What are you growing?

postie · Post by **postie** » 03 Sep 2011, 10:58

Is the little yellow thing next to it a car-jack?

I don't have too many apple trees close to here but know somewhere that does, so a cider press would be handy one day. How does it work.. and do you have plans? Maybe a new thread on it?

Little John · Post by **Little John** » 03 Sep 2011, 12:55

postie wrote:Is the little yellow thing next to it a car-jack?

I don't have too many apple trees close to here but know somewhere that does, so a cider press would be handy one day. How does it work.. and do you have plans? Maybe a new thread on it?

I'll draw up some plans for it over the next few days and post them on here Postie. And yes, it's a car bottle jack. It's what I use to get the pressure. It works really efficiently. I pressed out a builders tub full of apples in just over five minutes and got about three litres.

Little John · Post by **Little John** » 03 Sep 2011, 23:54

As promised. This is a basic diagram. I will do another with labels and then post measurements for the labelled items.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 04 Sep 2011, 03:41

We've been picking apples, mainly bramley, and damsons, 9.5 pounds from two very small trees/bushes. We've had half a dozen marrows from our courgette plants along with the courgettes. The marrows will store in the cellar for most of the winter, if there are enough, and will make some very nice soup. I'm adding some more shelving down there to take extra produce.

Autumn raspberries are fruiting well despite an attack by escaped cows! I must get the elderberries in and into the freezer for a while to break open the berries. I will then use those, and the ones in there from the previous two years, to make elderberry wine for the first time in 30 years. Mobile homes are not conducive to wine making.

We've got pears for the first time this year so we're going to bottle some in spiced red wine and keep the others in the cellar. We've got our first bottles of Hugh Fearlessly Eatsitall Tomato Pasata recipe ready to go into the cellar but it will be a few weeks before the next lot of toms are ready. There are 15 large jars of Farmhouse chutney ready to go down there as well. Carole used one of our onions weighing in at about 2 1/2 pounds for that. We've got another which looks a little smaller, just a little. We need a few more aubergines before this years ratatouille is made but we still have a few bottles left from last year and well as a couple of bottles of pasata.

Also got the usual runner beans coming out of our ears and onions and spuds as well. We're going to bag our spuds this year, ather than keeping them in open trays, to see if they will keep later into next spring in the cellar.

Must get some peas and winter salad crops in in the polytunnel together with spinach beet both inside and out. I'll start keeping an eye out for Japanese onions in the nursery soon and before we know it it will be time for broad beans as well.

There are masses of large Haws around this year and we've got a funky small fruit picker which will make in easier to pick them so I'll be making Hawthorne fruit leather again. I'll test it for sweetness though this time as the last lot was a bit bland.

Hopefully we will get an Indian summer to make up for the lack of a conventional one.

Liked the fruit press, Steve. You've inspired me to make one rather than buy one from Machinemart.

stumuzz · Post by **stumuzz** » 04 Sep 2011, 11:05

Ken, there is a good simple plan for a cider press here,
http://www.downsizer.net/Projects/Home_ ... ine_press/

I used the plans to make this one. I used Oak instead of pine as I had some reclaimed Oak door frames from a house I renovated some years back.

The first bucket of windfall Bramleys from the side orchard are ready to be processed. I'm thinking of making them into cider.

Anybody ever done bramley cider? Any good?

MrG · Post by **MrG** » 04 Sep 2011, 12:46

I've drunk cider made from cookers, not sure if they were Bramleys, but I was suprised at how good it was. The guy who hosts the welsh cider festival in his pub makes a cooker cider and it is lush... I think it was one of the winners from last year. Its some kind of blend though I can't remember he's well proud of it and was telling us all about it but at the same time as plying us with quantities of different ciders so I really don't remember!

I've also drank cider which was absolute gash and I put it down to it being made from cookers. That's why I was suprised when CJ's was so lush.. so as ever I guess its all about the blend.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 04 Sep 2011, 15:01

Maybe it was the rat that he put in it!!

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 04 Sep 2011, 16:51

There's a guy in our village who makes cider. Everybody gives him their surplus apples, all varieties including crab apples, and in return a few months later you get a proportion of it back in cider and the rest he sell in the local pub, various off licences and at the farm gate. He makes several thousand litres a year and at that scale his small electrically driven hydraulic press is justified.

emordnilap · Post by **emordnilap** » 04 Sep 2011, 17:47

Cunning! An underground tank of cider!

MrG · Post by **MrG** » 05 Sep 2011, 13:31

kenneal wrote:Maybe it was the rat that he put in it!!

That's supposed to improve it Ken! You've got to have a rat in the cider

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 05 Sep 2011, 15:02

Wrong kind of rat???

MrG · Post by **MrG** » 05 Sep 2011, 15:38

You been to the cat and wheel listening to their tales of where 'black rat' got its name haven't you.. it isn't a four legged creature

JohnB · Post by **JohnB** » 05 Sep 2011, 16:22

kenneal wrote:Maybe it was the rat that he put in it!!

In Zummerzet, it's a dog that fell in. It's sung about at the wassails in the village I used to live in. I assume that's were the term hair of the dog came from!

lurker · Post by **lurker** » 05 Sep 2011, 20:09

That looks well made they cost loads to buy so i was thinking of trying to make one also

Were you the person on here who was starting up a microbrewery?

Are thoose french beans instead the polytunnel or grapes?

MrG · Post by **MrG** » 06 Sep 2011, 10:08

Yeah that press looks really good. I wanted to make a press I may just copy that one. For the apples from the orchard we are using someone elses press which just seems ludicrous.

What do you use for a scratter steve? Last year we were experimenting with a plasterers whisk in a gorilla tub.. it works ok but you just end up with apple flying everywhere so a bi wasteful!