Strawberry wash/ brandy

[Sponge]

Hi just curious if any one has tried doing a strawberry wash/brandy I am currently attempting it now and was after any input from others and criticism

So far I have bought 4 trays of second for $24 and once the green bit was removed and sliced up I have about 15litres or one and a halfish buckets worth I am going to stew them slightly to break down the strawberry a bit add water check to see what specific gravity is and add dissolved auger if it is too low

I will use ec1118 yeast
I have pectinol enzyme (do you think it will be needed I'm not sure of how much pectin is in strawberries)
DAP yeast nutrient
And I was going to check and correct ph before pitching yeast (can anyone tell me what the ball park should be)

All up it should be 50l of wash

One last thing the ec1118 yeast packet says to rehydrate at40-43 degrees Celsius for 15 mins that sounds high to me am I wrong and that's normal?

[Sponge]

Don't worry about the yeast question I found the info I needed

[MacStill]

I believe strawberries are one fruit really high in pectin, might want to check that out mate and you should be ok :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[Sponge]

Ok mac I will look into that thank you I did add 50gm of pectinol which is within the recommended range for 50litres :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[bayshine]

Let us know how it goes as I've been thinking about doing strawberry brandy for ages but haven't got onto any cheep enough :crying-blue:
I wouldn't stew the berries but freeze them over night and blend them up as fine as I can and would also boost them with some sugar depending on what sg per volume I wanted :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Anyway just my thoughts , cheers

[bt1]

Gee be keen to hear on this one as it develops...normally only do strawberry infusions and they're a winner at Xmas time.

keep us posted please
bt1

[Sponge]

Ok so far bay shine the picture is how many strawberries I used they were seconds from the farm just north of joondalup on waneroo rd it cost $24 or I bought them as 4 trays and they just put them in the box for me.

I did end up adding 8.5kg of sugar to the wash as The specific gravity was only 1.015 in 50litres of wash that sugar brought it up to 1.076 I don't know if that is because it is the start of season or that's how much sugar you will always get next time I will double the strawberries and try your suggestion of freezing and blending them up fine.

Everywhere I look on the net for pectin count tells me that strawberries are low pectin value fruit so I might not of needed the enzyme but I'm sure it wouldn't hurt. :pray:

It is currently at a steady bubble rate of a bubble every 5 second but that's heaps faster that when it started :happy-partydance:

Also the smell is fantastic when the government got home last night she got upset that I used them all in the wash lol :laughing-rolling: and saved none for her.

I will keep everyone updated as it goes along

[bayshine]

Looks good sponge :handgestures-thumbupleft:
I think strawberries might be low in sugar as ex grower mate told me the first and last pic of the season were the sweetest as the middle season pick grow the largest and the least sweatest :think:
Looking forward to your progress :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[mattcoffs]

when the government got home last night

haha, that's awesome! :)) Haven't heard that before!

I'm curious to how this will turn out, sounds like it could be worth a shot.

[slodki]

Any updates how everything went?

[Sponge]

Ok well it turned out really really well I ran the wash through my 4 plate 4" bubbler but I think I ran it too slow I still pulled 91% abv during the run the smell off the still was amazing and strong to start with but still remained through the hearts just not so strong I used the very middle heart jar and soaked fresh strawberry pieces in them then diluted down to 20% and added sugar syrup to make a snaps which my sister and girlfriend devoured the following weekend the rest of the hearts is on medium toasted French oak at 5grams approx 1.8 Litres at 65% I reduced the oak because it was in chip form not dominos but time will tell how it goes :pray:

I get to have a sniff and a taste this weekend between flying home Saturday and heading out to the next shut on Sunday :happy-partydance:

I still got a mac rum waiting to be distilled I think I need to work less :))

[Zak Griffin]

Good work mate :handgestures-thumbupleft:

I just hope that 'your sister and girlfriend' are two different people :laughing-rolling:

[Prunus]

Hej,

strawberries are not easy to handle. If you can, run them on a complete stainless steel rig. In this case copper negotiate the flavours, cause the best flavors
of strawberries are based on sulfurics. In Europe you won´t find a good tasting strawberry brandy, cause all rigs are out of copper.


regards

prunus