Hot off the (cider) press! Wirral Pomona, 2015

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Hot off the Press Autumn 2015

Wirral Pomona Apple Juice and Cider Collective A year of planning and now we’re getting ready for this year’s harvest An Invitation or two... 

You can join us making cider from local apples

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You can bring your surplus apples to us and crush and squeeze the goodness into liquid gold

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You can get your friends, neighbours and family together, collect all the apples you can and have a go with our presses and scratters to make juice together

Inside this issue: Our Aims

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Events and activities

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A member’s story

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Apple days and other events

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The scratter

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The invitation to you

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Contact details

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We founded Wirral Pomona Juice and Cider Making Network in 2014 to make the most of the apples and pears in our gardens, orchards and parks - each autumn, an abundance of fruit falls from the trees, neglected.

The network is a not-for-profit organisation, with a strong commitment to our community and to enjoyable activities: Barn Dances, Harvests, Pressings & Wassails.

HOW DOES IT WORK? -To start with, we are at community events where people can use our machinery to press their own fruit and take away their juice (home cider making?) or leave apples with us to turn into fruit juice or cider, a proportion of which we keep.

WE ARE -a pleasant but slightly eccentric group (with interests as varied as tree preservation, social enterprise, growing food, reducing waste and making wooden clockwork machinery.)

In the process we’ve acquired a back -street cider house, hand-made new designs in traditional hand-powered devices to scrat and press fruit, mostly using recycled materials.

We’ve also been picking fruit and putting stuff in barrels and bottles, with events to celebrate and cider to taste …

The giant cider press, at a barn dance, producing fresh juice from Wirral apples for everyone taking part.

What does our cider and apple juice taste like?

When people taste freshly-pressed apple juice, it’s a revelation.

It tastes fresh and of apples.

Surprisingly, that’s a surprise.

After years of shop-bought, made from concentrate juices, fresh juice

tastes like you thought it should and you realise that the stuff you’re used to, well, just didn’t have that taste!

commercially-made ciders rarely are made purely with apples and have blends of sugar, glucose and fruits.

Our ciders have the same effect— mostly a lot drier than people expect, but overwhelmingly appley. This should not be a surprise, either, but

Our ciders have a range of tastes depending on the type of apple used.

We want to keep that distinctiveness & not blend into something uniform.

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Wirral Pomona Apple Juice and Cider Collective: Tommy’s Tale

When my friend Dave Ellwand asked me if I would like to become a founder member of a group of like-minded people with the intention of constructing a ‘scratter’ and ‘apple press for making cider,’ I jumped at the invitation although I had never even heard of a ‘scratter’, During the course of last summer, the scratter and press were designed and constructed and these pieces of equipment were then put to good use. I enjoyed making the scratter from the first day I started (Geoff and Dave constructed the press) and it makes me very happy to see it giving pleasure to a lot of people.

In my opinion it’s important what individual skills different members can bring to the group, recognising also that many of us have health restrictions: we should feel happy in what we are doing: the basis of the group is to be able to enjoy what Pomona is about. Support is on hand to members who think, “Am I getting out of my depth?” and all members are encouraged to find their best level of involvement within the Pomona group.

I am looking forward to the harvest and pressings for 2015

Tom Tom 2

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Wirral Pomona Apple Juice and Cider Collective: dates and events:

Wirral Pomona will be present with the scratters and presses at Wirral Earth Fest in St Bridget’s Fields, Church Road, West Kirby on 12th September from 11 am to 4:00 pm.

We’ll be with the Wirral Tree Wardens at their demonstration orchard in Brimstage on Sunday 20th September, 11:00 am to 4:00 pm.

Our harvest barn dance and cider tasting is at the Wirral Arts Centre (old church, Brookfield Gardens) Saturday 26th September from 6:30 pm. We’re also available from now to early December at other apple days, pressings, pruning & harvesting events, so if you and your neighbours or local community group can gather all your spare apples, we can show you how to press them and turn them into cider or juice for yourselves. We can lend you the equipment, so long as you look after it, follow carefully all the safety advice and clean it all thoroughly and arrange the transport. We’ll just make a small charge for showing you about juice and cider making and safe use of the press, etc. We want more communities to join in –we encourage community participation and so we minimise our costs to cover just replacement and up-keep of our equipment and storage, etc.

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We’ve had to organise ourselves , as having and sharing fun can be a serious business.

We started by putting together ideas about what we did and why we did it, so others can see if they want to join us. So first our aims:

Wirral Pomona Apple Juice and Cider Collective: our aims 1 To use surplus fruit from local orchards, gardens and green spaces, reducing waste and making best use of available resources 2 To make good quality apple juice, cider and apple cider vinegar for personal use and trade; to provide equipment, facilities and training which will enable members of the public to make their own apple juice products 3 To celebrate the rich cultural heritage associated with cider and juice making; to exchange traditional skills and promote convivial and communal activities while making apple juice and cider.

4 To collaborate with other organisations in raising awareness of local issues around food, trees and waste, preserving and reviving traditional skills and heritage varieties of fruit trees.

Pomona events including apple-harvest barn dances, winter pruning apple trees in Dibbinsdale and a Burns Supper with cider

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Wirral Pomona Apple Juice and Cider Collective: the scratter

secret life of the scratter The scratter minces the apples into small pieces about the size of a grape. These are put onto cloth bags on wooden racks for pressing. Any parts of the scratter which are in contact with the apples are made of oak. Any metal bits, such as the scratters’ teeth, have to be made of stainless steel. Even the glues which we use are special food-grade adhesives and the wooden frame is joined with oak pegs—11th century technology!

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Wirral Pomona Apple Juice and Cider Collective So this is an invitation to individuals and groups to join in.

Making cider and apple juice is a communal activity, so our invitation is to you to get your friends and neighbours to collect the apples growing in your area and make good use of them. Borrow our presses and scratters to make juice and cider (but look after them!!) We can show you how to do it. We also welcome volunteers in supporting local community orchards, doing the 101 jobs needed in keeping the kit and cider house in good order, bottle washing and more!

We tend to make a good time of all the hard work: most of our meetings are cider-tastings with cheese and our pressing events will have live music ( quite a bit of cake, too, I seem to remember) We do some work in local orchards, often followed with something tasty cooked on a wood-fire and a chance to try out some traditional crafts, such as whittling

Contact us at wirralpomona@gmail.com and look out for the Wirral Pomona facebook and blog.

The ages-old* tradition of Wassailing, bringing health and happiness to the orchard and the volunteers. * We started it in January 2013

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