Cider John
Cider John
by Stuart Harrison of Devon, UK
In our part of North Devon, John Symmonds is famous. Famous not in the modern way of fame, in that he is famous merely for being famous, but in the old manner of fame in that he is famous amongst his peers for possessing certain skills and practical knowledge and as a custodian of something special. For “Cider John”, as he is known locally, is a maker of cider, and not just any old cider, but cider made in the manner of cider crafted on small yeoman farms in Somerset and Devon for centuries. The process of “Cider John’s” alchemy is a relatively simple affair, yet it requires certain irreplaceable essentials before commencement.
First find yourself an old stone cider barn, a place dedicated to the apple and it’s juices, and to the equipment necessary to turn a simple unassuming fruit into the concentrated essence of British West Country life. It is tucked away down a narrow road, at the back of an old village, just before the cottages give way to open fields. The barn is a place of Apple worship and of reverence for this fruit. It is “Cider John’s Cider Barn” and it is a place of renown and pilgrimage. Next you must find yourself an ancient and venerable old cider press. This is not a mass produced table top fruit press of the sort found ten to the penny on eBay. Neither is it a modern industrial creation of stainless steel, hydraulics, and precision. This is an ancient behemoth. A veritable mammoth of a cider press, whose place and date of creation are lost in the mists of time. A cider press that could easily crush a man, far taller than a great horse, far wider than a prize bull, far heavier than both combined.
On first sighting it, it looked to me like some form of Medieval siege engine. Dark robust and forbidding. Others have thought it had similarities to a contraption used for inflicting horrible torture, perhaps devised by the Spanish Inquisition. It is made, forged, wrought and sawn from iron and oak. The very stuff of old English legends. It smells of apples, and of wood, and of resins and of oil. It creaks, even when not in use, and it moans when forced to work. It is a living entity and “Cider John” is it’s keeper.
Next you will need to lovingly restore a means of horse powered propulsion, a horse sweep, which will need to be married up to an old Victorian “Apple Scratter”, should you ever be lucky enough to find one at a farm sale or auction house. Most are seized up, abandoned to their rusting, stationary and unloved, fate. “Cider John” is a man who still sees the worth and poetry in such old cast offs and is willing to put in the hours and grazed knuckles to see them return to their youthful functioning glory. He revers such implements, he seeks them out, and he nurtures them back to health.
In England the term “Cider” is only ever applied to hard cider, that is alcoholic cider, anything else is mere apple juice. This cider making game is not at all an individualistic endeavour, it can only be done effectively, collectively. Someone with a press, someone with a barn, a horse to power the scratter, large quantities of apples from nearby orchards, food to sustain the workers, men to turn the cider press screws, shovels for the pulp, music, the presence of those skilled in the art of “cider cheese” making (of whom John’s wife Dianna is one) and then the spectators, for there are always spectators. The cider crew arrives in dribs and drabs ahead of the early afternoon start, but a decent throng of people is always present by teatime. I count myself lucky to be involved.
At this point it might be useful to describe something of the equipment cleansing that takes place ahead of the big day. I’ve read a number of treaties on cider making all of which seem obsessed with sterilisation of equipment. I cannot imagine too much attention being paid to cleanliness in days of yore, and certainly we rarely manage anything other than a decent wash down of equipment with water and perhaps a bit of washing up liquid. We make sure the equipment is clean, but nobody would even contemplate sterilisation. The entire point of alcohol is that it provides it’s own innate protection from harmful bacteria and I have never witnessed any problems connected with a lack of cleanliness when making cider. Pasteurising apple juice is essential, but it would seemingly be sacrilege to attempt to use this process in the making of real cider.
Cider making in our area starts either in late October or early November, depending on the ripeness of the apples. To make cider you must mash your ripe apples to a pulp, load the cider press by making a “cheese”, squeeze out the juice, place it into an oak barrel with a fermentation airlock in the bung, and wait until you hear the first cuckoo (mid-April) before drinking it. That is it. That is the whole process. It is a simple process. No additives are used, no chemicals are added, and the natural yeasts upon the surface of the apple are all that is required for fermentation. Different apples will affect the flavour and strength of the alcohol, as will the location, the soil type and the state of the apples themselves. I always try to use windfalls in my own cider, I find it adds to the flavour, but every locality has it’s own methods and distinctiveness.
The “cider cheese” is a thing of beauty. A layered cake like structure comprised of a carpet of straw with apple pulp piled upon it, layer upon layer. The overhanging straw is then folded back upon itself atop the apple pulp to prevent a collapse, before more pulp, more straw and yet more pulp are added as the structure grows from the base up. It’s a skill, nay an art, in knowing how much pulp to use with the available straw. The straw itself must be long and strong. “Cider John” favours leaving the ears of the wheat or barley on the stalk, and this some say aids the flavour and the process of fermentation. John’s wife Diana is a fine “Cider Cheese” maker. The straw sheaf is cleaned before use on a simple toothed stripping tool, to remove weed, flowers and any unwanted brash.
The air of expectation before the first turn of the screws is something to be experienced. There is a hush, all faces turned to the press. As the iron arms are lifted and placed into the screw lugs the spectators hold their breath. Then as the screws are turned there is a murmur followed by a cheer as the juice begins to flow.
Music, food, some hearty singing from a few bold fools and any remaining cider from the year before are fully employed in making the evening dash past. By nine o’clock there may be two barrels full, with another on the way, although the rate of flow from the cheese has slowed significantly. Much chatter, much laughter, some dancing, the evening is in full swing. It is a place full of character and of characters. It is proper “community”, a word that is often glibly used, but which is truly felt during an evening like this. You count yourself privileged to be at an event like this, in a place like this.
Later, as the rate of flow from the cheese slows, some of the attendees begin to make their way homeward. For others the night is but young. Eventually, with a few last tugs upon the screws, the barn falls into silence and darkness. You can still heard the odd plop into the juice bucket and as the “Cider Cheese” eases, it will gently produce a little more juice in a slow trickle, maybe for a day or two, before it is cut up and disposed of. In days of yore it would be fed to the pigs, but few places around here keep a pig to fatten for bacon anymore, so it is composted.
A year without making cider seems to me to be a year incompletely lived. There is something wonderful about the whole process, and especially in sitting on the porch bench of a summers evening watching the dying embers of the sun fall across the garden with a glass of your own cider. It’s something many, many, generations of Devon folk have done before, and it is something I hope many, many, more to come will also experience. Men like “Cider John” and women like Diana are the very soul of this part of the country, and they, with their hard work and welcoming hospitality, are key to keeping “Proper Cider Making” alive. My wife and I are proud to number them amongst our friends. May God bless them and their apple nectar.