Originally Posted by truckjohn

One suggestion... and it sounds dumb.... Make sure your cider apple choices come due around the time you want to be making cider, and mostly at the same time as eachother.... or you will be freezing a whole lot of apples.... or making single-variety ciders and blending them later on.... It also makes pollination go better when they are flowering at the same time...

Some of the early season apples come off in August and September - but there is such a huge flurry of activity around that time with the end of the gardening season and picking everything else that needs picking.... putting the yard to bed for the winter, etc.... There are a bunch of crabs that come due in Early September... Not exactly prime cider making season for me....

Personally, I like the apples that you can either leave on the tree or pick and store in the cellar until you are ready to press them.... rather than the ones that have to be picked and then milled within a few days... January is a great cider making time of year... and the apples that still hang on the tree are usually sugared up pretty nicely by now...

Thanks

John