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I have been gifted/given an extended loan of an EJWOX 1.6 gallon fruit press. This thing: https://ejwox.com/collections/frontpage/products/1-6-gallon-classic-wooden-wine-cider-fruit-press Unfortunately they do not have instructions on their website for it. I am going to assemble it with a...

After two days of squeezing apples and a trip to Whole Foods for juice I just put together three 1 gallon batches. Just hit them with a campden tablet. Tomorrow afternoon they will get pectic enzyme and about twelve hours later they will get yeast. The first two batches are a mix of Newtown...

I just chopped up the last few quince (less than a pound overall) and put them in the freezer. They will get thawed out tomorrow and pureed and juiced. I may just dump the puree itself into the carboy since I won't be using a lot. So far I got about two quarts out of the Newtown Pippins. I...

I tried that with other apples and I didn't get any more juice out of them than I did when I juiced them fresh. But it was certainly easier on the food processor. My extremely limited experience so far indicates that softer fleshed apples don't yield up their juice as easily as harder, crisper...

You appear to be prescient because I checked out Everyday Deals today and they had some McIntosh apples. I snapped up as many good ones as I could find and will juice them. Judging from the texture I don't think I'm going to get a very efficient juice yield. But they are the only of their...

I suspect the stores either go by appearance or have a pull by date. Produce that they consider over the hill is either dumped, donated to food banks, or sold/given to the liquidation places. Apples tend to have a long shelf life though, which is to our benefit. I never asked the Everyday...

I've been going to this grocery liquidation store near me called Everyday Deals. Most of the time their produce is over the hill. But they've had Newtown Pippin, Red Delicious, Granny Smith, and Sonata apples. All in fine shape. I have been grabbing them and juicing them. I would guess that...

I actually have a crab apple tree but it flowered early in the season. My parents cut it back viciously a couple of years ago and I think it's still recovering. Hopefully I can get some off of it next year. They were going to kill it entirely except it is probably a pollinizer for the sweet...

Do the malolactic bacteria consume sugar at all? I ask because I am attempting to test and propagate White Labs malolactic culture. I read the directions which said to boil the juice, add some yeast energizer, some fructose, and then toss in the bacteria (obviously I let it reach room...

That's what I'm afraid will happen. It's an unfortunate side effect of only being able to get dessert apples. While I, myself, like tart flavors, not everyone does. I can back sweeten with concentrate or plain sugar. But I book on cider I read suggested I learn to like my cider dry and...

That would be preferable but I don't have the proper cider apples or crab apples for a blend. I know that's what you are supposed to use but I just cannot get them now. So I'm stuck with what i can get. What I am mostly seeing now is honeycrisp, gala, fuji, opal, red delicious, granny smith...

North Coast has quarts of Gravenstein juice. But at about 5 bucks a quart it's not something I will get a gallon of anytime soon. I think Whole Foods might have it for slightly less. I was able to squeeze some Newtown Pippin apples. I got about two gallons and put it in the freezer. I will...

That's my question as well. I suspect Honeycrisp is not. But I have strange opinions about Honeycrisp. Pink Lady might work. It's got some tartness to it. It drew my attention because I rarely see single varietal juice for sale and I figured I should snag some while I can and others might...

Public service announcement: I went to my local Trader Joe's today and saw that they now have Pink Lady apple juice/cider as well as the Honeycrisp. It wasn't there a week or so ago. It's in 64 ounce (half gallon) bottles. Just like the Honeycrisp it is not from concentrate and unfiltered...

Yep, I think the more expensive metal gun is the one that was referred to as a gem. I got one of their 40 tooth circular saw blades. Nitride coated, like drill bits. Worked fairly decently in a miter saw. Though for a 110v saw you may be better off with a thin kerf blade. The Diablo blades...

Another (quick) update: Yeast was pitched for the salal wine. I used EC-1118 because it has a high alcohol tolerance and, according to what I've read, can handle tricky fermentations. Just leaving a towel over it for now. Once I yeast activity I will airlock it. I pitched both dry yeast and...

Update: I pulled out the salal and stuck it in a paint strainer. I stuck it in a two gallon fermenter and added enough water and sugar to bring it to about 15% potential alcohol. About one gallon of water. I put in two crushed campden tablets and have been letting it sit. Just threw in...

Splendid! What kind of juice yield did you get? While the frozen and thawed quince were softer and therefore easier on the equipment I didn't get a larger quantity of juice out of them. I froze a couple of bags of quince chunks. I'm thinking of taking out one or two, finely chopping them or...

My parents and I have one apple tree and two pear trees. One pear is bartlett, the other is bosc. We had an asian pear but it got hit with a disease (fireblight, I think) and died. The apple tree has been here since before we moved in twenty or so years ago. It produces medium size fruit...

What about oak chips? Do you boil those first or just toss them in? I don't know whether those got into primary or secondary. I've heard it's easy to overdo oak. I threw a single Cascade hop pellet into the primary of a one gallon batch. I'll be racking it soon and the guy at the brew...