Organic Apple Juice and Cider
Up until the nineteen fifities, so the story is told, Coombe Farm used to provide cider for the local constabulary who would arrive in their car and carry off several flagons. Then the old apple orchard was grubbed up under government grant aid - such were the agricultural fashions of the day. Now we have replanted the orchard with 131 trees, all old varieties, cookers, eaters and cider apples with such evocative names as slap ma girdle! The trees are just starting to produce apples which we plan to press for juice and cider or cook into crumbles.
The Old Cider Press and Threshing Barn
One of the barns here on the farm is an old threshing barn with massive doors either side so the wind could blow the winnowed chaff out the door leaving clean wheat behind. Then sometime in the eighteen hundreds a sophisticated twin screw cider press was installed.
In those days agricultural labour was paid for largely in cider. Unfortunately parts of the barn's roof and walls were allowed to collapse in the early nineteen forties. The walls were constructed from cob, a mixture of stone, clay and straw which is an excellent building material but no use if allowed to get wet. And the roof was thatched from local straw.
Now we have renovated the old barn, again helped by Countryside Stewardship, building up the cob walls and putting on a new green oak and thatch roof. When the first juice flowed off the press we had a small tasting, which turned into a small party!
You can read more about how we now use the barn for weddings.
2009 Apple Pressing
"A big thank you to the Sustainable Villages crew & Vigo juice processing equipment for making it all happen so spontaneously, and thanks to all our neighbours and local friends who helped us press, especially Rob, who works at Middle Coombe Farm, for his encouragement and finally not letting another year pass without doing an apple pressing! The whole process was wonderful, from apple picking - big thanks to the Amory and Grabham families for their orchards - to cider juice pressing on our 150 year old twin screw press. We have it on reliable evidence that Middle Coombe was one of the biggest cider producers in the area and supplied the local constabulary with their tipple!
On a more modest scale, there's about 100 gallons of cider juice all bubbling away in the barn and a good quantity of delicious drinking juice underneath the stairs ready to be offered to our guests. We fully intend to continue the whole social occasion every year as well as pruning, and wassailing. We also hope to expand the village event, where many people were introduced to apple juice for the first time. "I've never tasted anything like it" was the common cry from all who came, many bringing their own apples, thankfully saved from rotting away on the ground." - excerpt from Apple Pressing Course, Autumn 2009 Coombe Farm newsletter
The above pressing took place in 2009, and the cider was very successfully drunk at all of our 2010 weddings. This year, the cider from our April 2010 pressing will be ready for drinking in June (2011); due to the harsh cold winter, the fermentation process has been slower.
We look forward to another community cider pressing this October (2011)
