|
For the alcoholic beverage known in the U.S. as hard apple cider, see cider Apple cider is the name for a non-alcoholic beverage produced from apples by a process of pressing, especially in the United States and parts of Canada. It is more sour than conventional apple juice, and cloudy, retaining the tart flavor of the apple pulp which is lost in conventional fruit juice production.
Production In the United States, well over 12,000,000 gallons of apple cider are pressed each year by very small operations, with medium sized industrial presses producing many times more than that for mass distribution. In United States of America, cider was traditionally fermented, but that alcoholic apple drink is now referred to as hard cider or as alcoholic cider. Today in the US (and Canada to some extent), cider is a nonalcoholic beverage; a subcategory of apple juice traditionally made from early-harvest apples which have a lower sugar content and are more acidic, thus cider has a more tart, tangy taste than apple juice. It is generally (though not always) unfiltered, giving it an opaque appearance from suspended solids. It is occasionally still sold unpasteurized, which is considered to have a better flavor, however, due to the possibility of salmonella and E. coli infection, most apple cider is pasteurized. Variations
What is "cider"? It has been suggested that in United States of America the differences between apple juice and cider are not legally well established *, but in American common use, cider is usually understood to be the cloudier, unfiltered and less processed of the two products. Nevertheless, some large U.S. corporations continue to market the same clear, filtered, processed, and pasteurized apple juice as "apple cider", particularly in urban supermarkets, where customers might be less likely to notice the difference. In reaction to this lack of distinction, a clarifying turn of phrase has been developed: "If it's clear and yellow, that's juice there fellow; if it's thick and brown, you're in cider town." It is not clear where exactly this phrase is used aside from being spoken by Ned Flanders on an episode of The Simpsons. See also | ||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||
 |
|
| |