Kees
Well-Known Member
As the title says: what do you mean by crab apples? Which are suitable for cider and which aren't?
Acidity or bitterness/tannin?
This is why I love this board. You've given me a new treeThomas Jefferson's favorite cider apple was a crab apple.
I'm trying crab apples for the first time this year. I'm adding them to my regular garden apple tree mix to make it less sweet. I read recommendations to use crab apples for 20% of the juice. I got 2 lots of crab apples and put a little of each through an electric blender, then pressed the mash to taste what the juice was like. One lot was tiny red crab apples from an ornamental crab apple tree. The red juice tasted very sour, a bit like unsweetened cranberry juice, so I discarded these crab apples. The second lot were windfalls from wild crab apples in a nearby woodland - much larger and gave a yellow juice which tasted quite like ordinary apple juice, though sharper and rougher. I mashed & pressed enough of these (easy) to fill a fermentation barrel up to 20% volume, then topped up the rest with apple juice from my garden apple trees. Let's see what the result will be!As the title says: what do you mean by crab apples? Which are suitable for cider and which aren't?
Mind you in some parts people refer to cider apples as "spitters" because they are so acidic, so don't be afraid of using some of these fruit or try making a test batch using those "spitters" just to see what you can get from them.I'm trying crab apples for the first time this year. I'm adding them to my regular garden apple tree mix to make it less sweet. . . The red juice tasted very sour, a bit like unsweetened cranberry juice, so I discarded these crab apples.
I don't have any experience using these kinds of apples, but I've hear that the spitters are what you want for cider. You'd want to experiment with the percentage, but don't be so hasty to throw these out. Good luck!Mind you in some parts people refer to cider apples as "spitters" because they are so acidic, so don't be afraid of using some of these fruit or try making a test batch using those "spitters" just to see what you can get from them.
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