Sour/Granny Smith Cider - Ideas?

I would love to make some Granny Smith cider. I love the sour. Where can I find some good GS juice commercially?

Also would love to make some Pear cider. Same question.

Thanks!

Cb

Seneca used to make a concentrate. I am not sure if they still do. You may have to wait until the fall and then call your local orchards and ask them. If they do not have granny smith, they may have another tart apple.

Whole Foods or Trader Joe's might be a good source for "single varietal" juices sold by the gallon . . . if you have either of those stores near you. They may have pear juice too.

Channeling Mr. Claven for a moment, you may be interested to know that pear cider is also called perry. Kind of a cool word, I think.

I was wondering this very same thing myself. Guess I'll have to keep my eyes open for the concentrate.

Pear cider and perry are not really the same thing. Pear cider is a mix of apple and pear juice while perry is made from perry pears which are higher in tannin and acidity.Juice from dessert pears does not make a very flavourful drink on its own but is quite good mixed with apple juice.

Mr. Clavin, what's mobby?

Oh, and I loved your work in "Cars"

Granny Smith is a late season apple. Depending on where you live, you may be able find an orchard that will press you a batch, but not until the weather gets cold – unless they have them in cold storage. There are earlier ripening tart apples that are not as well known (Lodi, Gravenstein, Jonathan, Suncrisp). If you tell the person at the press that you are looking for tart apples, they can probably recommend something
All About Apples | Apple Orchard and Farm listings
Keep in mind that even sweet apples will ferment out with some sourness. Granny Smiths are really, really sour when they ferment out, and they don’t have a lot of flavor in the front of the palate – its all in the aftertaste. A few years ago I got a batch of juice that was half Granny Smith and half Yorks (another tart apple). It was very tart to start, and by the time it had dropped to 1.020 (which is usually still very sweet), it was too sour to drink. I cut it with some Stayman juice which came out great. When I can get them, I usually ask for no more than 25 percent GS in the mix. I have heard of people fermenting out all GS juice though, so if you want to check it out, go for it. I suspect it would need to age a long time for the tartness to mellow out.

CvilleKevin said:

Granny Smith is a late season apple. Depending on where you live, you may be able find an orchard that will press you a batch, but not until the weather gets cold – unless they have them in cold storage. There are earlier ripening tart apples that are not as well known (Lodi, Gravenstein, Jonathan, Suncrisp). If you tell the person at the press that you are looking for tart apples, they can probably recommend something
All About Apples | Apple Orchard and Farm listings
Keep in mind that even sweet apples will ferment out with some sourness. Granny Smiths are really, really sour when they ferment out, and they don’t have a lot of flavor in the front of the palate – its all in the aftertaste. A few years ago I got a batch of juice that was half Granny Smith and half Yorks (another tart apple). It was very tart to start, and by the time it had dropped to 1.020 (which is usually still very sweet), it was too sour to drink. I cut it with some Stayman juice which came out great. When I can get them, I usually ask for no more than 25 percent GS in the mix. I have heard of people fermenting out all GS juice though, so if you want to check it out, go for it. I suspect it would need to age a long time for the tartness to mellow out.

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Good info. Maybe the Tree Top GS/Red Delicious/Golden Delicious would be the way to go then.

The GS-RD-YD mix will probably give you a good sour note at the finish, but not a lot of midrange flavor when its in your mouth. If you go with this juice, I would recommend not fermenting it all the way out – it should still be plenty sour by the time it hits 1.010. Red and Golden Delicious do not have a lot of flavor once the sugar is gone. If you have any way to get ahold of some stayman or winesap juice that you could add, that would give you the midrange taste, so that the final brew has some body and complexity. If you don’t have access to fresh juice, adding a bit of tannin or using DME might also help. Adding other processed fruit juices like pear might help as well. Or not. Only one way to find out is to start mixing and see if you can get something you like.

When you are evaluating a juice mix for fermenting, you want to pay attention to at least four dimensions. First the smell – if it doesn’t smell good before the ferment, its not likely to get better. Then the first hit of the taste, which should be appley and sweet. The initial sugar taste should fade out fairly quickly and not be syrupy. The midrange is harder to describe, but want a nice flavor when its sitting in your mouth – preferably multiple flavors.- something that remind you of biting into an apple in an orchard (as opposed to drinking a juice box when you were a kid). Then you have the finish, where a tart note works as long as not too tart.

Within these four dimensions of juice are many sub dimensions. Some folks will argue there are at least 6 or 8 main dimensions of juice. But whatever – with a store bought juice you will be really lucky to get 2 or 3 of the 4 basic dimensions. If you cant go to the source for juice, then you will have to fill in the missing dimensions with something else – maybe by mixing different store juices. But make sure you have at least all four dimensions present in some degree before you pitch the yeast or you are unlikely to get good results once the sugar is fermented off.

take this with a grain of salt.

SWMBO and I had some of Woodchucks Granny Smith cider a couple of months ago.

Her and I looked at each other and said "It tastes like the first white wine you tried to make."

"It sure does"

I don't have any records from back then but it was frozen concentrate Welche's white grape juice and some sugar. Pretty sure it was champagne yeast. Only in the carboy probably 2 months. Made 5 gallons of it and instead of a kegger we had a carboy party. Good ole times. Didn't degass so it was still fizzy. The things you learn after the first dozen ferments.

FYI - the FG of a Woodchuck Granny Smith is 1.014. WGS is one of the dryest of the widely available commercial ciders. Many have FGs that are close to 1.030. What tastes like sour is actually a little bit sweet and mostly sour.

My guess is that if you used US04 and cold crashed the GS-RD-YD mix somewhere between 1.010 and 1.015, you could get something acceptably close to WGS. You might want to try a little tannin or other juice for taste and DME for body. If you are inclined towards experimentation, you can figure out what size stopper goes in a tree top jug and just ferment in the half gallon jugs that it comes in until you find a mix that is worth scaling up to carboys.