Ever made bochet?
Discussion
I recently read about bochet, which is mead made from honey which has been heated to the point of caramelisation. In the past, I've used juice from the garden apples to make cyser (fermented apple juice with honey) which was superb, so this year I am making a bochet cyser similar to this.
Smelling fantastic
Smelling fantastic
Basically, yes. Just juice the apples, add honey, yeast and nutrient and off it goes. You could make it with juice from concentrate too, I guess. It made a massive difference last time, because our juice was mainly bramley and made a thin, sharp cider. The honey gave it some body and flavour, and was especially good fermented dry and bottle conditioned to be sparkling - treat like a sparkling wine.
With the caramelised honey, you just cook it in a pan until it gets the colour and flavour you want (it's exactly like making toffee) and then EXTREMELY CAREFULLY add some apple juice to dilute it and make it runny enough to add to the main batch of juice. Adding juice to very hot syrup gets you a reaction a bit like adding water to acid or hot oil, so you have to put in tiny amounts, keep stirring and be prepared to jump back! I put some pectic enzyme in too, to avoid any pectin haze from the juice added to the hot honey.
With the caramelised honey, you just cook it in a pan until it gets the colour and flavour you want (it's exactly like making toffee) and then EXTREMELY CAREFULLY add some apple juice to dilute it and make it runny enough to add to the main batch of juice. Adding juice to very hot syrup gets you a reaction a bit like adding water to acid or hot oil, so you have to put in tiny amounts, keep stirring and be prepared to jump back! I put some pectic enzyme in too, to avoid any pectin haze from the juice added to the hot honey.
I'm using a cheap domestic juicer - I am pretty sure that it is nowhere near as efficient as a proper press, but it works well enough. Bruised is not a problem, windfalls are fine, but I reject any that have started to rot.
It will be interesting to see how this year turns out. We got nothing last year, because I picked the apples and stored them in the shed, and the rats got in and ruined the lot. The year before, when I made the cyser and cider, we had a massive harvest of Bramleys. I've still got nearly 40 litres of plain cider from 2009, but while it's drinkable, it's nothing to write home about - if I'd known that the cyser would have been so much better, I would have put honey in the lot.
It needs to be used up. I've got about about four litres of sloe gin steeping at the moment, so the plan is to give that a couple of months on the fruit then bottle it and chuck all of the sloes into the barrel of old cider. Slider Still not sure whether to then bottle that flat or try to get some bottle conditioning into it. A bit of sugar and active champagne yeast would probably fire it up OK.
This year, the bramley harvest is poor, but the other trees were quite, so we have a much smaller amount of juice, but maybe better quality. Certainly sweeter and less acid.
I'm thinking of trying to find room in the garden for a couple of proper cider apple trees, that would make all the difference to the flavour of the straight cider.
It will be interesting to see how this year turns out. We got nothing last year, because I picked the apples and stored them in the shed, and the rats got in and ruined the lot. The year before, when I made the cyser and cider, we had a massive harvest of Bramleys. I've still got nearly 40 litres of plain cider from 2009, but while it's drinkable, it's nothing to write home about - if I'd known that the cyser would have been so much better, I would have put honey in the lot.
It needs to be used up. I've got about about four litres of sloe gin steeping at the moment, so the plan is to give that a couple of months on the fruit then bottle it and chuck all of the sloes into the barrel of old cider. Slider
Still not sure whether to then bottle that flat or try to get some bottle conditioning into it. A bit of sugar and active champagne yeast would probably fire it up OK.This year, the bramley harvest is poor, but the other trees were quite, so we have a much smaller amount of juice, but maybe better quality. Certainly sweeter and less acid.
I'm thinking of trying to find room in the garden for a couple of proper cider apple trees, that would make all the difference to the flavour of the straight cider.
Gassing Station | Food, Drink & Restaurants | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff