider or wine blend available.

That's good to hear, then there is the question How much juice to make a gallon of wine? How much to make a gallon of hard cider? I guess I need to start researching recipes!
To date, I have made 3 batches of wine, all within the last 3 weeks. 1 gallon of gooseberry, 2 gallons of Dragon's Blood, and 4 gallons of chokecherry. All my equipment is in use! Until I can afford to buy more that is!

 

[Scooter68]

All Juice, NO Water. So One gallon of juice for one gallon on wine PLUS about 1/4 to 1/3 gallon additional juice to allow for volume lost to lees.

For hard cider normally No sugar added. For wine you need to bring the SG up to achieve at least 10% ABV where a cider is going to be between 6%-9%

 

[Jennifer Patterson]

Yup Agree, in fact that's why I bought an Omega Juicer. Only had enough apples for a one gallon batch because I use the rest of the OUTSTANDING juice for Hard Cider and Fresh Apple juice.

So, Absolutely that's what I'd do. And mixing both tart and sweet apples is the recommended route with more tart than sweet in the mix.

I have a 20-year-old champion juicer that is a workhorse! I don't use it much anymore, but I do make fresh juice with the apples every year, I have sometimes processed it for later too, but it's never as good after processing.

My hubby wants to try hard cider, and because HE wants it, I might be able to talk him into helping me with the big press. It's been buried in the barn for about 10 years, ever since the last kid (helper) moved away from home. We used to press fresh cider every year, OH that reminds me, it's always wasp season too!

 

[Johny99]

All my equipment is in use! Until I can afford to buy more that is!

Oh, you do have the bug! Welcome.

 

[Jennifer Patterson]

Oh, you do have the bug! Welcome.

Yeah well for years I processed my fruits into jams, jellies, syrup, apples for pies, dehydrated them and a multitude of other things. But now that it's only the DH and me all that work goes to waste! I end up tossing it after 3 or so years because we can't eat it all. I do give some to the kids, but I still have more than we can eat. SO I decided instead of not making anything with the fruit, and watching it rot on the ground (which I did last year......the deer loved it!) I would try my hand at winemaking.........I KNOW that will get consumed!

 

[Scooter68]

Wine to the deer? Do you know how ugly a drunk deer can be? Just kldding.

 

[drainsurgeon]

LOL, have you seen the video of drunk elephants after eating fermented apples. It's hilarious! Anyway, I made apple wine 2 falls ago. I quartered and froze 110# of apples. Freezing the apples make it a little easier to press and extract the juice. I ended up with 7 1/2 gallons of apple juice and after several rackings, ended up with 6 1/2 gallons to bottle. Use plenty of pectic enzyme and be patient, it will clear eventually. Try some cinnamon sticks or cloves while bulk aging. It ages well and is delicious. Good luck!

 

[winemaker81]

It's probably too late now, but you can do a second run off the apple pulp. I juiced a case of apples a while back, making wine from the juice. After juicing I had a huge amount of apple pulp that seemed quite moist, and it seemed criminal to throw it out. So I tried making a second from it.

With grapes, the pressed pulp following fermentation can be used to create a second batch, lighter in color and flavor, and aging much quicker as well. It's something to drink while the main batch is aging.

For each gallon of free run juice, add 1/2 gallon water to the pulp. For each gallon of added water, add: 2.5 lbs sugar, 1/2 tsp yeast nutrient, 1/2 tsp yeast energizer, 1/4 tsp grape tannin, and 1/2 tsp acid blend. Use whatever yeast is desired. You get about half as much from the second run as the first.

I made mine from red delicious and the second run pickedup a light pink color from the skins, which the main batch did not have.

Warning: This foamed up a lot and a 3 gallon batch overflowed a 8 gallon primary. I'm going to do it again this fall and use a 16 gallon primary

 

[Venatorscribe]

Hi there, another newbie here. My freezer is filling up fast, and my apples are just starting to ripen. I have multiple varieties of cold climate apples. The Honeycrisp and Dolgo are ripening now, the Chestnut crab will be starting in a week or so, then there are the Sweet Sixteen, Haralson, and Hazen, plus the old tree that was here when we moved in which is best after it a light frost in late September.

Here is my dilemma, these all ripen at separate times, and right in the middle of my busy season at work. I don't have an apple press. Well, I do, but it's huge and with everything ripe, at different times it doesn't work so well. Wish it was smaller for small batches. I am wondering if I used my juicer and then froze the juice if it would work to make wine with later this winter? I know with grapes and other fruit it's better to use them with the skins on for extra flavor, does that hold true for apples? OR should I see if I can find space for a second freezer and freeze the apples whole?

Thank you
JennyP

That should be no problem at all.

 

[RRRwine]

I processed apples several years in a row, both hand smashing them and then using a fruit press. The last 2 years of pressing them for wine we quartered and cored them before freezing. An odd experiment I did early on was to back sweeten the wine slightly before bottling. But that year we added a twist and back sweetened the wine with fresh honey from a local supplier. The great thing about that batch of wine was after bottling, the wine aged in such a way that each time we opened a bottle the flavor had changed slightly, taking on slight aromas of the wild flowers from the honey.

Has anyone experimented with doing a cold stabilization on the juice prior to primary fermentation?