Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

Discussions of fruits, veggies and grains other then just mashing

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cranky
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

Post by cranky »

Fredistiller wrote: Thu Sep 16, 2021 11:47 am Very nice video Cranky :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: good info's in here!

Makes your "apple stuff" very concrete.
Thank you.

Yes it makes the final pomace quite solid. That second pressing for just a little under a gallon out of 100#s of apples can take more time than most people want to spend but I personally find it's worth the extra time and effort...especially when I'm having a busy day at work and only have time to come back every 15 minutes to deal with the apples.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

Post by Fredistiller »

I'm afraid I'm quite possessed with this apple grinder/press stuff. Can't help thinking about it all day long.
I was wondering while mounting this fan at work how many kilos of apples it would chop in 1 hour :D
20210917_074621(1).jpg
20210917_074635(1).jpg
Sorry for the joke...

I looked around and I'm afraid I won't find enough "pickable" apple trees around here, at least for this season. I contacted a farmer and he can sell me "reject" organic apples for a very good price. I believe I'll invest my time in making my press instead of picking and go to the farmer. The question that keeps me awake is "Am I going to make my grinder or buy one?"
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

Post by Saltbush Bill »

Fred with fabrication skills like these I'm sure you will manage to make a very nice apple chopper.
freds lid.jpg
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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That fan looked promising...

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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Saltbush Bill wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 1:10 pm Fred with fabrication skills like these I'm sure you will manage to make a very nice apple chopper.
freds lid.jpg
Thanks SBB! I believe that it shouldn't be that difficult for me. I have 24 years of experience in tailor made industrial machines and access to all the machines and stainless steel someone can dream off for this hobby ( up to 6 meters and 15mm thick, that should do :mrgreen: ) I don't want to brag, I just consider myself lucky.

If I can find a motor for a good price, I would make something looking like the one bushman talked about (Electric fruit crusher ESE-018 – Apple mill), but my biggest problem is TIME!! My days are long enough... but not broad enough :ebiggrin:
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Yesterday on my way home I stopped and picked nearly a bucket of grapes. I didn't want Mrs. Cranky to know about them so when I got home I left them on the porch with the plan to bring them inside when she wasn't around.
GRAPES 20 SEP 21 - C.JPG
Then when we sat down for dinner she asked me if I was getting in touch with my inner wineo. When I asked what she meant she said "I saw the grapes on the porch"

:shock: So I had to confess I stopped on my way home and picked grapes :roll: I am considering seeing how well the Victorio handles them with the regular auger. They sell a special grape auger but I don't want to buy one just yet.

Then today we were on our way over to the Mobile home to work on it to get it ready to sell and I noticed this
PLUMS 21 SEP 21 #3 - C.JPG
A plum tree loaded with ripe plums that are dropping all over the ground.
PLUMS 21 SEP 21 #4 - C.JPG
When I stopped and pointed it out Mrs Cranky gave me that look and said "Don't even think about it"

For the record I wasn't thinking about it, I was just commenting that we had been past that place hundreds of times and I had never even noticed the tree before. But I could really use a few more buckets of plums to ferment...So much fruit...so little time.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

Post by Saltbush Bill »

Damn , How I wish I had access to plumbs like that :cry
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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cranky wrote: Tue Sep 21, 2021 9:25 pm Yesterday on my way home I stopped and picked nearly a bucket of grapes. I didn't want Mrs. Cranky to know about them so when I got home I left them on the porch with the plan to bring them inside when she wasn't around.
GRAPES 20 SEP 21 - C.JPG

Then when we sat down for dinner she asked me if I was :thumbup: getting in touch with my inner wineo. When I asked what she meant she said "I saw the grapes on the porch"

:shock: So I had to confess I stopped on my way home and picked grapes :roll: I am considering seeing how well the Victorio handles them with the regular auger. They sell a special grape auger but I don't want to buy one just yet.

Then today we were on our way over to the Mobile home to work on it to get it ready to sell and I noticed this
PLUMS 21 SEP 21 #3 - C.JPG
A plum tree loaded with ripe plums that are dropping all over the ground.
PLUMS 21 SEP 21 #4 - C.JPG
When I stopped and pointed it out Mrs Cranky gave me that look and said "Don't even think about it"

For the record I wasn't thinking about it, I was just commenting that we had been past that place hundreds of times and I had never even noticed the tree before. But I could really use a few more buckets of plums to ferment...So much fruit...so little time.
Better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Get the plums! :thumbup:
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Saltbush Bill wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 3:28 am Damn , How I wish I had access to plumbs like that :cry
It would be nice if I had the time to deal with all this fruit that is falling in my lap this year.
8Ball wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 9:05 am Better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Get the plums!
That is what I'm doing with the ones I can pick on my way home but those plums are near the other house 15 miles away and when we go there it is together to get it cleaned up and ready to sell. By the time we leave we are too exhausted to think about dealing with fruit and there is just too much other things that need done... That's not to say I won't try to do stuff with the fruit :roll:
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Heading out to the island farm tomorrow and will be there until Sunday. Should give us 2 full days to process apples. We have a crew coming over with different tasks. Trenching a ditch to divert water run off from the cabin, some will be working the sheep, and some making apple cider. Should be a productive 4 days.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Bushman wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 5:55 pm Heading out to the island farm tomorrow and will be there until Sunday. Should give us 2 full days to process apples. We have a crew coming over with different tasks. Trenching a ditch to divert water run off from the cabin, some will be working the sheep, and some making apple cider. Should be a productive 4 days.
Sounds like a fun four days. Well except the sheep part. Grew up raising cattle so never had much use for those wooly critters.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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subbrew wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 7:58 pm
Bushman wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 5:55 pm Heading out to the island farm tomorrow and will be there until Sunday. Should give us 2 full days to process apples. We have a crew coming over with different tasks. Trenching a ditch to divert water run off from the cabin, some will be working the sheep, and some making apple cider. Should be a productive 4 days.
Sounds like a fun four days. Well except the sheep part. Grew up raising cattle so never had much use for those wooly critters.
Keeps the property taxes down as on his 40 acres he has 7 beaches.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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It does sound like a fun weekend. I look forward to the pictures.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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I stripped the shinseiki pear this morning. It didn't yield much but I didn't expect a whole lot. It tastes very strongly of little white flowers. It really needs that second run to calm that down a bit. I now need to dig out the small boiler and run this off. I expect it will yield around a bottle which is the perfect amount to add to the apple brandy.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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I don't think I have mentioned it before but not long ago I discovered this tree
COUSIN IT #2 - C.jpg
In the yard of a vacant house. We have dubbed this one Cousin It because it's so uncared for and so overloaded with apples the branches hang down like Cousin it's hair.

I've been checking on and testing it's apples since discovering it still hoping to find something to make canned pie filling with. These apples are smaller and green and have the look of a good pie apple. 2 weeks ago the apples were only testing at 10 brix and were sour. Today after some significantly rainy days since then they are now testing at 14 brix and are sweet, juicy, with just a hint of tart and still very crisp. I think they are going to make great pie filling. So my plan is to stop some time on my way home from work and see how fast I can pick a bucket or two (or 10 :roll: ) of apples.

I'm guessing I can pick 2 buckets full in under 2 minutes without having to take so much as one step sideways. I would guess there are probably 800 to 1,000 lbs of apples in this poor unloved tree and most are within 8ft of the ground so they are easy picking.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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I'm a freight train driver. I pass by a lot of those trees near the tracks were someone must have tossed out an apple core years ago.

Most don't produce tasty apples, some do. I often pass by three trees near an old car factory but I don't trust them because the soil is very contaminated there. They do look exactly like your picture, and I sometimes think about getting cuttings.

Makes you wonder why we bother pruning at all. They seem to do just fine and are usually loaded.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Corsaire wrote: Mon Sep 27, 2021 9:31 pm I'm a freight train driver. I pass by a lot of those trees near the tracks were someone must have tossed out an apple core years ago.

Most don't produce tasty apples, some do. I often pass by three trees near an old car factory but I don't trust them because the soil is very contaminated there. They do look exactly like your picture, and I sometimes think about getting cuttings.

Makes you wonder why we bother pruning at all. They seem to do just fine and are usually loaded.
Pruning is important, the trees out in the islands where I go do not get the care they need as know one lives there full time. The branches are wound together and picking with an apple picker you drop one for every 3 or 4 you pick. With sheep on the ground we do not pick the ones up that hit the ground.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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A properly pruned tree makes it easier to pick but trees like Cousin It are low to the ground so most picking can be done without the use of a picker. Overloaded trees also tend to produce smaller apples, not that that is a bad thing. It's actually a good thing since smaller apples tend to have more flavor than large ones.

I stopped yesterday and picked a bucket of apples off Cousin It yesterday. I was trying to time it but someone pulled up and wanted to talk to me about the truck. That's a common thing when you drive a truck that many people don't know was ever produced or they haven't seen one of in 30+ years. I might go back and pick more but technically I don't have permission to pick and even though the house is vacant I don't like to pick without permission.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Pressed a couple hundred pounds of so of apples yesterday and got about 12 gallons of juice. The HF wood chipper wouldn't start. Took it apart and found it was one of the brushes was stuck. You can't take the brush out, it is not serviceable, but I managed to get a small screwdriver in there and wiggle it back and forth until it loosened up a little. A bit of arcing at first but it seated and we were OK.

Later in the run I found out why the brush was stuck. I noticed that apple goo mixed with grease was oozing out of the motor cover which brings it right past the brushes. When I washed the rig out I thought I try rinsing while it was running. A cloud of water vapor/droplets came out of the motor. Yikes! It is definitely on the endangered species list.

I took a look for the ESE-018 and miracles, it showed the 120V version in stock! I sure hope it is true. We ordered one but no confirmation that it is real yet. If so it should make it here in time to use this year.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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A couple days ago I got a text telling me the Pawpaws are ready and to come get some :D So today after work I stopped by, the owner of the trees wasn't home and hadn't been very clear on how many I could have so I only got a few to try. There were a lot on the ground so I'm assuming the owner wouldn't care how many I picked up off the ground.
PAWPAWS 10 OCT 21 #6A - C.JPG
I was hoping Mrs Cranky would like them and give me her blessing to get all I want but she doesn't :( and finding time would be a problem anyway. Of course I would really like to make a brandy out of them because it's something few people can say they've done and I like unusual things. I think it would require a steam stripper though.

They are certainly an interesting tasting fruit. Kind of hard to describe, just sort of a mixed tropical fruit flavor. I'm thinking I might try to grow some trees from these seeds so I have my own future crop of pawpaws to make brandy out of.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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I paid Cousin It another visit today and picked 2 bucket of apples without interruption this time :D I've got close to 100#s of apples in the back of the truck and hope to get another hundred or so before next weekend.

My hope is to haul the chopper and stuff back into work next weekend and get some pressing done.

Cousin It's apples might actually work for an iced apple cider, which would be nice but there is still just the slightest tartness to them so maybe not.

I hope to separate the non wormy from the wormy and the large from the small in the hopes of getting some pie filling put up...I wonder if my boss would mind if I used the kitchen at work to do that :problem: Lately It's been very difficult to get free time at work so that might be a problem but I might try it anyway :roll:
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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cranky wrote: Mon Oct 11, 2021 5:27 pm I hope to separate the non wormy from the wormy and the large from the small in the hopes of getting some pie filling put up...I wonder if my boss would mind if I used the kitchen at work to do that :problem: Lately It's been very difficult to get free time at work so that might be a problem but I might try it anyway :roll:
Just don’t forget to get those wormy apples out of there and you’ll probably be ok :P or maybe leave them for the person who’s always rifling through others lunches…trick or treat haha
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Stonecutter wrote: Mon Oct 11, 2021 5:45 pm
cranky wrote: Mon Oct 11, 2021 5:27 pm I hope to separate the non wormy from the wormy and the large from the small in the hopes of getting some pie filling put up...I wonder if my boss would mind if I used the kitchen at work to do that :problem: Lately It's been very difficult to get free time at work so that might be a problem but I might try it anyway :roll:
Just don’t forget to get those wormy apples out of there and you’ll probably be ok :P or maybe leave them for the person who’s always rifling through others lunches…trick or treat haha
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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An idea I've been playing with lately is concentrating the sugars and flavors in a fruit juice by freeze jacking some of the fruit, then blending the jacked juice with it's own brandy to sweeten the liqueur. I've had some great results, but we are not really into sweet liqueurs. My parents and grandparents were and would have loved the results of these experiments.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

Post by GreenEnvy22 »

We got about 170 lbs of apples/pears from our 3 trees. I froze them for a week and then thawed and pressed in my wine press, got 48L. I'm fermenting it now and will probably keep 20L as cider, and distill the rest.
I also figured why not try to get even more from them, so I dumped all the pressed apples into a fermenter, added a 5 gallon bucket of iffy 3-week old grape skins/pulp ( I had them in the fridge since pressing but took them out a few days ago to make room for party related food and forgot to put them back in), and 4kg of sugar. Will see if I get something distillable or just a bunch of vinegar.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Stonecutter wrote: Mon Oct 11, 2021 5:45 pm Just don’t forget to get those wormy apples out of there and you’ll probably be ok :P or maybe leave them for the person who’s always rifling through others lunches…trick or treat haha
Separating out the wormy from non is more a matter of convenience. Normally I will cut out the wormy bits when I peel and cut them up for pies but since I have 100#s or so from Cousin It it will be easy enough to separate out a bucket or so of large ones that aren't wormy and put up some pie filling. Small non wormy ones will probably go to to sweet cider to share at work.

It's been a rough couple years, we've been working a full work load with 2/3rds of the people all year so it's nice to have something to share and people can help with the process since I'm doing it at work this year. Before the pandemic we had what was known as the "Sunday Brunch club" where people would pitch in and we would cook something every Sunday. One day I brought a gallon of fresh pressed sweet cider and everybody was amazed at the taste and texture. I guess few of them had ever had it that way before.

It's been a while Since we've done any food, the pandemic kind of ended that. Food prices have increased drastically and Mrs Cranky has had some health problems so food only happens sporadically. The last time was labor day when we did what's known as "Sausage Fest" with 3 types of sausages and sides. With the price of bacon close to double what it was pre pandemic we are now way overdue a Baconpalooza where Mrs Cranky would pre cook 15# of bacon and I'd cook 5 dozen eggs, possibly waffles and some other things. Fresh pressed sweet cider would go very nicely with a Baconpalooza, especially cider that we made at work.

People can be funny about drinking juice made from wormy apples. Wormy apples will be reserved for brandy because they are really just yeast food.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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NZChris wrote: Mon Oct 11, 2021 11:12 pm An idea I've been playing with lately is concentrating the sugars and flavors in a fruit juice by freeze jacking some of the fruit, then blending the jacked juice with it's own brandy to sweeten the liqueur. I've had some great results, but we are not really into sweet liqueurs. My parents and grandparents were and would have loved the results of these experiments.
I think I'm going to try that this year, I like the sweet stuff but the apples have been very poor this year, even the high sugar ones have had a sour acidic character that doesn't concentrate well but Cousin It's might be sweet enough.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Speaking of sweet, low acid apples, the Karen's delights are coming ripe but like most everything else they are poor quality this year coming in at only 18 brix and only a couple dozen since the tree is in a planter and doesn't really have room to spread out. I stopped on my way home and picked another bucket of apples from Cousin It but the neighbors have started noticing my activities and I don't like to be watched when I'm picking unauthorized apples, even if it's at a vacant house.

I think I'm going to stop picking there... :think: ...or maybe start stopping on my way to work on Saturday and Sunday when nobody is up to watch me.

I also stopped and checked on the church apples, which is little more than a sapling but has been producing for a couple years now. The church apples are at the edge of a church parking lot. For some reason the tree was cut down a number of years ago and is working on regrowing from the stump...or maybe roots. Every year the apples seem to be completely different, usually nothing spectacular but this year they are really special, 15 brix, crisp, sweet with very little if any tartness. In the next few days I will see about picking the couple of dozen apples it has to give.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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Picked around 300 pounds of apples in the rain today. Golden Delicious, Jonathan, Jonagold and Braeburn. The look and taste good. We got 1/2" pf rain during the time we picked! But they had to get picked this week so we can press them next week. We are going to the north rim of the grand canyon the week after that.
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Re: Lets get carried away with fruity goodness

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stillanoob wrote: Thu Oct 21, 2021 10:16 am Picked around 300 pounds of apples in the rain today. Golden Delicious, Jonathan, Jonagold and Braeburn. The look and taste good. We got 1/2" pf rain during the time we picked! But they had to get picked this week so we can press them next week. We are going to the north rim of the grand canyon the week after that.
Funny what we will do for apples :D
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