Peach/Nectarine/Prune/Pear Cider

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emlou

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Hi,

I am about to start multiple experiments brewing cider from Peaches, Nectarines, Prunes and Pears. I plan to use Nottingham Ale Yeast and to ferment naturally (no boiling or sulphites). I don't have a press so I am just going to juice the fruit, add yeast nutrient, pectic enzyme and pitch the yeast, leave to ferment for a few weeks than rack it, add a sugar solution and bottle it to carbonate.

This will be my first time brewing so I was wondering if this seems like a good method? Or does anyone have any suggestions of how I go about it.

Each fruit will be a different batch of cider and then depending on the tastes, I planned to mix a few batches to see what I get.
 
Thanks GF,

If the prune cider is tart, do you think it would then work well to balance out any sweetness from the peach or nectarine? I imagine that these two will end up quite sweet as I know the sugars are exceptionally high in our produce.

Would you recommend doing a mixture of water and prune for fermentation?
 
Thanks GF,

If the prune cider is tart, do you think it would then work well to balance out any sweetness from the peach or nectarine? I imagine that these two will end up quite sweet as I know the sugars are exceptionally high in our produce.

Would you recommend doing a mixture of water and prune for fermentation?

Well, that hair-raising tartness did eventually age out on it's own, but it took a year or so for that to happen. I used pure prune juice, I'd suggest you dilute the juice with water before fermentation. I think you'd get a better flavour that way too. How much water is something you'll have to figure out.

Now for the peach & nectarine, you might be surprised at how much acid there really is in those fruits; remove all the sugar & a peach is pretty tart. I've never worked with pure peach juice, only the actual fruit. I made peach wine once & it wasn't bad, but not really my 1st choice either. Here's the recipe I used, it's for a 1 gallon batch, I used the 1st recipe:
http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/reques26.asp

If you're working with pure peach/nectarine juice, I'd say dilute it, but again, how much is up to you. I'm still trying to figure out how much to dilute pure black currant juice for a batch of wine. I guess taste testing is going to be the best bet to determine the water to juice ratios.

You could also try chemical acid reduction with calcium carbonate, I never did try that with my prune juice experiment, but it might work reasonably well. As for mixing the prune juice with another juice, I think it would work if used in small amounts; the food industry uses it to enhance various other flavours.

Here's a recipe for prune wine:
http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/request173.asp
I've never tried it, as I conducted my prune juice experiment before I saw this recipe & after the experiment, I didn't really feel like trying it with prunes again. You might get some useful info from the recipe though.

Hope this info helps. Regards, GF.
 
Thanks GF for your help again.

The second recipe you sent, the one for the prune wine, says that prunes are just dried plums which actually isn't true. Prunes and Plums are the same family but different fruit and fresh prunes are a very unique taste but I can definitely see how your prune experiment came out tart.

My initial experiments I am planning to go for natural (no added sugar) in one bucket and the other to have added sugar to see the difference. I will be juicing the fruit myself and it will be fresh off the farm that I live on. I think I'll go for a 80% juice to 20% water for first batch, especially for the prunes and see from there.
 
You might try taste testing the juice to water ratios in a pint glass before committing to a larger volume. Just pour a 1/2 glass of juice & add water to it in measured increments & taste. Repeat until you're satisfied with the flavour.
Obviously this won't give you the exact flavour of the cider/wine after fermentation, but it will give you a pretty good idea as to how it will turn out.
Regards, GF.
 
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