Apples and more apples

Finally a weekend when I did not have too many things on my to-do list. I’ve got everything completed except the blog post, and here we are!

We have an abundance of apples. One of my apple projects was dried apple slices. Dried apples are a handy, healthy snack, but a few apples make a lot of slices.

Apples in the dehydrator

To use more apples, I have been experimenting with apple juice. My first attempt was to follow the recipe in the Ball Blue Book. It called for 24 points of apples and two quarts of water, cooked together “in a large saucepot” until the apples fell apart and then strained through a jelly bag. In preparation, I bought a jelly bag and frame and at Farm and Fleet.

I started cleaning and weighing apples and quickly realized that a saucepot large enough for 24 pounds of apples would be enormous indeed. I scale back to a more reasonable 6 pounds, which just fit in my largest stock pot. I dutifully added 2 cups of water and turned the burner on. If you think this sounds a lot like making apple sauce, you’re right. When the applesauce was done, I assembled my new jelly bag and frame. To my dismay, I discovered that the jelly bag held about a quart, and I had roughly two gallons of applesauce to strain. I put in as much applesauce as the jelly bag would hold and waited. And waited. Eventually, I had 1 tablespoon of apple syrup.

I started diluting the applesauce so that there would be some fluid to go through the jelly bag, planning to boil off the extra water later if I needed to concentrate it. I initially thought that I might get applesauce as a byproduct, but no, much of the flavor had washed out. I had to wash the jelly bag often to get out the particles that clogged it up almost immediately. The apple juice, while a beautiful light pink, tasted exactly as one would expect washed applesauce to taste. It was not only watery and flavorless, but also thick from the pectin that had cooked out in the process. I did not attempt to concentrate it.

I declared that a failure and got out my juicer. The juicer was new the last time I used it, purchased on the recommendation of America’s Test Kitchen. The trouble was that the juice was foamy and pulpy. I addressed those problems by a two-step filtration process. I poured the whole pitcher, foam and all, into the strainer. I stirred the foam to encourage it to go through. I then put it through the jelly bag, again rinsing it at regular intervals. I boiled the resulting juice, skimming off the scum that rose to the top. I put it through the strainer and the jelly bag. I poured it into a jar. It still had a lot of flocky precipitates in it. After it sat in the refrigerator overnight, I poured off the top and threw out the bottom. I had used a tray full of apples and ended up with less than a quart of juice.

Apple juice, take 2: juice on right, waste on left

“You make juice to use up apples,” Terry remarked. And that established the theme of making apple juice: embrace the waste.

I invited Jane up Saturday afternoon to help me. The time-consuming step was cutting up the apples. We did that together until we had the first big bowl of apple wedges ready. After that, Jane cut the apples, and I did everything else. 

Jane cutting and cleaning the apples

Me putting the apples through the juicer. Metal strainer and pitcher on the right

It took a minute to put the apples through the juicer. I learned on the second batch that if I didn’t clean the fine-meshed screen between every pitcher of juice, the juice would be pulpy. It took 10 minutes to clean the juicer. While I did that the juice settled in the pitcher so I was better able to pour off the bottom while leaving the foam behind. Yes, there was still juice in the foam, but I just threw it in the mulch bowl. Embrace the waste.

Juice with foam

I put the juice in my big stock pot. My plan was to put it through the jelly bag only once, and that was after boiling it. My other duties as assigned included taking the waste bowl to the mulch bin, which from my previous experiments was now a breeding ground for fruit flies and wasps. I also brought in more apples and washed them.

Interestingly, Macintosh apples to not oxidize as readily as the other three varieties we used (Liberty, Jonathon, and Macoun).

Juice from Macintosh apples

I skimmed the foam off the pot as it heated up. I am pleased to report that the juice went right through the jelly bag. After the first liter or so, I didn’t even bother with rinsing the bag. While I was straining the juice, Jane washed the dishes and tried to clean the counters. I'm pretty sure the kitchen will be sticky at least until the cleaning ladies come on Tuesday.

I let it settle again overnight, but I wouldn’t have needed to. There was very little in the bottom of the pot. We got 6 quarts of juice. If we paid ourselves minimum wage, it works out to be $10/quart, assuming the apples, electricity, and gas were free. You don’t make apple juice to save money. You make apple juice to use apples. Embrace the waste.

The outcome of 3.5 hours of work by two people