A hobby pressing log
Eleven old trees, a borrowed press and a notebook on the shelf above the carboys.
A hobby pressing log from a family orchard plot near Vilnius: old Baltic apple trees, a borrowed rack press, wild and cultured yeast, and one long weekend each autumn.
- PlotNorth of Vilnius
- First pressing2020
- Pages in the log4
Inside the front cover
The trees that crop, one line each
Every tree carries a numbered aluminium tag on a low branch, and every crate in the shed is marked with the number of the tree it came from. Two of the eleven have no name that anyone can vouch for, so they have working names instead.
Antonovka
5 trees
Sharp, green-smelling, the backbone of every blend. Two of them crop one year and rest the next.
Lithuanian Pepin
2 trees
Sugar and body, very little acid. Picked last and kept in the cellar into February.
Striped autumn apple
1 tree
The sweetest fruit on the plot and the smallest crop. My grandmother had her own name for it.
Popierinis
1 tree
White, soft and finished by the middle of August. Eaten, given away, almost never pressed.
Bottom Russet
1 tree
Unnamed and older than the family plot. Hard, dull-skinned, and the only real tannin we have.
Big Green
1 tree
Also unnamed. Large, bruises easily, tastes of little. A neighbour's goat is grateful for it.
The back page
How the last weekend of September usually goes
- Pickmid-September
Antonovka first, into open crates marked with the tree tag.
- Sweatten days or so
Crates left in the cool shed until a thumb leaves a faint dent.
- Wash and sortSaturday, 9:00
At the water butt. Rot goes to the compost, bruises are cut out.
- Millall morning
A converted shredder with a steel drum. A crate becomes pulp in a minute.
- Build the stackseven cheeses
Pulp folded into cloths between beech racks, thinner than feels right.
- Pressforty minutes a stack
A few strokes of the jack, then wait for the trickle to slow.
- SettleSaturday night
Covered buckets in the cold shed until the sediment drops.
- Jar or carboySunday
Neighbours' juice is heated and sealed, the rest goes down to the cellar.
Pressing log