Development of Red-Juiced Apple Cultivars for Michigan Hard Cider

Research Date
2020
Authors
Amy Bane, Steven van Nocker
Priorities
Disease Management, Product Development
Crop Categories
Apples
Beverage Categories
Cider, Wine

Hard cider is a rapidly growing sector of the Michigan adult beverage industry. As the market begins to saturate, consumers will begin to gravitate towards novelty and specialty ciders. Some non-commercial apple cultivars produce red juice, and our preliminary work has shown that these produce excellent cider and that consumers are likely to be attracted to these. However, none of these red-juiced apple cultivars is perfectly suited to Michigan conditions. MSU has initiated an apple breeding project, called Michigan PureRed, designed to produce disease-free, productive cultivars with fruit that has highly intense, red juice with appropriate biochemical properties and taste for hard cider production, and that are optimized for production in Michigan.

View: FINAL Performance Report Vannocker (PDF)
View: Final Technical Report vannocker 2021 (PDF)

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