Yes, but it's a tough row to hoe. You can chop apples up in a food processor, and then put the pomace into a big coffee can with a bunch of holes punched in it. Put a big plywood disk in and squeeze it with a big C-clamp.

Other folks get a juicer- but take the seeds out first, as you don't want them shredded into your cider.

A couple of seasons of this and you'll start looking at real cider presses, which is what happened to us.

Applenut

new elf:

There is no practical way to make apple cider without first grinding the apples and then using a basket press with pressing bags to hold the pomace while the press squeezes out the juice.

I have a large screw-type press, and use a garbage disposal for my grinder. This works fine, but it is best to quarter the apples before feeding them into the disposal because you want to do it really fast. Garbage disposals overheat after about 20 minutes continuous use, and you have to wait about 15 minuted for cooldown before the thermal protector can be reset. So I feed quartered apples into the disposal just as fast as my little fingers can move them. Discharge is into clean, plastic 5-gallon buckets lined with large nylon pressing bags from Happy Valley Ranch Co. in Kansas. I can easily do 5 full gallons of cider in an hour if I have someone to help me with the apple cutting.

Then I take a break. Plastic jugs of cider go into the freezer, and are withdrawn as needed during winter months.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Yes, certainly 'tis the cider season. We pressed about 20 gallons in a couple hours yesterday. We also use the infamous Yellman Grinder to do our grinding. I'm getting better at my timing. I only popped the thermal breaker once.

We use a pack press powered by a 6 ton hydraulic jack. It quite a beautiful sight when you put that first pressure on the press and the juice seemingly waterfalls down the racks. Making cider, plus the smell of green chile roasting, are some of the true pleasures of living in New Mexico.

Happy fall!

Don

Don:

Don't forget Mama Josie's Ay Caramba! Jalapeno Apple Pie (it has slices of Jalapeno) wedged into the top crust). One of the joys of growing apples in Southern California.

Applenut

I use a "Juiceman Jr." electric juicer to make cider, tomato juice, and other fruit juices. It was cheap -- $49 on sale at K-mart a few years ago, and I've made many gallons of juice with it. It works great!

Yesterday, I made Asian Pear/Apple cider with Korean Giant pears and Arkansas Black apples. It is yummy. I picked about 2/3 rds of a five gallon bucket of fruit, and ended up with about two gallons of juice. No peeling, coring, or seeding, you just have to wash and quarter or cut up the fruit small enough to go into the chute, and trim out any bad spots if present -- most fruits will go in just fine quartered, unless they are exceptionally large. What comes out the back are the seeds and a fine, dryish, sawdust like mixture of peels, stems, fibers, and cores. The only things which it CANNOT handle are large, woody pits from from cherries, plums, peaches, and apricots -- you MUST remove these first.

Total processing time including picking, washing, and juicing was under an hour.

Tomato juice is slightly more laborious, because tomatoes do not juice as efficiently as apples or pears, and I find it necessary to re-process the seed/skin/core mixture three or four times in order to extract all possible juice out of it, which does add slightly to the time it takes. However, this juicer is SO MUCH LESS WORK than other things I've tried in the past, including a press-type extractor and a "Squeezo" hand-cranked juicer.

There are quite a number of juicers in a wide price range on the market, but frankly, my little, cheap, mass market model works great for my needs -- I put up about 40 to 50 quarts of tomato juice every year, a dozen to two dozen quarts of grape juice, and I usually make some cider every year just to drink fresh with homemade cinnamon-sugar donut holes.

Applenut--

Sign me up.

Don