Juiced 20 gallons of apples yesterday. What do I do with it?

[redking11]

I spent the weekend picking, crushing, juicing and pasteurizing apples from our old overgrown orchard. The result is 20 gallons of dark sweetness; and it is sweet, but without that tangy zing that I like.

Like I said, the juice has been pasteurized, which I'm not sure is a good thing for making cider? but it is more than I can drink or store before it goes bad, and I want to try making wine or hard cider. My question, is the juice going to be at all good for either of those purposes?

I would very much be interested in making a Darmstadt style Apfelwein with it. the semi bland watery wein is something that I grew a taste for while living in Der Vaterland.

So is it good for anything considering its been pasteurized and consists of juice from sweet table apples and not tart cider apples with higher tannen and acids?

Many Thanks for the help.

 

[phug]

check the recipe section for edworts apfelwein. ferment it all, pick up some acid blend to bring that acidity level back up. of ferment it as is and add some acidic berries in secondary to give it some acidity. plenty of options, ferment it all and then take small samples to add flavours to until you find one you like

 

[phug]

I would actually even go so far as to use any of the popular recipes in that section of the forum that call for plain storebough apple juice. Malic acid is just malic acid, so you can always buy some malic acid powder and add that in. and if that recipe does well with storebought juice, then you can live without the tannins.

 

[oljimmy]

Sugars mask acid, which comes out nicely after the sugar has been fermented. You are lucky to have found a juice source which is not too acidic. Mark my words, ferment it out to relative dryness and you'll taste the malic.

I love the German Apfelwein too, but it's important to remember that you are not using their apples, nor their processes, nor their particular yeasts. You will not be able to "clone" their stuff without replicating many/all of those conditions. So just enjoy whatever you can make out of what you have!

 

[cernst151]

Congrats! We did the same recently. We pressed 25 gallons one weekend and 22 gallons another weekend. The first weekend's batch was quite tart and delicious while the second was very sweet with little tartness. We've done this before and can say the tartness comes out more as the sugar is fermented away. I've never used malic acid before but I may this year.

How did you pasteurize it? We heat pasteurized it all to 165 degrees so there are no chemicals in it at all. If you put in chemicals to pasteurize then it's fermentability will depend on what chemicals you used.

 

[TheNewGuy2]

You give me 5.5 gallons to be safe?

 

[gratus fermentatio]

Yes, that juice should be great for cider! You can always freeze it till you're ready to use it too. You can always add acid blend or just malic acid later if you want, same with tannin.
The apfelwein recipe is good, but the end product really benefits from aging at least 6 months, a year is better. I like the graff recipe better, not quite as simple, but still pretty easy & much tastier, much quicker. Have a look at the recipe section:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f81/
with 20 gallons, you can make multiple recipes simultaneously or make one really BIG batch, it's your choice.
Regards, GF.