using juice from pressed apples vs off the grocery store shelf

[xunzx]

I want to make one dry carbonated and one sweet still cider. I'm contemplating going to an orchard to pick apples and get them pressed. For people who have used fresh pressed juice, is it worth the trouble, or does store bought juice work just as well?

If it's worth it to go out and get apples pressed, what variety of apples should be used? I'm in the Chicago area if anyone has good suggestions a particular orchard.

This chart looks like a great source, but hardly any of the apple varieties are at orchards near me.

This and this are the sources I will be referencing for blending the apples.

 

[skills0]

When you say grocery store, are you talking about sweet cider or apple juice? I know a lot of people on here use apple juice, but imo that's not really hard cider. They are 2 different things. Even cider that I typically see in grocery stores is usually pasteurized and often has stabilizers/preservatives.

I personally would always go fresh pressed, preferably pressing it yourself if you are really interested in getting the best product. Fresh pressed and unpasteurized from an orchard would be my next pick, although you have little control over the blend. Choosing to pasteurize it as part of the process a personal decision, but at least you are making the choice.

I used to live in Chicago and there aren't great options for good cider apples. One orchard that has a nice variety is More Than Delicious, about an hour and a half north of the city.

 

[MindenMan]

Last year during apple season, I grew and got donated to my first batch of hand pressed apples of different varieties. At that same time, I brewed cider using AJC. The difference in flavor between the two was huge! The fresh juice flavors were amazing, the AJC juice was really wiped out of flavor. Not only does my SHMBO like sparkling hard cider, she also really loves the "apple schnapps" I make from freeze concentrating a gallon or two of my hard cider. I took my fresh apples and washed them in produce soap and then tossed them into a bucket full of Iodophor just to be safe. Pasteurizing is always an option, but if you do, hold the temp of 160*F for twenty minutes. Do not boil or your cider will be cloudy, and there usually will be a flavor change. Not for the good.

 

[gregbathurst]

There is no need to worry about pasteurising the juice, the only reason to clean the apples is if they have been sprayed or fallen on muddy ground. Ordinary clean apples straight off the tree can go straight through the mill and press, into the fermenter without any concerns. That is the standard treatment for hard cider and it has proven safe over many, many years. There really isn't any comparison between supermarket juice and fresh-pressed. They produce different drinks, comparing them isn't useful.

 

[cervid]

All apples have been sprayed. Non organic are the worst. If you buy them from the orchard, rather than pick yourself they will have sprayed them clean with water. Cherries are even worse.. When you get them they are covered in sulfur most times and you must clean them, or buy cleaned ones from the orchard. I live right by many of both of these orchards. Any apples from the store will have wax on them also..

Most people treat their unpasteurized cider with campden for sterilization and pitch their own yeast. Apples have wild yeast on the peels. Pretty sure it's lactobacillus and it's the same thing that occurs with making sauerkraut. The lacto lives on the leaves of that too.

I have 5 gallons of flash pasteurized, local, preservative free cider going now, pitched with Nottingham yeast, and 32 oz of maple sugar. Next week I may get unpasteurized from another orchard and add campden, but it is not as sweet a cider to begin with so I may wait to start tasting this stuff too..

 

[GrizzlyGremlin]

I crush and press every drop i make by hand. Here in the northeast we have an abundance of free old orchard apples. Every variety you can think of. Many of which are varieties that were used for specifically for cider. The flavor profiles from these apples is incredible. Chances are there is some kind of free for the picking fruit in your area. Taste the apples too. A good cider apple is very sweet but brings strong apple, tart and sour to the party as well. Its rewarding as well, bringing your cider from a crushed fruit at birth to a clear nectar with age is very fulfiling.

 

[cervid]

Those are some good jelly apples you have there too.. Probably wouldn't even need to add pectin. Small apples have more in them. But, you want them less ripe. Unripe or barely ripe if you are going to make apple pectin itself.

 

[podz]

I always buy plain-old-apple-juice from the store. The cheapest one available - 85 euro cents per litre. They have more expensive AJ in the same store, but I don't see the need to try it.

I ferment it with 750 grams of sugar and half a pack of Kitzinger Reinhefe Champagner yeast for a 5 gallon batch (unless I'm siphoning and starting a new batch directly on the old yeast). It tastes way better than any commercial cider I've tried (I live in Europe and have tried most of them).

 

[JRParker]

I used pasteurized no preservative cider from the grocery in my current batch.

I am sampling an unfinished fermentation now(only a little over 5.5% abv, at 1.010 current gravity and still action in the airlock)

Strong granny smith apple flavour mixed with a slight pinot grigio note(the cheap-ish stuff).