Wine juices – regulations
Apple juice, pears and grapes.
The juices of these fruits are usually not sweetened, you can say, that they are pasteurized in their pure natural state. Only in unfavorable years for wines and fruit can some sugar be added. For this, a small amount of sugar is dissolved directly in the juice – only when the juice is very acidic, in the water – and mixes with all of the fluid. To achieve the right juice flavor, you can generally rely on your own intuition (on 1 liter of juice approx 5-10 g of sugar) or you can determine the sugar content and acidity like this, as described later.
Raspberry juice
Raspberries contain relatively little acid, therefore they are most often mixed with redcurrants, which are characterized by high acidity. By making pure raspberry juice, tartaric acid is added thereto: on 1 liter of juice 0,6 liters (600 g) water, in which it dissolves beforehand 15 g of tartaric acid. Sugar is added to this and to enrich the taste 1/4 liter of red wine. The more the juice is sweetened, the more it becomes syrup-like and must be diluted again to drink.
If the juice contains a lot of sugar (that is, for one liter of more than half a kilogram of sugar), there is no need for additional pasteurization. If he is in the cold, keeps well for some time. For longer storage, however, it is better to pasteurize the juice.
Currant juice
The juice is seeping through the cloth, it sweetens (about half a kilogram of sugar per liter), it is ennobled 1/4 liter of red wine, bottles are filled with it and pasteurized. Red wine can be replaced with rum or plain vodka (two to four glasses per liter).
Cherry juice
Cherry juice is sweetened to taste. One liter of juice is added to it 1/4 liter of good red wine, 4 g cinnamon and 4 g cloves. After eight days, the juice is filtered and bottled pasteurized. The flavor of the juice can be improved by adding a few mashed cherry stones, but you shouldn't take too many of them, because they contain poisonous prussic acid (the taste of bitter almonds).
The juice from the Black Elderberry
The squeezed juice is sweetened (per liter 200 g of sugar) and pasteurizes.
The pomace can be made into a puree. Wild elderberry is extremely stable, it is very difficult to induce a fermentation process in it, and besides, it needs to be warmed up, so that the sambunigrin contained in it lose acid, destructive to the gastric mucosa.
In fact, all these provisions are the same. A certain variety can be achieved by mixing the fruits with each other, for example apples with blackberries, strawberries with rhubarb, blackthorn with pears, and currants with raspberries. The addition of various spices can significantly expand the palette of flavor shades.
Here are some suggestions.
The fruit aroma of the juices will gain intensity, if they are enriched with liqueur or vodka made from the same kind of fruit; pear wine distillate is added to the pears, for mirabelles, mira-beam vodka or mirabelle or apricot liqueur, and to the apples – Calvados. Other, but the addition of various high-percentage alcoholic beverages gives no less rich-tasting effects, such as rum, whisky, cognac, and juniper, gin or vodka. However, it should not be forgotten, that the alcohol is intended only as a spice and cannot turn fruit juice into a kind of liqueur.
Addition of white wine, red or pink, depending on the color of the juice, enhances its aroma. Here, too, the proportions must be properly balanced.
The spices are added to the pulp before juicing, or to the ready-made juice and after the appropriate spice has achieved the desired effect, the juice must be filtered again.
For all fruits, which contain small amounts of natural acids, you should add lemon. Besides, there are no general rules. It's best to try the various accessories yourself. They harmonize well with each other:
– candied orange peel and mountain ash,
– candied lemon peel and melon,
– wanilia and agrest,
– anise, fennel and Hungarian plums,
– cloves and cinnamon and cherries,
– ginger and melon,
– coriander and pear and quince,
– juniper and cumin and apples,
– nutmeg and oranges.
Just like when cooking or baking, also in this case you should keep in mind the rule: better too little than too much, because it is very easy to spoil the delicate taste of fruit juice with too much spices.
They are needed for making fruit juices:
-bottles or jars with twist-off caps (e.g.. jam stoics or ketchup bottles)
-rubber caps or stoppers
-fruit crushers:
a meat grinder with an attachment or an electric juicer or a press, mill, fruit press or – for the simplest method – cloth and stool - a special pot for pasteurization of bottles
-bottle filling funnel (enamel, aluminum or plastic)
-graduated cup, wooden spoon for mixing, hood, clean cloths, kitchen scale, rubber filling hose, sugar, paraffin or liquid beeswax.
