Apricot wine at home: recipe

Content

1 Cooking apricots
2 Important points
3 Masterpieces of winemaking
4 Conclusion

It's hard to find a person who doesn't like ripe, aromatic apricots. They are also used to make preparations for the winter. As a rule, these fruits are used to prepare compotes, preserves, jams, and marmalade. Lovers of homemade wine believe that the most delicious dessert drink comes from apricots. It's all about the unusual taste and amazing aroma.

Apricot wine can be prepared at home without much difficulty if you know the recipes and the specifics of the manufacturing technology. We will try to talk about the basic principles of winemaking in this article based on the most popular recipes. Apricot wine combines flavor and delicate sweetness. But the color palette will depend on the selected variety of fruit. The shades of apricot wine vary from yellowish to amber and red.

Cooking apricots

To prepare apricot wine, you need to take care of the correct selection and preparation of the main ingredient. The fact is that the taste of the finished intoxicating drink will depend on the ripeness and variety.

So, how to choose apricots:

Firstly, the fruits must be ripe and undamaged.The best option is freshly picked from the tree (it is not advisable to pick it from the ground, since apricot wine will have an earthy taste). Unfortunately, apricots are not grown in most of Russia, so you have to be content with what stores offer. You need to choose fruits without rot or mold, otherwise the taste of the wine will be spoiled. After all, damaged apricots may contain pathogenic microorganisms, and the fermentation process began spontaneously and prematurely.
To make the drink, you can use not only cultivated varieties of apricots, but also the fruits of wild shrubs. The taste, of course, will be different: wine made from wild apricots is more aromatic, while wine from cultivated apricots is sweeter.
Secondly, when preparing fruits (regardless of the variety and origin), it is necessary to remove the seeds. This part of apricots contains hydrocyanic acid, which is dangerous to humans. This is a natural poison; drinking wine with seeds can be fatal. In addition, apricot kernels add bitterness and an almond aroma to the wine.
It is not recommended to wash apricots before preparing homemade wine according to any recipe, because wild yeast is found in a light coating on the skin. If the fruits are dirty, simply wipe them with a dry cloth.

Attention! When preparing apricot wine, you need to work with sterile instruments and utensils: pathogenic microorganisms will contaminate the juice and render the drink unusable.

Important points

How to make homemade apricot wine so that it harmoniously combines taste, sweetness and aroma? This is possible if you pay attention to some nuances:

It is necessary to get acquainted with the recipe and understand all the intricacies in order to avoid problems.
To prepare an intoxicating drink from apricots at home, choose enamel, glass or wooden containers. It is not recommended to use aluminum, copper or iron containers, since due to oxidative processes the wine interacts with metals. Enameled dishes must be free of cracks and chips.
Before preparing apricot wine at home according to the recipes given below (and any others), the necessary equipment is washed with hot water and soda, rinsed and dried.
The fermentation process should not be left unattended.
The temperature regime at home must be strictly observed, otherwise, instead of table wine, you will get apricot vinegar.

Any business, and making apricot wine in particular, requires effort and patience. Only in this case will you be able to taste the delicious aromatic drink when it is ripe.

Masterpieces of winemaking

Option one

This is a simple recipe for apricot wine, but the quality of the finished drink is excellent.

For 12 liters of clean water we need:

4 kg of ripe apricots;
4 kg granulated sugar.

Important! Do not use tap water because it contains chlorine.

Cooking method

Peeled apricots are kneaded by hand or ground in a meat grinder with a large grid.

Then the apricot mass is poured with warm water and placed in a warm and dark corner for fermentation in an enamel bowl. Place gauze or thin cotton cloth on top. The wort must be stirred because the pulp rises to the top.
On the second day, foam should appear on the apricot preparation. If for some reason fermentation does not start, you need to add a handful of raisins.This catalyst cannot be washed so as not to remove wild yeast from the surface.
On the fifth day, the wort is filtered from the apricot pulp through gauze folded in several rows and poured into a bottle. The juice from the pulp is also poured into the total mass.

The precipitate that has fallen cannot be removed, since this is wine yeast necessary for further fermentation.
Pour off some of the juice and dissolve granulated sugar in it. You can add the entire volume at once or divide it into two parts. Sugar is added a second time after 5 days. The bottle is tightly closed with a water seal or a medical glove with a finger pierced with a needle is pulled over the neck. Fermentation of apricot wine at home, according to the recipe, should continue in a dark place at a temperature of +17 to +24 degrees for 20-25 days.
After the specified time, the fermentation of apricot wine made at home according to the recipe is completed. This can be determined by the water seal, since gas stops flowing into the water. If a rubber glove was worn, it will deflate and fall onto the bottle. Now the apricot wine needs to be removed from the sediment. This must be done carefully so that yeast does not get into the drink.
Apricot wine poured into a clean container should be left to mature. This stage, according to the recipe, lasts from two to four months. In the room you need to maintain a special temperature regime - +10-12 degrees. At higher temperatures, vinegar is formed instead of apricot wine. During the period of settling, the drink gains taste and aroma.
Wine from ripe apricots at home is removed from the sediment again, after the allotted time for ripening. Strained and filtered apricot wine is poured into bottles or jars and hermetically sealed.

Comment! From the ingredients specified in the recipe, a dessert drink is obtained, the strength of which varies from 10 to 12 degrees.

Option two

According to this recipe, 3 kilograms of ripe apricots will require the same amount of sugar and 10 liters of water. The color of the wine will depend on the variety and intensity of coloring of the fruit.

Recipe step by step

And now about how to make apricot wine according to this recipe at home:

Wipe the apricots, remove the pits and knead them thoroughly with your hands. The result should be a homogeneous, fiber-free mass.
Place in a wide-necked bowl, pour in water heated to 25 or 30 degrees (not higher!). Add half of the granulated sugar called for in the recipe and stir until completely dissolved. We will add sugar in stages during fermentation.
Cover with a thin insect repellent cloth and remove for 5 days. For the fermentation process to take place intensively at home, you need a dark room with a temperature of 18 to 25 degrees. The pulp will rise to the top along with the foam. It must be constantly repressed, otherwise the wine will sour. The fermentation process begins in different ways. Sometimes a foam cap appears after 8 hours. But most often, apricot wine begins to ferment 20 hours after “starting”. In addition to foam, hissing will be clearly audible.
After 5 days the pulp must be removed. To do this, strain the wort through gauze folded in several layers. We also squeeze out the pulp and pour the juice into the strained liquid. At this stage, add 0.5 kg of granulated sugar. We do not add sugar to the total mass, but stir it in a small amount of liquid, pouring it from a bottle of wine.
According to the apricot wine recipe, we do not fill the bottle to the top so that there is room for foam and carbon dioxide.We close the container with a water seal or put a rubber glove with a pierced finger over the neck.
The container must be placed in a dark place with a temperature of 18 to 28 degrees for further fermentation for 25-60 days. During this time, every 5 days we add the remaining sugar twice more. As a rule, the fermentation process of apricot wine at home ends after 50 days. If the apricot wine continues to ferment, it must be urgently removed from the sediment and sealed again with a water seal. If you miss the moment, the wine will be bitter.
When apricot wine, prepared at home, becomes transparent and acquires the required color, it stops foaming, gurgling in the water seal, and the glove is deflated - the drink is ready to be completely removed from the sediment and poured into small bottles. They are pre-washed and sterilized, since any microorganisms have a detrimental effect on wine.

At this stage of preparing homemade wine, you need to taste the apricot drink for sugar, and if necessary, add a little sweet ingredient. In this case, you will have to again keep the bottle under a water seal or glove for 10 days so that the sugar ferments, and again remove the wine from the sediment.

Attention! Many winemakers fix wine with alcohol or vodka, adding no more than 2-15 percent of the total volume: the wine turns out harsher, but lasts longer.

Bottles or jars in which apricot wine will be stored at home are filled to the very top to reduce the amount of oxygen. Close the containers hermetically using lids or stoppers. The prepared apricot drink should be stored in a cool cellar or refrigerator for up to 4 months.If sediment appears during the ripening period at home, remove the wine from the sediment again and filter.

There should be no sediment in the finished apricot wine after 5 months. A drink with a strength of 10 to 12 degrees (unfortified) is stored for about three years. Ripe homemade apricot wine has a unique taste and aroma of fresh fruit.

Option three - with nutmeg

In previous recipes, nothing was added to homemade apricot wine. But if you want to make a dessert drink with an original fruity aroma, you can add vanillin, ginger, cinnamon or nutmeg to it. We will discuss below how to make Muscat apricot wine at home.

You need to stock up on the following products in advance:

ripe apricots – 5 kg;
granulated sugar – 3 kg;
grape table wine – 1 liter;
nutmeg - 1 tablespoon.

This recipe for apricot wine requires 5 liters of water.

Some nuances

Mash the juicy pitted apricots until smooth, add 2.5 liters of water and grape wine. Add granulated sugar to the remaining 2.5 liters of water and cook the syrup. When it cools to room temperature, add it to the base for the future wine. Add nutmeg here too.

How to prepare apricot wine at home is described in detail in previous recipes:

pulp separation;
fermentation for several months;
repeated removal from sediment.

It should also be noted that muscat apricot wine can be served with dishes after three months of aging. The wine is aromatic and its color is golden.

Apricot-raspberry wine, recipe and preparation features:

Conclusion

Making homemade apricot wine, especially if you have even a little winemaking experience, is not difficult. After all, the process itself is practically the same. Although there are nuances, we talked about them in the article.

If you want to “brew” your own apricot drink at home, carefully read the recipes and recommendations for them. Don't try to take large proportions right away. Experiment first and choose the most suitable recipe. And then you can make as much wine as needed. We wish you successful steps in winemaking.