Orchards
Damaged fruit and what it costs
Does it matter if cider apples are bruised or rotten?
In short
Bruising costs quality and rot costs more than quality. A bruise is oxidised tissue: it darkens the juice and consumes some of the phenolic material that would have given the cider structure. Brown rot and blue mould are a different problem, because some of the moulds involved produce patulin, a mycotoxin that is regulated in apple juice.
The regulatory limit exists precisely because rotten fruit is not only a quality question. Removing visibly rotten fruit before milling is the single most effective control, because patulin concentrates in and around the rotted tissue.
Frost damage, sun damage and over-ripeness are quality questions rather than safety ones, and each costs something specific.
What each kind of damage actually does
| Condition | What it costs | Whether it can be managed after milling |
|---|---|---|
| Bruising | Colour and phenolics, through oxidation at the damaged tissue | Partly — sulphite limits further browning but cannot reverse it |
| Brown rot or blue mould | Food safety, through patulin; also off-flavours and microbial load | No. Sorting before milling is the control |
| Frost damage | Texture and juice release; frosted flesh breaks down and mills badly | No |
| Over-ripeness | Acid, firmness and pressability; the fruit smears rather than grating | No, though blending with firmer fruit helps the press |
| Under-ripeness | Sugar, and therefore alcohol; starch that has not converted | Only by waiting, which is not available once the fruit is picked |
| Sun damage | A small amount of tissue, locally | Sorting, if severe |
| Pest damage | An entry point for rot, more than direct loss | Sorting removes the fruit that has gone on to rot |
Patulin, and why it is the one that is regulated
Patulin is a mycotoxin produced by several moulds, of which Penicillium expansum — the blue mould of stored apples — is the most important in fruit. It is heat-stable enough to survive pasteurisation and it is not removed by ordinary clarification, which is why control is a matter of what goes into the press rather than what is done afterwards.
Maximum levels for patulin in apple juice and in solid apple products are set in law in the United Kingdom and the European Union, with a lower limit for products intended for infants and young children. The instrument is a contaminants regulation rather than a cider one, and it applies to apple juice as an ingredient.
Fermentation reduces patulin substantially, so a fully fermented cider generally carries much less than the juice it was made from. That is a real mitigation and it is not a licence: the level in the juice still governs, unfermented and partly fermented products do not benefit from it, and the reduction is variable.
Windfalls: the case that is argued both ways
Fruit picked up from the orchard floor is the traditional raw material of West Country cider making, and it is also the fruit most likely to be bruised, soil-contaminated and beginning to rot. Both of those statements are true and the tension between them is real.
What resolves it in practice is time and condition rather than principle. Fruit that has just dropped, from a tree shaken deliberately, in dry weather, onto mown grass, is sound fruit that happens to be on the ground. Fruit that has been lying for three weeks in a wet autumn under an unmown sward is a different material, and no amount of tradition makes it the same one.
The distinction the trade draws — shaken fruit gathered promptly, against fruit that fell of its own accord and lay — is the one that matters, and it is why orchard floor management is a cider quality question as much as a horticultural one.
How much sorting is worth doing
Sorting is labour, and at any scale above a few tonnes it is the most expensive thing in the yard. The economic answer depends on what is being made: a juice or a low-alcohol product carries the patulin risk without the fermentation mitigation, and warrants more sorting than a cider destined to ferment fully dry.
The quality answer is less absolute than it is often stated. A small proportion of bruised fruit in a large press is a small oxidation cost. A small proportion of rotten fruit is a disproportionate microbial and off-flavour cost, because rot brings its own population with it into a vessel that is about to be a growth medium.
The one thing that is not a matter of judgement is fruit with visible mould growth, and that is what a sorting table is for.
Also answered on this page
Questions this page covers, so you can tell at a glance whether it is the one you want.
- Can you make cider from rotten apples?
- Are windfall apples safe for cider?
- What is patulin?
- Do bruised apples matter for cider?
- Should cider apples be washed?
Related
What people ask next
Questions readers ask about the things this page mentions. Each one goes to the section that answers it rather than to a page written to receive the question.
- Can you press rotten apples, and what actually goes wrong if you do
- How do cider makers keep patulin out — By sorting rotten fruit out before milling, because patulin comes from moulds growing on damaged apples. Fermentation reduces what gets through, so fermented cider carries no limit where juice does.
- What does oxygen do to cider
- Can you use windfall apples for cider — Traditional cider making relies on fruit gathered from the ground, and there is nothing wrong with it if it is sound. Rotten fruit is a different matter: brown rot carries patulin into the juice and should be discarded, not pressed.
- Does cider contain patulin — Patulin comes from mouldy fruit and is regulated in apple juice. Fermentation reduces it substantially, so fermented cider carries far less risk than unfermented juice made from the same fruit.
- Why does mouldy fruit matter for cider — Penicillium expansum is the blue mould of stored apples and the principal producer of patulin. Sorting rotten fruit out before milling is a food-safety step and not only a quality one.
Sources
What this page rests on. Where a source is marked as registered rather than read, CiderHQ is recording that the body is authoritative on the subject without claiming to have worked through the document itself. See our evidence policy for what each state means.
European Union; assimilated into UK law and maintained by The National Archives · legislation · passage verified 2026-08-24
Registered because it answers, in law and in a number, the question of what rotten fruit actually costs. Patulin is a mycotoxin produced by moulds — principally *Penicillium expansum* — growing on bruised and damaged apples, and it survives pressing and fermentation. Cider is not lumped in with fruit juice here: it has its own line in the table, at the same limit. That is the sharpest available answer to "does it matter if some of the fruit is rotten", and it is why windfall selection is a food-safety control rather than only a quality preference.
European Food Safety Authority scientific opinions
EFSA · regulator · retrieved 2026-08-24
Registered for the food-safety questions cider genuinely raises: patulin in juice from rotten fruit, sulphite sensitivity, and the toxicology behind additive limits.
The Science of Cidermaking and associated technical writing
Andrew Lea · reference work · passage verified 2026-08-24
Written by a food chemist who worked at Long Ashton on apple phenolics. Unusual among specialist cider writing in that it is primary-research-adjacent: the author is describing work he did, and cites the literature. This is why it is registered at tier 1 for chemistry while a general cider book is not.
National Association of Cider Makers
NACM · specialist organisation · retrieved 2026-08-24
The UK trade association. Useful for industry-agreed definitions and for the voluntary labelling standards its members work to. A trade body has an interest in how its product is described, so CiderHQ cites it for what the industry says about itself rather than for neutral scientific claims.
The New Cider Maker’s Handbook: A Comprehensive Guide for Craft Producers
Claude Jolicoeur, Chelsea Green Publishing, 2013. ISBN 9781603584739 · reference work · bibliographic record verified, not opened 2026-08-25
Bibliographic record verified on 2026-08-25 against the Open Library union catalogue: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2013, ISBN 9781603584739, one edition recorded. That establishes the citation points at a real book in a stated edition, which is what a citation needs and is all it establishes. No copy was opened and nothing is quoted from it. The book itself is in print and not digitised in any open collection; where CiderHQ needs a figure from this territory it uses an accessible research source instead and says so.
Where to go next
- Cider orchards — The rest of the orchard material, grouped by what you want to know.
- Cider apples — The cultivars themselves, with vigour, pollination group and harvest window.
- How cider is made — What happens to the fruit once it leaves the orchard.