Yeah, one time I helped a friend pick apples in his heritage orchard and he gave me 50 gallons of fresh pressed apple juice to take home. I made (alcoholic) cider from one barrel - the other one, I decanted into plastic bottles and froze, plus I boiled some down to syrup - it took quite a long time, but the result was the consistency of maple syrup - quite sharp and acidic still, but great on ice cream and pancakes.
When i buy “natural” cider, the stuff that still has some apple debris in it, it routinely ferments in the fridge if i keep it too long. And it always tastes good. Less sweet than fresh cider, fizzy, appley, and a little bit like alcohol.
I’ve never had it taste unpleasant, unless you find “less sweet, and a bit like alcohol” to be unpleasant.
I usually go by flavor. That and the fizz let me know it’s fermented.
If I buy fresh cider from the apple farm up the road, if not drunk immediately that stuff will start to ferment within a couple days, even sitting in the fridge.
Its good either way.
Yeah, whenever I’ve pressed apples, the juice just gets started fermenting straight away; there is usually quite a significant dose of wild yeasts on the apple skins and this is well represented in the pressed juice - indeed milling the apples before pressing gives the yeasts a chance to get started populating the juice even before pressing - it’s almost impossible to have apple juice that isn’t at least a little bit fermented and alcoholic, even if you try really hard.
Yeasts aren’t the only things on the apples though - and especially in the case of apples collected from the ground, there can be a lot of bacteria too - some of these are relatively harmless or may even be beneficial - lactobacilli, for example - some are non-harmful but aesthetically undesirable - one of the key issues with rough cider is bacterial activity that turns it ‘ropey’ - the texture is changed into a slimy, stringy goo, even though this might not make it toxic, it does make it undrinkable - and there will probably also be some bacteria that are pathogenic to humans (although the acidity of the juice does control those a bit).
Ropey?
Yeah, no
I pass
We have a small orchard in our yard - 25 trees, 10 of them apple. In a good year we get 30 gallons of apple juice. We throw the apples in a garbage disposal, core, skin, seeds, worms, and all. When we press it we “add” wasps. We pasteurize it and can it and it lasts about 18 months with very little fermentation. Nothing tastes as good as straight out of the press, but for about 17 months it tastes as good as when first bottled.
Cider is an abomination that i try to comprehend and perhaps one day understand.
Insects of the genus Vespula? In apple juice? Localized entirely within your kitchen?
I have visions of yellow jackets swarming around the press, landing on the apple mash, and some of them getting into the press.
That’s probably exactly what happens. The few cider presses I’ve been around were positively rife with wasps.
If you bottle apple juice without pasteurising it, there is a high risk that the bottle will explode. Fermentation in a sealed vessel will build up pressures in excess of 100 psi.
Careless of me - probably Common or Western Yellowjackets. Sometimes the local Bald Faced hornets join the party. We press and can outside and they find their own way in to the mash or juice. Probably 50 - 100 get in on an average day of pressing - 15 gallons or so - and we get most of them out before they drown. Generally they are apathetic about our activities as long as we are careful and respectful.
We mostly use half gallon canning jars.