6 Apple juice

A.G.H.LEA

6.1 General background

Apples are amongst the most widely grown and widely consumed of tem-
perate crops, taking second place only to grapes. The annual world apple
crop is of the order of 40 million tons (Way and McLellan, 1989), of which at
least five million tons is processed into juice (Possman, 1986). Fresh apple
juice is a most unstable material both from the chemical and the micro-
biological point of view. Consequently, the distinct types of apple juice which
are available on the market largely reflect the preservation technique used for
their production.
Pure apple juice, which is unobtainable outside the laboratory, is a colour-
less and virtually odourless liquid. Within seconds of its expression from the
fruit, however, it undergoes a sequence of enzymic changes to produce the
colour and the aroma with which we are familiar. Such raw juice is occasion-
ally found for sale on a farm-gate basis, particularly in North America where
it is known as 'apple cider'. (It should be noted that the term 'cider' in Britain
(and equivalent terms in France and Spain) refers to fermented apple juice
which will not be discussed in this chapter. Excellent reviews of this subject
are available elsewhere (Beech and Carr, 1977; Proulx and Nicholls, 1980;
Durr, 1986; Lea, 1994.) The raw juice can be protected from microbiological
degradation for a few days by storage in a refrigerator, or may be protected
indefinitely by pasteurisation or by the use of permitted preservatives. Such
juice is nearly always turbid, brown in colour, and tends to sediment on
storage. A clear juice can be obtained by filtration, fining or the use of
pectolytic enzymes before bottling.
An alternative product which has recently become popular on a commer-
cial scale is prepared by flash heating or by the addition of ascorbic acid to the
raw juice immediately after pressing, followed by pasteurisation or aseptic
packaging. The effect of this is to produce a juice with an aroma much closer
to that of the fresh fruit than in other types of apple juice. The turbidity is
high, but the cloud is light in colour and is relatively stable to sedimentation.
Such 'opalescence' is generally regarded as a positive quality factor.
The greatest volume of apple juice, however, is processed into 70 Brix
apple concentrate before its eventual reconstitution. It may then be stored
and shipped around the world as a relatively stable product occupying
approximately one-sixth its original volume. The aroma which is inevitably

P. R. Ashurst (ed.), Production and Packaging of Non-Carbonated Fruit Juices and Fruit Beverages
Chapman & Hall 1995
154 NON-CARBONATED FRUIT JUICES AND FRUIT BEVERAGES

removed during concentration is often recovered as an 'essence' and traded as

a separate commodity. Peaks and troughs in fruit production may thus be
evened out, and the juice packer can ensure reliable and consistent quality by
blending together both concentrates and essences from different sources.
Concentrate also lends itself to blending with other fruit juices or to the
manufacture of carbonated apple beverages. The technology and chemistry
involved in producing both opalescent juices and juices from concentrate will
be considered in detail later in this chapter.

6.1.1 Juice extraction

Apple juice production begins with fruit harvesting, transport and washing
facilities (see chapter 7). It is unusual for fruit to be grown specifically for juice
production except in parts of Central Europe, and most juice is derived from
second-grade or 'cull' fruit which is unsaleable on the fresh fruit market. In the
United States, where there is a significant commercial apple sauce industry,
much juice is produced from misshapen fruit which is too irregular to pass
through the mechanical peelers and corers. Lower quality juice is also
produced from the peels and cores themselves. However, all fruit must be
sound and free from gross damage or contamination. In particular, it should
be free from mould or rot which can lead to flavour taint, patulin contamin-
ation and microbiological instability. Certain types of mechanical harvesting
equipment can lead to excessive bruising and skin penetration which cause
off-flavours or even infection by pathogenic microorganisms. This is particu-
larly the case where animal manure slurries have been used in the orchard, or
where the fruit comes into contact with bare soil during harvesting. In such
cases, it is good practice for fruit to be washed with clean water in the orchard
before transport to the factory. Ideally, fruit for juice production should have
been picked when fully ripe, with dark brown seeds and no residual starch as
detected by an iodine test. Fruit which is picked slightly under-ripe for the
dessert market or for controlled atmosphere storage should therefore be
allowed to mature for a few days at ambient temperature before pressing
(Figure 6.1).
As described in chapter 7, the fruit is washed, milled to a pulp, and then
pressed using traditional pack presses or horizontal piston presses of the
Bucher-Guyer type. In the USA, screw presses are still popular for apple juice
production. Belt presses, both of the traditional Ensink type and of the
serpentine Bellmer-Winkel design, have also established a considerable
market niche for apple juicing in Europe. Diffuser extraction systems, using a
current of hot water to extract the soluble solids from apple slices, were
intensively investigated in Germany and Switzerland in recent years
(Schobinger, 1987). However, they have proved unpopular in practice except
in South Africa where the very firm 'Granny Smith' apple is well suited to
them.