Cider Making 2026

A lot of hail (hagel) adding to the joy!
Washed, sulphites washed (the idea is, I think, that it kills the wild yeast off, not too sure on that, despite my best efforts from 0800 to 14:40 cleaning equipment I feel sure we get some Voorne aan Zee yeasts in the cider) readied for chopping up – it’s needed prior to scruttering.

Ahem, a lack of buckets to process the whole trailer load; enough for the brewing of the juice. Tetris.

7 buckets chopped up. It’s essential to pass them through the “sinkhole” in my field expedient scrutting machine.

Eeeeek, added sulphites to kill off some mould growth and only one bucket had a strong fermentation started: should not be a problem, aerated the juice and will if necessary rack it off to reduce sulphur dioxide content. But, and it’s a shock, I am seeing Brix (sugar content) at 14%! How can that be, 2.5 times what I would expect. Managed to capture an image of the refractometer and posted it below.

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