Science and Practice in Farm Cultivation Part 38

2. Dessert Apples-some of the fine-flavoured varieties.

3. Cider Fruit-which includes all the others.

1. Cooking apples may be hand-picked as they become ripe, and those that will not keep long, as the various codlins, may be disposed of in the lump to the fruiterer, or sent to market in smaller quant.i.ties. The good keeping apples may be sold in the lot when ripe, or kept in store to be retailed at market.

Both these sets of apples require to be gathered with some care; in short, to be what are called "hand-picked," as, when bruised, they not only are injured for present use, but their keeping qualities are greatly affected.

For store apples the fruit should be gathered before being what is called "dead ripe," that is, when they are quite crisp and juicy; one of the best indications of fitness being a bright light-brown kernel as opposed to a dull dark-brown.

The fruit should be kept in a dry room, from which frost is entirely excluded, and where air can freely ventilate whenever required. The best plan is to fit up such a room with shelves made up of laths three inches wide, and placed an inch and a half or two inches apart.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLAN OF SHELF FOR KEEPING FRUIT.]

In this way _a_ represents the laths, of which there may be many or few to each shelf according to the breadth required; _b_, the inters.p.a.ces.

Here, then, the fruit is placed in lines over the inters.p.a.ces, the object being thus to secure a free pa.s.sage for the air all around the fruit; if placed in a single layer, faulty ones can be seen at a glance, and these should be removed as soon as detected.

If this plan be found too onerous, and fruit must be put together in larger quant.i.ty, we would advise that they be so placed as that air can get to them from below. Keeping fruit in heaps in corners, or even spreading them between layers of straw, tends to their destruction rather than preservation. If, then, it be borne in mind that the end to aim at, in order to keep fruit, is that of exposing sound examples to the free access of the air, it will be seen that the nearer we can secure this the better will be our result.

We say _sound_ fruit, for it is useless to put spotted and worm-eaten apples or pears in the keeping-room. These had better be put by and used as soon as possible for whatever purpose they may be fit, for whenever the air can get into the interior of fruit by reason of abrasions, borings, &c., decay soon sets in; and now, while we are writing, we have a quant.i.ty of apples with the plague-spot of rottenness proceeding from their being "worm-eaten."

2. In storing dessert apples these directions are even more important.

If, then, the farm should produce one or several sorts in quant.i.ty, if they are to be disposed of, we would advise their sale to the fruiterer with the onus of gathering and managing them. Small farmers sometimes make no bad addition to their income by thus disposing of fine fruits, and we always advise that such should be planted to a greater extent than is usually done about farm homesteads. It is not a heavy matter for the landlord to find a few sorts of choice fruit-trees for his smaller or even larger holdings, and, by thus adding to the comfort or even luxuries of his tenants, he will be benefiting not only himself but the country at large. We believe it to be a duty inc.u.mbent upon the landed proprietor thus to foster a love of fruits, and we honour the names of Knight, of Downton, and Williams, of Pitmaston, in that they loved to propagate new fruits, and to encourage their dissemination. It is said by Mr. Benjamin Maund, the author of "The Fruitist":-

A propagator of apple and pear trees from seeds may be supposed to possess not only patience, but a desire to benefit posterity.

Twelve or fourteen years cast a long shadow before them; and when, after waiting this length of time, the uncertain value of the substance is considered, it must be confessed that men deserve more than praise, who originate new fruits. Apple trees rarely show the real quality of their fruit in less than fourteen years. All, however, who have the convenience of doing so, should raise seedling trees; for it is to these only that we can look with any degree of confidence for permanently furnishing our orchards, and not to old or cankering varieties.

It is true that it is not within the province of all, even of the permanent owners of the soil, thus to add to the number of Pomona's gifts, but all can inquire for and purchase esteemed sorts; and no tenant that is worth having will grudge them care and attention, be his tenure ever so precarious.

We would a.s.sign to the lords of the soil the duty of improving fruit-trees, while the gentleman who resides in the country, it may be for only a short season, should make the best use of it to encourage a love for the garden, and to increase its various attractions to charm the eye, and to increase and vary the vegetable food of the people.

3. Fruit for cider-making will consist of "wind-falls," that is, such as has fallen prematurely ripe, or been shaken off by the wind; and gathered fruit. As regards wind-falls, it is only necessary to state that, although these can only be employed for an inferior kind of drink, yet even this may be improved by care, as thus:-Instead of picking up the apples while they are still wet with dew, they should be gathered in as dry a state as possible, and then not, as is too often the case, huddled together in a heap in the orchard, exposed to alternations of frost, and wet, and dry.

Such fruit will often require to be kept for some time waiting temperate weather, which is best for cider-making. It should be kept then under cover, and in such a manner that the air can get beneath it; and for this purpose we have found a few wattled hurdles well adapted for keeping fruit on that is waiting to be ground.

In gathering cider-fruit we should consider it ripe at that period when a not rude shake of a limb would cause most of it to fall pretty well at one and the same time. We dislike beating off fruit with sticks, as it damages the bearing shoots. In fine, in gathering fruit all undue violence should be carefully avoided, as it is unwise to use that amount of hurry, which will only secure a large present crop, unless it can be done in such a manner as not to injure our hopes of the future. It is a curious circ.u.mstance that in the garden there is usually something like a crop, even in a bad season; but in the orchard we seldom meet with anything like a crop the year following what is called a "hit of fruit,"

and only the finer sorts of apples which are hand-gathered with care are often found to be most constant bearers, while the rougher cider-fruits seldom afford a good crop oftener than once in from three to five years.

Surely, then, much of this must be the result of the rougher treatment to which cider-fruit is so carelessly subjected.

When the fruit is collected, it should be put in a dry airy place, to await the process of grinding. For this we adopt the plan of spreading it in sheds or outhouses on wattled hurdles. This keeps it from the rain, by which it becomes sodden when in exposed heaps: then the wind will only partially dry it, and the result will be a general heating of the ma.s.s, which results, if not in quick decay amounting to absolute rottenness, yet in that state, technically called "moisey,"[31] or dead, in which the juices are nearly dried up and the fruit flavourless.

[31] Apple moise, or apple moce, was an old dish made of pressed apples.

In cider counties apples are called moisey when they are juiceless, dry, and without flavour-dead. (See Archaic Dictionaries.)

We have seen heaps of apples, consisting of many waggon-loads, in the orchard at Christmas, when wet and frost had so preyed upon them that none of their proper juices remained. This is certain to make a cider which will be of inferior quality; and though some of our friends boast of the good quality of their cider which has been made in the roughest manner, yet one cannot help thinking how much better it might have been with the fruit carefully collected, and kept until it could be ground.

Still, with all our care in this matter, disappointment is sometimes the result; for it is with cider as with wine, the season will have a great deal to do with it, though with both, the manner of making and storing will be all-important matters, to which we shall advert in the next chapter.

We much object to the gathering of fruit for any purpose in the wet.

Were it not for the expense, it would be better to take advantage of dry weather, and to collect even cider-fruit by hand-picking before it has become dead ripe, and so let the ripening process be completed in some dry storing-place. In our own experience of cider-making, the two or three casks made for home consumption from carefully picked and well-kept fruit are usually of the best quality, and so made we believe cider to be a most agreeable and very wholesome beverage,-to paraphrase Isaac Walton, only fit for farmers or very honest men. As long, however, as rough people are about who never know when they have had enough, the rougher cider made by a ruder process is quite good enough.

It must be obvious to all that if a man can drink as much as four gallons of good cider in a day's mowing, he would be better off with a less quant.i.ty of an inferior sort, supplemented with tea or coffee.

CHAPTER L.

ON CIDER-MAKING AND ITS MANAGEMENT.

In making cider or perry it is well not to begin unless the weather be moderately cool, as in hot weather the changes in the fluid become too rapid, and it consequently does not keep well.

The first process will be to grind the fruit into as perfect a state of pulp as possible. This will be effected when the kernels are decidedly crushed. Such a state of pulp usually ensures the best results, not only from the fact that the whole juice of the fruit is not only set free, but it is all exposed to the action of the air, by which both the colour and quality are greatly improved; and, besides this, every good quality is decidedly increased by having the principles and flavour of the kernels mixed with the other juices.

The method by which this is best effected is by grinding in the usual circular stone horse-mill. This is confessedly a slow process, but notwithstanding the newer methods, to be presently described, we still prefer it to all others, and that from the great completeness with which the grinding is effected.

Of late years cider-mills have been brought out which essentially consist of a combination of gribbling teeth, by which the fruit is first torn to pieces, and two cylindrical rollers, between which it is afterwards crushed with greater or less completeness.

In some cases the rollers are of iron, in others of hard stone: the latter is preferable, as contact with iron, even where but slight, causes the drink to a.s.sume a degree of blackness, especially on exposure.

Portable mills of this kind are now very general, but we so fully agree with the remarks of Mr. Cadle, that we here quote his description of some portable cider-mills, with his comments upon their action.

About twenty-six years ago, Mr. Coleman, of Chaxhill, Westbury-on-Severn, commenced making an improved cider-mill and press, which could act either as a fixture or a portable mill. It was found that the cider thus made fined better, and the process was also more expeditious. These advantages, together with the cost of keeping the old kind of mills in repair, which landlords were unwilling to undertake, led to their being superseded, as they wore out, by Coleman's, or a similar mill.

Coleman's mill consists of two pairs of rollers fixed in a strong wooden frame; it is fed from a hopper, the apples pa.s.sing through the first pair of rollers, which are made of hard wood, with iron teeth, so as to break the apples, which fall next between a pair of stone rollers set close enough to break the kernels, and from these the pulp drops into a trough placed beneath to receive it.

Mr. Latchem, of Hereford, has also paid considerable attention to the construction of these mills, and has taken out a patent for doing away with the iron in the feed-rollers, and subst.i.tuting steel teeth fitted into one roller, and working through other steel teeth on a fixed plate, partly on the same principle as a curd-mill. The fruit, after pa.s.sing this "chewer," is ground between a pair of stone rollers, as before described.

Until the portable apple-mills became general, we had a mill to almost every farm, and even to many of the cottages; but in Devonshire one mill or pound-house serves for a number of makers, and sometimes for a parish, each person paying so much per hogshead for the making.

Most of the travelling portable machines in Herefordshire have two presses with each mill, and are worked by two horses, making 1,000 to 1,500 gallons in a day; sometimes they are worked by a small portable steam-engine. They are very expeditious, and do very well for a second-cla.s.s cider, but if you would have the best, they are very objectionable, because the different sorts of fruit very rarely get ripe at once in sufficient quant.i.ties to enable you to make much at a time. Much cider is therefore spoiled, the fruit being ground when too green, by those who are impatient to finish the process. I think that each farm or holding should have a mill of its own, even if it be only a small hand-mill.

There are several other rude plans of grinding, such as nut-mills, graters, scratchers, &c., but they are so objectionable that they hardly deserve notice.

All metallic substances should be kept from contact with the pulp, as chemical combinations immediately take place on contact; for instance, if you take a clean knife and cut an apple through, the knife quickly becomes black, as well as the apple. For this reason I think the iron teeth and cast-iron in the rollers are objectionable; as also the steel ones, although perhaps not to the same extent. I should recommend that this iron be removed, and fluted rollers of larger diameter be made of some hard wood, such as yew-tree, or American iron-wood. No doubt more power would then be required to work the mills, but this would be of little consequence if the produce was first-cla.s.s cider.

When this new mode of grinding was first tried, there was great complaint amongst the labourers that the cider did not agree with them, and this was generally attributed to the iron; but in my opinion, the green state of the fruit when ground made the juice harsh, and caused irritation in the system.-_Journal R. A. S._, vol. XXV. page 1.

The next point for consideration is the pressing out of the juice. This has been done with screw-presses of various kinds, either wood or iron, with single or double screws.

Hydraulic presses are now coming into fashion, and one advantage which they possess is, that of easily and expeditiously getting _all_ the juice from the pulp.

In Dorsetshire the ground pulp or "pummy" is usually put upon a flat stage between layers of straw, which are deftly turned up at the edges so as to keep the "cheese" together. Upon the top of the cheese is placed another flat board, which is acted upon by the press.

In Worcestershire and Hereford the pulp is pressed in hair cloths, which plan is much more perfect than with straw.

In pressing it is well to observe that the pulp be ground on one day and pressed the next, as not only colour but general richness in quality results from exposure. The dark colour which an apple a.s.sumes on being cut is due to this cause, not as supposed to the steel knife, for the change mentioned is equally certain with a silver one. In the now almost exploded plan of scooping apples, the pulp of even sour apples becomes sweet by the process.

As the juice is exuded from the press it falls into a trough beneath, which is divided into two parts by a grating with small holes, by which the particles of pulp are separated, and from this the clearer fluid is conveyed to the cask.