Maceration and Cuvage - new member from Ireland.

[Mark Jenkinson]

Hello all
New member from Ireland here Mark Jenkinson.

A quick intro -- This is my third season making cider and most if not
all of my limited knowledge has been gleened from Andrews website and
book together with the pooley & Lomax book. So far this season I have
220 ltr on the go in 11 X 20 ltr Kegs (I re-use 20 ltr plastic bottles
from office water dispensers for fermenting and bulk storage) and I
have 300kg of apples waiting for my attention out in the shed. I have
a small farm and an even smaller derilict orchard with only one lone
old apple tree left and a few other damsons and plums so all my apple
pressings are an equal mix of about 5 varieties of cull eaters and
cookers from a local commercial orchard dependant on whats available
that week.

I seem to be having some problems this year with off flavours/aromas
and am hopeing someone may be able to help me. I think the off flavour/
aroma is sulphury but I can't be sure as my taste/sensory skills are
very poor but I
did some test samples with and without copper pennys added (as
discussed in Andrews book) and this definitely
reduced the offending smell and taste.

Maceration and Cuvage --- I normally let the pulp stand overnight for
12-24 hrs in sealed containers before pressing as this seems to give a
more complex flavoured juice which is hopefully passed on to the cider
and it also results in a deep amber coloured finished cider rather
than a watery yellow one.Would this cuvage be contributing to off
flavours ? also is there any other particular reason why nobody else
seems to use cuvage except when keeving ? I am familiar with Asturian
cider and I understand they let the pulp "rest" for a number of hours
before pressing.

Yeast --- This is more lightly the culprit, I am experimenting this
year with 5 different yeasts (a mistake I think now
after reading this group,but too late) I do not add nutrients as
recomended with cultured yeasts because the apples come from a
commercial orchard and rather than have stuck or vigorous
fermentations I can only describe mine as almost violent-- from SG1050
to SG1002 in two weeks (temp 15-20 C) and then moved to a cold shed to
settle for a week or two,rack and bulk mature.
Some batches have had no So2 treatment and others half the recommended
dose,Ph has been ajusted if required.
Regardless of juice batch,treatments or yeast used this off flavour/
aroma seems to be indiscriminate from vaguely
detectable to one or two kegs destined for the compost heap !

Sorry,I hope this is not too much of an information
overload,particularly for a first post,I only discovered this group
last week (its an amazing information resource) and this is my first
time using a group.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance,Mark.

[Dries Muylaert]

On 12/3/09, Mark Jenkinson <ma...@artglass.ie> wrote:

Hello all
New member from Ireland here Mark Jenkinson.

A quick intro -- This is my third season making cider and most if not
all of my limited knowledge has been gleened from Andrews website and
book together with the pooley & Lomax book. So far this season I have
220 ltr on the go in 11 X 20 ltr Kegs (I re-use 20 ltr plastic bottles
from office water dispensers for fermenting and bulk storage)

 

Not the very best, cider will oxidize in thin plastic. Glass damjanne 50 liter is the best solution for smaller quantities

 

 

I seem to be having some problems this year with off flavours/aromas
and am hopeing someone may be able to help me. I think the off flavour/
aroma is sulphury but I can't be sure as my taste/sensory skills are
very poor but I
did some test samples with and without copper pennys added (as
discussed in Andrews book) and this definitely
reduced the offending smell and taste.

 

 

If fermentation is going on the rotten egg smell can be driven out by the co2. If the cider is finished you have a problem, but it can be solved with addition of bocksin and filtering, or by time.

Maceration and Cuvage --- I normally let the pulp stand overnight for
12-24 hrs in sealed containers before pressing as this seems to give a
more complex flavoured juice which is hopefully passed on to the cider
and it also results in a deep amber coloured finished cider rather
than a watery yellow one.Would this cuvage be contributing to off
flavours ? also is there any other particular reason why nobody else
seems to use cuvage except when keeving ? I am familiar with Asturian
cider and I understand they let the pulp "rest" for a number of hours
before pressing.

 

24 hours is long, especially if the temperature is above 10 celcius. 6-12 hours is the usual. I use 8 at 10 Celcius. And even that can be to long. I was told it can lead to off flavours, but it's more likely these off flavours (rotten egg) are caused by the use of cultivated yeast in absence of adequate nutrition, or by blending in syrup or fresh juice once fermentation is running, or by leaving the cider to long on the lees. Pulp rest is used in order to:

- extract more flavours

- extract more pectin for a better brown hat (keeving)

- higher yield

- reduction of tannins that are tanned onto the pulp, but if left to long the will reenter the juice and give a dominant bitter flavour, depending of course on the variety of apples used. I remember an article by Andrew on this one, can't find it at the moment, but I recall (old man bad memory) the optimum for tannin removal was 6 hours. It's a choice you have to make based on experience. No pulp rest, high on tannins, moderate period, low on tannins, to long, all sorts of problems and higher bitterness, can be useful but I don't like that. 
 

Yeast --- This is more likely the culprit, I am experimenting this

year with 5 different yeasts (a mistake I think now
after reading this group,but too late) I do not add nutrients

 

 

et voila. But if you don't want to use bocksin, give the cider some time, it might go away without treatment. Have to say that even with 'wild yeast' my cider produces rotten egg smell during fermentation, but it leaves at some stage during that fermentation. Some wine makers use aeration to get rid of the problem, I would never ever do that with cider, risk of infection is high and oxidized cider tastes bad (taste like over mature apples) 

as
recomended with cultured yeasts because the apples come from a
commercial orchard and rather than have stuck or vigorous
fermentations I can only describe mine as almost violent-- from SG1050
to SG1002 in two weeks (temp 15-20 C)

 

With this temperature fermentation is bound to be fast. If you don't want that, keep the temperatures lower (10 celcius) and make an initial keeve.

 

and then moved to a cold shed to
settle for a week or two,rack and bulk mature.
Some batches have had no So2 treatment and others half the recommended
dose,Ph has been ajusted if required.
Regardless of juice batch,treatments or yeast used this off flavour/
aroma seems to be indiscriminate from vaguely
detectable to one or two kegs destined for the compost heap !

Sorry,I hope this is not too much of an information
overload,particularly for a first post,I only discovered this group
last week (its an amazing information resource) and this is my first
time using a group.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance,Mark.

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[Andrew Lea]

Marks,

As you say the problem you perceive may well be yeast related or a yeast
/ nutrient interaction and you are obviously exploring that. Other
thoughts are:

Are you sure about your water cooler bottles and whatever vessels you
macerate in? Try a taint migration test into 10% clean alcohol and leave
for a couple of days before tasting. (Dilute neutral vodka 1 part to 3
with water to get the neutral alcohol).

Maceration / cuvage is usually only done for keeving and the main reason
is to increase the soluble pectin levels. It is of questionable value
otherwise.

Does your commercial supplier use any sulphur based sprays on his trees
or fruit to protect against scab, mildew or storage rots? On grapes
this is a known cause of sulphur taints.

Your fermentations are quite hot for cider and I would try to keep them
a bit cooler. If you use commercial yeast you should use the full SO2
dose first to knock out everything else and also most likely use nutrients.

Sulphur notes can be quite prominent early in fermentations but may
persist. If the copper penny test is positive, try the full copper
sulphate dodge. I have not used Bocksin
http://www.fallbright.com/Bocksin.htm so cannot vouch for how good it
is, but it is only silica so not selective like copper sulphate.

Andrew

--
Wittenham Hill Cider Page
http://www.cider.org.uk

[Mark Jenkinson]

Dries/Andrew

Thanks for the detailed replies,lots there that never dawned on
me,plenty to keep me busy in the process of elimination to get to the
bottom of this and the cures for my current batches.

As for the 300kg of apples I'm going to tackle this weekend,I don't
think I am willing to risk any more cider by further experimenting
with cultured yeasts and adding nutrient this time to see if that was
the cause,as it may not be.

So think I will not bother with cuvage,half dose with SO2 and go for
wild yeast fermentations.

Given that the temp here is now well below 10C mostly,any thoughts on
on keeping the juice warm until first signs of activity then removing
to cold,as otherwise I presume if the temp is arround 5C it may take
many weeks before it starts.

Also I have a Klercidre kit I purchased last year but never got
arround to using,presuming it's still OK to use a year later,I was
going to give it a go but I'm sure I read here somewhere that keeving
doesn't work on dessert apples ?

With thanks Mark.

[Dries Muylaert]

On 12/3/09, Mark Jenkinson <ma...@artglass.ie> wrote:

As for the 300kg of apples I'm going to tackle this weekend,I don't
think I am willing to risk any more cider by further experimenting
with cultured yeasts and adding nutrient this time to see if that was
the cause,as it may not be.

 

 

Problem might be that the cultured yeast is all over the place now and that wild yeast only will take care of the first stages of fermentation. But don't bother, I'm in the same position as is the majority of us I presume.

So think I will not bother with cuvage,half dose with SO2 and go for
wild yeast fermentations.

Given that the temp here is now well below 10C mostly,any thoughts on
on keeping the juice warm until first signs of activity then removing
to cold,as otherwise I presume if the temp is arround 5C it may take
many weeks before it starts.

 

 

That's right. 5 is really low.

Also I have a Klercidre kit I purchased last year but never got
arround to using,presuming it's still OK to use a year later,I was
going to give it a go but I'm sure I read here somewhere that keeving
doesn't work on dessert apples ?

 

 

It's to do with acidity. Acid apples don't keeve easily. Possible the Klercidre takes care of the problem. But not sure. Eating apples can be high on acid.

With thanks Mark.

[Claude Jolicoeur]

Mark Jenkinson wrote:
> Also I have a Klercidre kit I purchased last year but never got
> arround to using,presuming it's still OK to use a year later,I was
> going to give it a go but I'm sure I read here somewhere that keeving
> doesn't work on dessert apples ?

You may increase a bit the dosage of PME to take into account the
reduced efficiency.
I have done many successful keeves with dessert apples. However, I
grow them myself in an unfertilised orchard, so there is very little N
- maybe this has to do with the success of the keeving. I would say:
go ahead and try it! The worst that can happen is that the
fermentation will pick before the chapeau brun forms itself, and then
you are in a normal fermentation...

Claude

[Mark Jenkinson]

Dries/Claude

Yes,I've seen some of the threads regarding the "house yeast"
dominating regardless of cultured yeasts used but given that I won't
be adding a starter bottle of cultured yeast I guess there may be a
fair amount of natural wildlife going on.

Re keeving-- so if I ajust the PH up to a safe high level (3.8) which
will reduce acidity,will that increase the chances of a successful
keev ?

Given that keeving is better with a high SG and my juice SG will only
be about 1045 or 50 is it OK to add sugar syrup before keeving to
correct this ? I have not seen chaptalisation in relation to keeving
mentioned anywhere.

Mark.

[Claude Jolicoeur]

Mark Jenkinson wrote:
> Dries/Claude

> Re keeving-- so if I ajust the PH up to a safe high level (3.8) which
> will reduce acidity,will that increase the chances of a successful
> keev ?

Personnally, I don't think acidity have so much an effect. My juice
usually has TA (titrable acidity expressed as Tartaric acid) between
0.8 and 0.9% and keeves successfully all the time. This TA would
roughly correspond to a pH of about 3.2 to 3.3 (I don't measure pH
however). My opinion is that the success of keeving is not in acidity
level, but elsewhere... In fact it mostly has to do with pectin!

>
> Given that keeving is better with a high SG and my juice SG will only
> be about 1045 or 50 is it OK to add sugar syrup before keeving to
> correct this ? I have not seen chaptalisation in relation to keeving
> mentioned anywhere.

I agree that low sugar concentration might be a problem. And,
personnally, I don't think adding sugar is a solution. Couldn't you
try to find a batch of high sugar apples, like russets, to raise the
sugar level of your blend?

Claude

[Dries Muylaert]

Two remarks:

 

I only work with eaters and cookers after pulp rest, I don't use Klercidre. Keeving works but the brown hat isn't as abundant as what I have seen with a blend containing bittersweets and sweets. French publications mention 'les pommes aigres et aigres doux' not to be good keevers. Is it the lack of pectin? The lack of natural PME? Or the higher acidity directly or indirectly, fe higher acidity prohibiting pme to be formed? Wouldn't know.

The low amount of sugar will imo not play a part. On the contrary. You need to keep fermentation slow and hesitant during keeving. Adding syrop won't help that.

 

[Andrew Lea]

Mark Jenkinson wrote:

>
> Yes,I've seen some of the threads regarding the "house yeast"
> dominating regardless of cultured yeasts used but given that I won't
> be adding a starter bottle of cultured yeast I guess there may be a
> fair amount of natural wildlife going on.

There will be but there will also be an influence of 'past history'. A
paper I dug up when this was last a topic seemed to indicate the effect
of a cultured yeast in a winery persisted for 3 years AFAIR. Remember if
using a 'wild yeast' there is a succession of at least two (apiculates
from the fruit followed by Saccharomyces from elsewhere)

>
> Re keeving-- so if I ajust the PH up to a safe high level (3.8) which
> will reduce acidity,will that increase the chances of a successful
> keev ?

Yes it will, but I would be wary about raising the pH too much. How do
you propose to do that anyway? Adding potassium carbonate? Certainly you
should see pH 3.8 as your absolute ceiling; maybe pH 3.6.

There *is* an effect of pH on keeving. It is to do with the pH optimum
of the enzyme. The PME (even from apples) typically has an optimum
working pH for greatest effect of around pH 4.5, which is way above a
safe level for a clean fermentation. Working down around pH 3.6 or 3.8
the PME activity will be much less; but still probably effective given
time. At pH further down towards 3, the PME may hardly work at all. This
is probably why sharp apples do not traditionally keeve.

However, if you add a commercial fungal PME you can / do add a great
deal more enzyme to compensate. Also, they may have a lower pH activity
spectrum anyway. With the addition of the commercial enzymes you can
indeed keeve successfully way down at around pH 3.2 - 3.4. I think you
said you had Klercidre available?

>
> Given that keeving is better with a high SG and my juice SG will only
> be about 1045 or 50 is it OK to add sugar syrup before keeving to
> correct this ? I have not seen chaptalisation in relation to keeving
> mentioned anywhere.

Density (though not chaptalisation as such) is mentioned in Comment
Faire du Bon Cidre; a minimum of SG 1.055 is recommended. There is a
good reason for that, because by increasing the juice density you will
decrease the relative density of the calcium pectate gel (the 'chapeau')
and so it will float better. If I had a juice as low as SG 1.045 I would
bring it up to 1.055. Also of course you need a higher SG because you
will effectively be doing an arrested fermentation so you need more
sugar to create 'enough' alcohol when some sugar remains unconverted.

Choices, choices .....!!

Andrew

[Mark Jenkinson]

Wow,Choices,Choices,thats for sure,thank you all,this should make for
an interesting and busy weekend.

Somewhat coincidentally I managed to get my hands on two bottles of
Normandy cider today (never seen it for sale in Ireland before) so am
hopeing for some inspiration whilst enjoying them tonight.

I should get over 200ltr from my 300kg apples,I have a Brouwland
shredder and a homemade welded steel rack and cloth press (similar to
vigo types) with a 20 ton car jack that manages about 50ltrs per
pressing so should do it in 4 maybe 5 pressings.

Will do some juice with Vit C and pasteurise and the rest I think I
will split between wild fermentations (to hopefully avoid this
hydrogen sulphide problem I have with my current batches) and a keev
with the Klercidre kit,I did try keeving last year (not with klercidre
kit) using chalk and salt and kept it at 5C for 4 or 5 weeks but
nothing happened,brown hat or fermentation and when film yeasts
started to form I binned it.

So given the above posts,for keeving I'm thinking --- ?
Cuvage maybe 12 hours.
No real need to ajust PH (I use calcium carbonate not potassium) if I
add extra PME.
Ajust SG up a little if needed.
Add half dose SO2.
Follow Klercidre instructions,think I seen English translation here.
Keep fingers crossed.

Mark

PS just finished first bottle of Normandy (Duche De Longueville)
lovely rich colour and sweet,bit of a peculiar taste though,tastes
"old" maybe,not sure if I like it,anyway won't stop me opening the
second in a minute.

[Dries Muylaert]

No real need to ajust PH (I use calcium carbonate not potassium) if I
add extra PME.

 

 

As posted before by Andrew be carefull with the calcium carbonate for acidity adjustment.