Mobilejuicing.com brought its high tech apple juice rendering machine to the Lower Similkameen last week to process nine bins of apples from a Cawston orchard.
The $200,000 unit - the price includes a truck and generator needed to make it mobile - can process up to 16 bins a day - and more if necessary said owner / operator Kristen Wurtele.
The juicing machine does it all - grinds the apples to a pulp, pumping the slurry onto screens that are stacked seven deep into a 40 ton hydraulic press that recovers 70 per cent of the apple’s juice.
The product then goes to a flash pasteurizer where the juice is hit with 78 degree Celsius heat for 15 seconds. From there it goes to a holding tank and from there it flows into bags.
Coarse filtering does not remove all the solids; the consumer is left with the choice of using clarified juice, which occurs through settling, or shaking the container to mix it up again.
The finished product keeps up to a year on the shelf without refrigeration, and for three months on the shelf after being opened.
“We went through organic certification recently,” Wurtele said, “so we are now able to process organically certified apple juice, which should be good news for Cawston growers.”