Why clean kit makes better cider

You can grow the finest bittersharp apples in the county and still end up with a disappointing brew if your equipment lets you down. Cider is fermented by yeast, but it is spoiled by everything else: wild yeasts that arrive on the fruit and on your skin, acetic acid bacteria that turn alcohol into vinegar, and moulds that lurk in the scratches and crevices of a tired old bucket. These organisms need very little encouragement. A smear of dried apple pulp in the base of a demijohn, or a film of residue inside a siphon tube, is enough to give the whole batch an off-flavour that no amount of patience will cure.

The remedy is simple, cheap and rather satisfying. Clean everything thoroughly, sanitise it properly, and keep the working surfaces smooth and unscratched. Half an hour of preparation before you press will spare you months of wondering what went wrong.

Cleaning first, sanitising second

These are two different jobs, and skipping the first makes the second a waste of time. Cleaning removes the physical muck — pulp, juice, dried lees, the sticky ring around the neck of a fermentation vessel. Sanitising then reduces the remaining microbes to a level where your own yeast can take charge and outcompete them.

Start with warm water and a soft cloth or sponge, plus an unscented washing-up liquid or a little washing soda. Never pour boiling water into a cold glass demijohn, and keep hot water away from plastic buckets and airlocks, which warp and cloud. Work through every item that will touch the juice:

• Fermentation buckets, demijohns, lids, bungs and airlocks.
• Siphon tubing, racking canes, funnels, jugs, stirrers and hydrometers.
• Taps and screw threads, which trap more residue than any other part of the kit.

Draw cleaning solution through tubing rather than merely soaking it. Use a soft bottle brush on necks and shoulders and a slim pipe brush on hoses. Then rinse with cold water until there is no suds and no smell, and stand everything upside down to drain.

Choosing a food-safe sanitiser

Once the kit is visibly clean, sanitise it. A no-rinse acid-based sanitiser made for brewing is the easiest option: mix it to the dilution on the label, give it the stated contact time — usually a minute or two — then drain. Sodium metabisulphite also works well; crush two Campden tablets per five litres of water and add a teaspoon of citric acid, which makes the solution far more effective. Leave it in contact for ten minutes, drain, and do not rinse, as the trace of sulphite helps protect the juice from oxidation.

Thin bleach can be used in an emergency, but it must be rinsed obsessively and never mixed with acid or with sulphite solutions, as the combination releases dangerous chlorine gas. Whichever route you take, mix sanitiser fresh on the day. A bucket left standing for a fortnight is just a bucket of water with ambitions.

Never scratch the plastic

Plastic is the workhorse material of the cider shed, and it is also the most easily ruined. Every scratch becomes a hiding place. Once a bucket or demijohn is scored, no amount of scrubbing will reach the microbes down in the grooves, and you will spend the rest of its life fighting infections that seem to come from nowhere.

• No scouring pads, wire wool, abrasive powders or metal scrapers, ever.
• Use soft sponges and soft-bristled brushes only.
• Do not stack damp buckets inside one another; the scuffing adds scratches and traps moisture.
• Retire anything badly scored. A new fermentation bucket costs very little next to a spoiled twenty-litre batch.

Hold a torch against the outside of a plastic vessel and look through it from the other side. Scratches and dried films show up immediately, and you will spot the grubby patch you missed with the sponge.

The press, the mill and all that pulp

The press is the dirtiest work of the year, and the most important to finish properly. Apple pulp sets like concrete, so clean down as soon as you have finished pressing rather than the following morning. Scrub wooden slats, frames and the pressing plate with a stiff brush and cold water, but never soak wooden parts — prolonged wetting swells and splits them. Give the screw thread a wipe and a little food-safe grease at the end of the season.

Press cloths deserve better than a cursory rinse. Wash them with unscented detergent on a hot cycle, and dry them in full sun if the weather allows, since sunlight is a fine sanitiser in its own right. The scratter or mill should be dismantled as far as is sensible, brushed free of pips and pulp, and left to dry thoroughly before reassembly. Trays, crates and buckets that held fruit on the way in should be washed too — they are just as likely to carry spoilage organisms as anything else.

On the day, and putting things away

Sanitise your vessels and tools within an hour of using them, and keep a bucket of fresh sanitiser and a clean cloth to hand so you can re-sanitise a jug or spoon that has been set down on the grass. Anything that touches the ground touches the compost heap, not the juice.

When the last of the cider has been racked, wash everything straight away, dry it completely, and store it dry. Hang tubing to drain, leave airlocks empty, and stand vessels upside down with a clean cloth over the neck to keep out dust and mice. A dry, airy shed is far kinder to your kit than a damp corner of a garage. Do this properly in October and next autumn you will pull out equipment that is ready to go the moment the apples are ready to press.