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So, my friend has two cherry plum trees (yellow and red) that went a little nutso this year. ON two separate occasions she invited us to come harvest plums and we could keep what we picked. And particularly the first trip where a number of us showed up at once and we picked with our kids running around and husbands standing nearby chatting, I have to say it was a lovely experience. Both times we came away with 10kg of cherry plums. The first time i made cordial, jam, chutney, froze some because life happened, and i even attempted but failed in making fruit leather.
This second time though i felt that i had enough jam, and chutney to last me for awhile so I decided to make something a little different. I decided to have a crack at plum wine. I'd carefully kept the yellow and red plums separate this time so I figured why not try a red and a white.
I've done beer before, so i had a lot of the equipment already, and the fruit was sitting in my baskets in my lounge. It was time to research wine making from fresh fruit. I have to say youtube is my best friend, I've learned so much from that medium. It's been a long process and in all honesty it's not done yet, i'm not sure if this will even work, but i want to keep record of what I've done so that IF i decide to try it again I have a guide.
To begone with i washed and sorted through the plums, they'd been sitting in the house for a day and as they had been very ripe on the tree i wanted to make sure i had none rotting. While i did this I weighed them, resulting in 7kg of yellow plums and 3 kg in red plums. This meant i was going to need to use the 5 gallon brewing keg for the yellow but I felt the need to acquire some glass demijohns for the red.
IN the mean time though i used my own brewing keg and my fathers to prepare the fruit. Cherry plums being the size they are pitting them would have been a pain so i needed some other way to do it. I went down the path of soaking essentially.
Pour the plums into the keg, add water, pectic enzyme and a campden tablet and let sit for three/four days.
So...
Red plums Yellow plums
3kg plums 7kg plums
1 camden tablet, crushed 3 campden tablets,crushed
1 tsp pectic enzyme 3 tsp pectic enzymes
3L Water 8L water
Stir on occasion is you wish. I will note that at one point if dropped a rubber grommit into the yellow plums, and as such found myself up to my elbows in it fishing it out, this served to get many of the yellow plums actively squished by me because, while i was there, why not.
Three or four days later i managed to acquire my glass demijohns and move don to the next stage. They smelt good when i opened them sweet and fruity. This bit took awhile, in fact i spend a whole day doing this next bit. They musk (I think it's called a musk i'm not sure) needed to be strained through a sieve with a single layer of muslin lining it. I started with the red first, a smaller quantity, quicker results and a sense of achievement before heading into the massive task that would be the yellow plums. Carefully fed through the muslin lined sieve gently pushing it through with a spoon and then gathering the muslin up and squeezing it gently util I was happy i has as much juice as i could get form it, i worked my way through the red plums. At one point i drops the sieve and all the pits form it went into my carefully strained juice, so i continued on as i had been, and made sure to put it through the sieve a second time and get what i'd dropped in it out, the second time through went much more quickly and was much less hassle.
Once I'd gotten through that I puzzled over the next part for awhile, making up my recipe as i am, combining methods I found on youtube I watched the videos again and finally came up with what i decided was reasonable. I needed to dissolve the sugar in some water before adding it to the juice, i had a rough estimate on how much sugar (for every 4lb of fruit, we needed 2lb of sugar, yes i had to convert it too), but the measurement on the water was vague and unhelpful. Who wants to put too much water in their wine?
In the end i decided to just have a go and match the numbers. I needed 1.5kg of sugar for the red, ok i'll use 1.5L of water. At this point it was easy and when i had reached thi same point with the yellow plums i was so releived. (those plums took me 5 hours of near constant processing time to sieve).
To the juice add
Red plums Yellow plums
1.5kg sugar, melted into 1.5L water 3.5kg sugar, melted into 3.5L water
1 tsp yeast nutrient 3 tsp yeast nutrient
Once it's cooled, cos you don't want ti kill the stuff add 5g of yeast. Both got the same amount of yeast, the sachet said for use in UP TO 5 gallons of liquid. I had less so i used one packet in each batch. Let the yeast sit for 15 minutes or so then stir it in. Seal those babies up with your airlock in place and put it somewhere it can bubble away safely.
Now I've seen and heard a lot saying that 6 months down the track it's time to drink it. A friend of mine who makes her own fruit wines says a couple of months ought to do, so i figure i'm going to wait 2 months, test it, rack it, and leave it for longer if i need to. A lot of info out there also says leave it for 12 months before drinking. Not sure if that'll happen.
A few things i need to note here.
I know that one needs to wait to put the yeast in because, well it was midnight by the time i'd finished sieving the yellow plums, i was tired and impatient. Therefore i did not wait as long as i ought to have. The next morning as it is right now I notice there is not bubbling, the red had gotten quite excited quite quickly so i'm thinking perhaps I put the yeast in too soon, as a result, i'm going to add some more if there is not further evidence of action from the yellow stuff by this afternoon. I've read that this is ok and i figure, well if it just sits there and does nothing it's not good to me so i might as well try. I also forgot to use 3 tsp of yeast nutrient in the yellow, adding only the 1 tsp i added to the red, i'll put in the other two when i add the yeast.
I used the hydrometer in both of them before sealing them away, they both measure at dessert wine level, if on the upper range of it, i think the number on both was around the 100 mark, so quite close to tipping up into the table wine range.
Starting potential alcohol - approx. 13%
This is an experiment and i'm going to keep track of how it's gone, where things go right, and where they go wrong for my own record. I would like to make my own brews often if possible.
P.S. Just one more side note, I steralised everything i used, just thought I ought to mention that
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