Recipe: Cherry Wine

On Sunday I called home for a Father's day chat with Daddy Macleod and after telling him all about my cherry haul from the previous day he suggested making cherry wine. It wasn't something I'd considered until then, but after a quick bit of researching I realised it wasn't as hard as I'd first thought. Arjan was 100% behind this idea, so we went on the hunt for suitable containers and wine yeast.

The containers were easy enough, first we found 2 big glass jars, one 2.5L and one 5L, and then we were able to borrow an actual 15L fermenting bottle from a friend's dad.

Then came the hunt for yeast. After extensive research into the subject we realised that it definitely could not be just any old yeast, baking yeast, beer yeast and wine yeast are all distinctly different and are selected and bred for their specific qualities. So we began a wild goose chase from shop to shop, each person answering with a "sorry no, but you might find it in this place", until finally we were given a phone number and a name that led us to a tiny shop in a nearby village. The owner was exactly what I'd imagined, a friendly older man with rough hands and a walrus moustache. The shop was tiny and a little chaotic but felt homely and loved, this was clearly the fruits of a lifelong passion. He'd opened for the afternoon especially for us and then took the time to talk us through exactly what we should do and things to look out for, he even told us to call if we had any questions. We left with two packets of yeast and we will definitely be going back sometime, even if just to say thank you. 

The next step was to choose a recipe, so many people had different methods that it was hard to choose one. We went with the simplest and easiest to follow which we found here but we also added a step which was a tip we were given by the lovely shop-keeper, to mix a bit of the juice from the mashed cherries, a spoonful of sugar and the yeast in a small tub so that it activates the yeast, then to add this to the cooled cherry-sugar-water mix. 

Arjan getting messy 

The awesome 15L fermenting bottle we borrowed, complete with airlock.

Mashed cherries in their jars 

They were so juicy! 

The yeast starter, this foamed up hugely a short while later

Boiling the sugar water

All mixed up and ready to go!

Their final resting place in Oma's basement, this was an old ice chest I think.

We now have to wait an excruciating few weeks before filtering and bottling and after that, more waiting! We're keeping everything crossed that they come out well and we don't end up with litres of cherry vinegar on our hands, to find out you'll have to check back in a month.

For now this is the last of the cherry posts, we basically cleaned out Oma's tree today but since selling them we've had people putting in orders! So tomorrow we're moving on to a friend's trees to see what we can muster. Depending on the amount and quality of the haul, you may see some more cherry related goodies in the near future.