156 



THE ESSENTIAL QUALTFIES OF GOOD CIDEP.. 



The report recently issued by the Board of Agriculture 

 upon the Distribution of Grants for Agricultural Education 

 contains an account of some investigations in the manu- 

 facture of cider carried out at Butleigh by Mr. F. J. Lloyd, 

 F.I.C, F.C.S., on behalf of the Bath and West of England 

 Society, and the following observations on some of the 

 results have been summarised from Mr. Lloyd's notes. 



The essential conditions of good cider in the order of 

 merit or importance are enumerated thus — first, flavour ; 

 secondly, good appearance, which includes both colour and 

 clearness ; and lastly, keeping quality. How to obtain these 

 conditions has been the object of the experiments at 

 Butleigh. 



To obtain flavour it is well known that two conditions 

 must be observed. First, the introduction into the juice of 

 any substance which w^ould impart an unpleasant flavour 

 thereto must be prevented. If perfect purity of the juice 

 could be insured, then it becomes evident that the flavour of 

 the resulting cider would depend either upon the original 

 flavour of the apples or apple-juice, or upon changes which 

 took place during fermentation. The flavour doubtless 

 depends to a certain extent upon the original flavour of the 

 apples, for if cider is made from one variety of apple only, 

 and if this has a special, distinct, and marked taste of its 

 own, such, for example, as the Foxwhelp, this flavour of the 

 apple will be present in the resulting cider. Evidently, then, 

 the flavour of other varieties of apples which may not be so 

 marked must still contribute to the flavour of the resulting 

 cider. 'I.'hese flavouring compounds form an infinitely small 

 part of the original juice, and their true flavour only becomxes 

 marked when all the sugar has been converted into alcohol. 



