What is Cider, as opposed to Wine?/Quince Cider critique - Page 2

Ayianna · 08-27-2011, 03:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JulianB

Petes mentions freezing the fruit. Is that normal practice? For (apple) cider, I take the apples straight from the ground or tree, wash, chop, and press.

I think that due to the severe decline in use and knowledge of quince fruit in the general US population, there isn't much 'normal practice' to be had. Thus said, quince is a hard fruit and I can imagine it would be fairly difficult to press in it's raw state.

Freezing causes the water to crystalize, expanding to break the cell walls of the fruit. When thawed, the fruits would be significantly softer, and thus easier to press all of the liquid out of. You may even try this with apples and see what difference it makes.

Whether freezing is completely necessary for quince fruit is a reasonable question to ask, but one I'm afraid I can't help with. I haven't got a quince tree (yet).

**Ravenshead** · 08-27-2011, 04:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ayianna

While Prohibition is now only a part of American history, there are still signs and traces of the period in our culture today. For example, you cannot buy hard liquor before noon on Sunday. How silly, when you can buy it at 8 am on Monday and Saturday!

During Prohibition, people did what they could to substitute alcoholic drinks for legal, non-alcoholic ones. The main difference for ciders is that they simply were not subjected to fermentation. Cider came to refer to unclarified pressed juice. Because the Prohibition was limited to the US, the term cider everywhere else continued to refer to a lightly fermented juice (lightly as compared to wine or liquor). Thus, Americans coin the term 'hard cider', which really just means, well ... cider!

Slight correction:
The no-liquor-before-noon-on Sunday thing is a Texas law not a federal one. Other states don't have that restriction. It traces more to the "blue-laws" of the various bible belt states. It used to be that you couldn't buy much of anything on Sundays other than groceries.

Also, you can't buy any liquor on Sundays except in a bar. It's beer and wine sales that restricted before noon.

Ayianna · 08-29-2011, 06:28 PM

Oh, my mistake. Thank you for the correction there!

**Ravenshead** · 08-29-2011, 10:50 PM

Sorry about being a stickeler on that but federal vs. state law is kind of important for non-brewing reasons. That and it's a pet peeve of mine.

JulianB · 08-31-2011, 09:17 AM

I see this thread's had a new lease of life, so I thought I'd report back on my quince cider experience. I made one gallon with three parts quince juice to one of apple juice (as well as several gallons of straight apple). It has a pleasant and aromatic flavour, but too astringent an aftertaste, making it quite hard to get through a pint. For this year, I'll try a batch at 50:50 and see if I can still get the flavour without the shrivelled mouth effect.
This could be a long-term project, with only one harvest per year, as I slowly zoom in on the perfect ratio!

I've also planted a Black Dabinett cider apple tree this year, which should fruit next year and improve the apple cider. Up until now, I've used a random assortment of cookers and eaters, and I don't even know the varieties of some of the more heavily cropping trees.

**janivar123** · 08-31-2011, 02:01 PM

I kinda group it diffrently
Main fermentable is sugar and its wine main fermentable is fruit makes cider
Eksept grapes that only makes wine
Mead maplewine and birchwine is another category by itself(its not fruit so its not wine)
But im not sure what exactly that is

dayflyer55 · 08-31-2011, 06:17 PM

After doing some research, I found one interesting observation. All fruits are called fruit wine except for one category: the pome fruit. This includes apples, pears, quince, ect. These all have their own specific names. I don't know if this has to do with region of origin or their unique qualities that are not in other fruits (surely their texture is different than any other type). Also, I agree that a functional definition primarily has to do with alc content.