4000 apples - Updated with pictures

I had some one come over to my work area and ask the production Manager.
"Hey I bet you know where we can get 4000s apples for Monday"
I'm the company buyer but the idiots didn't think to come ask me.
I left it be.

They then went to Marketing and asked them to get one of the girls go round all the supermarkets in this and the next town to go buy apple.

3 hours later and less than 300 apples later I got a call from ther finance director asking if I could help out the "*****bunch of time and money wasters and could I beat the projected £750 bill and save the £100 expense claim on mileage.

Any how one hour later I have aprox 6000 apples being delivered in the morning for £185.

So why am I telling you this!!!!!!!!!!

Come on.....6000 apples......who do you think will dispose of them for expenses?

Me....


CIDER here we come.

just a little bit.

"HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES?"

6,000 apples for like $370? Small apple weighs what, half a pound? You're buying apples at like $0.10 - $0.15 per pound? They charging you extra for the worms?

£3 a tray.

That's a 3rd retail. We don't live in apple country and it's out of season.
Believe me, that is cheap!

@ £0.10/Lb
~3 apples/Lb
6000/3 = 2000 lbs
2000x£0.10 =£200.

Retail = 15p-20p each (budget)
4000 x 15p = £600

When it comes to oranges I think we pay something like 10x what you can get them for.

But it's the Cider I'm chuffed at.

What are the apples for?

Joker said:

What are the apples for?

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We deal in RFID and have to test real life situations including RF absorbstion rate of crates filled with produce. It just so happens that it is apples this time.

But then they are for Cider!

orfy said:

But it's the Cider I'm chuffed at.

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Orfy, this sounds like a sweet deal for you, do they just trash the apples after testing?

BTW Ive never heard anyone say "chuffed" before, sounds awesome, can I get a English to English translation on that? :cross:

So when are they testing absorption rate through sacks of 2 row and MO.

mr_stimey said:

Orfy, this sounds like a sweet deal for you, do they just trash the apples after testing?

BTW Ive never heard anyone say "chuffed" before, sounds awesome, can I get a English to English translation on that? :cross:

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I'll have to pay to have them disposed of.
Or I'll take them away for expenses.

[FONT=VERDANA,ARIAL,HELVETICA]chuffed adj generally happy with life. You can also get away with saying you are "unchuffed" or "dischuffed" if something gets your back up. Make sure you only use this word in the correct tense and familiarise yourself with the meaning of the word "chuff" too.

[/FONT][FONT=VERDANA,ARIAL,HELVETICA]cider n alcoholic apple juice. To Brits all cider is alcoholic - there's no such thing as "hard cider" and any non-alcoholic apple juice is called simply "apple juice". The photograph below is from an American office kitchen, and would only be of amusement to Brits.[/FONT]

Absolutely brilliant

Hope you have a friend with a press that likes the hard stuff. Aren't we talking a ton or so?

~2 ton.

I have an extractor and will probably only do 20-30 gallon
The rest can go on the compost or in some pigs.

There are no commercial cider makers round here so I can't get it pressed.

orfy said:

The rest can go on the compost or in some pigs.

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Now that is what I am talkin' about...pigs stuff with apples!

They arrived today and in good condition.
I'll probably be using them next weekend for cider.

I'm not talking about stuffing a pig with them.
I'll feed the pigs then eat them aftrerwards. If I can find some pigs.

orfy said:

I'm not talking about stuffing a pig with them.
I'll feed the pigs then eat them aftrerwards. If I can find some pigs.

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Tastey either way.

I made a start today.
I have ~65 trays available

3 trays (approx 250 apples) makes 6 gallons of juice
I did my firsrt 6 gallons tonight.

So in theory I have enough for well over 100 gallons.

The question is how much cider does a man need.
How long does it last?

orfy said:

I made a start today.
I have ~65 trays available

3 trays (approx 250 apples) makes 6 gallons of juice
I did my firsrt 6 gallons tonight.

So in theory I have enough for well over 100 gallons.

The question is how much cider does a man need.
How long does it last?

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So I take it you have enough carboys to handle all of it?

We going to see pictures when it is done?

thanks for the update sounds like you've got a small river of cider.

Without any purchases I can probably store around 50 gallons but that will leave me nothing spare for beer.

I think I may settle for 20 to 30 gallons.
It took me an hour to extract enough for the 6 gallons.

Quick question. How many campden tablets should I add to 6 gallons to kill the nasties? How long can I leave before pitching. (max and min)
I've used 5.

I need to read a little on cider making but I pooped at present.

Hey Orf, I didn't know you were in purchasing, that's my line of work as well. Cheers on the apples.

The general rule is 1 tablet per gallon. With a good yeast pitch, one tablet short shouldn't matter. I wait at least a day before pitching yeast. I've never waited more than five days, I really don't know if there is an accepted maximum amount of time from campden to pitching.

I've had cider last two years. It hadn't gone bad, I just ran out.

With that amount of cider, there is a lot of crazy things you can do; cysers, chopped raisens in the secondary, fruit additions, etc. However, I have always been a fan of a straight dry cider.

Will it ferment out at <1000?
Will that be okay to prime and carbonate?

I guess now I'm making it I should move this to the cider forum.

I have to ask. Why did your company need 4000 apples for Monday?


Edit: oops, never mind.

Maybe you could try a batch or two using spontaneous fermentation?

I usually use wine yeast and it dries out to about 0.996 with a beginning gravity (depending on the apples) of 1.040 -1.045. Some people will carbonate it, but I rarely do.

Some Piccies.

I'm getting 1045 -1050 on the apples.


This is 1/5thh of my inventory, 1/25th of the avalable stock.

I'm getting 1 pint per 10 apples.
Approx 5 boxes per 5 gallon.

Using this.


Into these.

That is one box.

One of these per fermenter esspecially if it is Sunday morning.

Plenty of this for the compost.
One bucket per box.


After leaving in the fermenter for 1 day with camden tablets it settles to a slurry at the bottom and a crust at the top.



I rack to another container so it is just the clear juice.


I'm around half way there. It takes a couple of hours per 6 gallon.

I'm using every container I can find.
I don't want to use my beer stuff.

orfy said:

I'm using every container I can find.
I don't want to use my beer stuff.

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I've been thinking you need one of these!



I don't know what size stopper you'd need for an airlock though

Wow that's a whole lot of cider. I agree with the earlier recommendation, if you love cider and you're doing 25 gallons, than what about doing 15 gallons of straight cider and 10 of some other variations?

Oh and good plan on the juice, campden, rack for juice, than pitch. Looks like a great assembly line you got going.

Hehe. I dunno how I missed this . Yeah 25 to 30 gallons of cider is a lot imho. Don't get me wrong I like cider, but I have over 4 cases now and 2 more in the secondary and maybe 2 more (I gotta check lol, it's just been sitting in my fridge the one 5 gallon container since October so I am not sure what it's doing!).

So what's the update. JackLalane getting painful?

Yeah 1.047 is what I have hit 2 years in a row now.

Jack LaLane!!!!! hahahahahahaha

I'm done. About 4 hours juicing in total and Jack is fine.

I'm at around 25 gallon.

I'm a little worried with one batch. I used Camden tablets and it still started fermenting in it's own without additional yeast!

I sent the rest of the apples to an animal sanctuary. They wasn't happy when I asked if I could take one of the pigs off their hands. I think they knew what I wanted it for!

orfy said:

I'm done. About 4 hours juicing in total and Jack is fine.

I'm at around 25 gallon.

I'm a little worried with one batch. I used Camden tablets and it still started fermenting in it's own without additional yeast!

I sent the rest of the apples to an animal sanctuary. They wasn't happy when I asked if I could take one of the pigs off their hands. I think they knew what I wanted it for!

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LOL. "suuueeee! Here pig pig pig"

Orf, I fermented a natural batch this year. It is clearing now, takes a long time! But so far....(thankfully!)....it hasn't turned...

Well 3 of them have stopped producing CO2 a I've measured the gravity at ~1000

The 4th hasn't started yet. I'll give it a shake later.

orfy said:

Well 3 of them have stopped producing CO2 a I've measured the gravity at ~1000

The 4th hasn't started yet. I'll give it a shake later.

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I saved the yeast from the natural ferment I did...food for thought.