News 2023 10 20
Greetings to all, The cider apple harvesting and processing season goes on, to be honest, it is approaching it's peak. With a decent blow of wind, and there are plenty of these here in Normandie, the apples which are close to maturity or they are done already goes down and then the sprint is on. It is a race with time to get them into baskets of 12.5 kg and then into the 25 kg bags. So far, on 16th of October our team has won "gold", I would say for the first stage of the competition. 4.7 tonnes of apples are already pressed resulting in 31 hl (3 000 l) of moût/fresh apple juice, yield being then around 66%. This is a decent ratio. Densities were around 1045 which is also quite nice, especially for the first pressing of the season.
Otherwise we are finishing the first passage of the last orchard and when it is done, by Saturday hopefully, we will restart the three orchards we have done already. We cut the grass there and prepared it for the peak of the season, so we should fly through them. It is very important that before the main "fall" of apples comes all bad apples which have fallen during the summer are disposed and grass is cut as short as possible.
The invitation to join us for the season still stands. The weather got naturally a bit colder and unfortunately also more wet but that is life, at least here in la Manche. The big caravan is still empty and ready to be used and we have 5x10 m party tent up with kitchen, hanging out area and dry toilet in the back. The conditions are rustic, but lets say doable, food healthy, tasty and drinks first league. Did I already mentioned that 50 m from our spot is an artistic micro-brewery?
Take care everyone and fingers crossed to see some of you here, don't forget 2023 season will happen just once!
Sincerely for Cidrerie Jara from Vale de Saire,
František
