Cherry liqueur at home: recipes and cooking features

2024 Author: Isabella Gilson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:14

Cherry liqueur is a great homemade alcoholic drink that is perfect for any occasion. Cooking it is very simple, you just need to know some of the tricks of the process and its features, which we will consider below.

What is liqueur

Not everyone correctly imagines what cherry liqueur is. This drink is an alcoholic product that is made on the basis of alcohol, which, as a rule, is vodka or homemade moonshine.

It should be noted that you can buy such a drink at any wine and vodka store, however, if you make it at home, you can enjoy a product that will be better not only in taste, but also have a brighter aroma and color.

There are a lot of tricks that make cherry liqueur especially tasty and intoxicating, but the main secret of quality lies in the use of natural ingredients, and not the chemicals and artificial colors that the store product is made of.

Cherry cooking methods

There are a large number of recipes for this drink, and many of them involve different technologies for preparing the drink. All of them have one thing in common - excellent quality ripe cherries are used as the main ingredient.

As for cooking methods, the most popular is the infusion of berries on alcohol, which is cognac, vodka, moonshine, and other strong drinks. If you want to make a low-alcohol drink, you need to use the berry fermentation technique. To do this, they should be covered with sugar and sent to a warm place for the formation of a natural process.

In ancient times, the ancestors were engaged in the preparation of kirschwasser - a drink made by fermenting a dark variety of cherries, combined with ripe cherries.

And, finally, another technology for making a cherry alcoholic drink involves distilling it from homemade mash - this way you can get real vodka made on a berry base.

General principles for making liquor

In order to make a delicious drink, you need to know some basic principles of its preparation. First of all, the main ingredient is prepared - berries. They need to be folded into one large container and pour the required amount of alcohol. Now the container with berries and alcohol must be sent to a cold place, closed. For a certain period between berries and alcohol there will be a necessary interchange of properties. After the alcohol acquires a cherry taste,flavor and turns raspberry, the drink is ready.

In order to change the taste and color characteristics of the product, many chefs experiment with the volume of water, alcohol and sugar, as well as with varieties of berries. Practice shows that in order to give a special taste and aroma, to prepare ripe cherry liqueur, it is very successful to use various spicy spices such as cloves, cinnamon, etc. In some cases, the recipe even provides for the use of vanillin.

How much sugar do you need for a cherry? As a rule, the most appropriate amount of "sweetener" is determined in the recipe individually. However, despite this, there is still a classic volume, which is considered the most optimal by experienced moonshiners - about 400 g per kilogram of fruit. This ratio of sugar and cherries makes the drink moderately tart and strong enough to get drunk from a small amount of alcohol.

How to choose the main ingredient

Practice shows that the most delicious drink is made from properly selected berries, because their original taste is of no small importance for the final result. So, which cherries are perfect for making liqueur?

To create a very tasty and truly intoxicating drink, you should choose fruits that are juicy, fragrant and, most importantly, ripe. They should not have any damage, especially rotten areas. As for taste, for the preparation of a home-made alcoholic drink, it is advisable to use fruits that have a sweet and sour taste.taste.

You can make a cherry liqueur with or without pits. If you follow the first option, then at the exit you can get a drink with a more original, spicy taste, reminiscent of almonds. However, being a fan of such a special taste, it should be understood that bones contain certain substances that, with a very long interaction with an alcoholic beverage, can not only spoil the overall taste, but also turn into a real poison.

For the preparation of the drink, experienced moonshiners advise taking fresh fruits. However, some recipes call for frozen cherries and even dried cherries.

Classic liqueur

Everyone who has ever tasted a cherry-flavoured homemade alcoholic drink at least once in their life must have dreamed of reproducing it on their own, and without much effort. This liqueur recipe provides for the preparation of this drink in the simplest and most classic way.

To create it in this way, you need to take a three-liter glass jar and put a kilogram of pre-washed ripe cherries into it. Bones from them do not need to be removed.

Fruits must be covered with a couple of glasses of sugar, and then poured with cognac so that the alcoholic drink covers the fruits completely, and the container is filled with it to the very edges. After that, the container with the future drink should be tightly closed with a lid and sent to a cool place, for example, in the cellar. In order to make the taste of the liqueur more pleasant, every two days it is necessaryshake the container with it.

After a couple of weeks, the berries and the resulting tincture should be divided among themselves. The fruits should be covered again with a couple of glasses of sugar, mixed and set aside again for a couple of weeks.

As soon as the allotted time has passed, you need to strain the mass and drain the resulting liquid to the previously prepared tincture. Now the almost finished liquor needs to be closed with a lid and sent to a cold place for 3-4 months. After this time, the drink will find its best taste and will be ready.

On vodka

In order to make a cherry liqueur on vodka, you need to thoroughly wash a liter jar of fruits with seeds, then pour them into a three-liter glass container and cover with the same volume of sugar. Now the berries must be poured with high-quality vodka so that the alcohol reaches the level of the “shoulders” of the container. In this case, the contents of the jar should not be mixed.

Now the container must be tightly closed with a lid and sent to a cold place for several months (3-4). After the allotted time, a delicious alcoholic drink will be ready. Admirers note that vodka liqueur prepared in this way is very rich, it has an amazing aroma, as well as a beautiful color.

As for the strength, this indicator for a drink made according to this recipe is about 30-35 degrees. In the event that, as a ready-made option, you need to get a liqueur that has a mild taste, you should take a base with a small strength index.

Sspices

In order to make a spicy alcoholic drink at home, you should take a three-liter glass jar, washed cherry fruits and 400 g of granulated sugar. These two ingredients must be laid out in layers in the container in such a way that the berry mass occupies more than half the volume of the entire container. After that, the mass must be sent to a warm place. After some time, the fermentation process will begin in it. It should be made so that it lasts about a week.

After the allotted time, it is necessary to pour high-quality alcohol into the cherries with sugar so that it fills the jar completely. After that, spices should be added to the total mass, among which it is necessary to use half a cinnamon stick, as well as about a dozen cloves. If desired, and in the presence of such an ingredient, you can also add a pinch of wormwood color - it will give a special unusual taste to the drink.

In this form, it is necessary to infuse the resulting mass, first tightly covering it with a lid. After three weeks, the liquid must be drained, laying the fruits separately. After 3-4 months of infusion of an alcoholic drink in a cold and dark cellar, it will be ready.

Kirschwasser

The old recipe for Kirschwasser was known in antiquity. The original taste of this drink can conquer any gourmet. In the modern world, it is especially popular in such European countries as the UK, France, Germany and Switzerland.

In order to prepare it, absolutely all connoisseurs of the original recipe for this drink recommenduse fruits of a special variety. Both cherries and sweet cherries chosen for it should have the darkest color, very sweet taste and small stone.

At the initial stage of preparing kirschwasser, you need to take its two main ingredients (cherries and cherries) in equal proportions, wash them and then remove the seeds. Now the fruits should be ground in any convenient way so that a homogeneous mass is obtained from them.

After that, they should be put in one dish made of wood (this is done according to the original recipe) and let it brew in this form for 4 weeks. Throughout this period, every other day you need to open the container with the contents and mix its filling in order for the air to escape.

After the mass is ready, it must be driven away like ordinary moonshine, and then poured into glass or, even better, clay bottles, and then let it brew for several months until it becomes strong.

Practice shows that in the field of bar art such a drink serves as an excellent basis for preparing delicious and original cocktails.

It often happens that at the exit the drink acquires a slightly unpleasant aroma and its taste is somewhat specific. In this case, you should overtake it again - this way you can achieve an excellent result.

Alcohol free

It may seem surprising to some, but you can make a liqueur without the use of alcoholic beverages. To do this, take a couple of kilograms of fresh berries, wash them thoroughly, separate them from the stalks,and then put in a container for cooking. Before this stage, you can also preliminarily remove the seeds from the fruits, but you can not do this - then the drink will have an original taste and a special aroma.

After preparations, you need to add 800 g of sugar to the berries, mix everything thoroughly, pour in a glass of purified water and leave it in this form in a warm place. First, you need to install a water seal on the container, which at home can be replaced by an ordinary rubber glove.

In order for the fruit to ferment better, in this liqueur recipe, it is suggested either to pre-pierce each berry with a needle, or to slightly knead the fruit with something before going to a warm place. During fermentation, the glove will fill with air and inflate. When it falls again, it will be necessary to strain the resulting mass through cheesecloth, squeeze the fruits well and, spilling them into glass containers, send them in a sealed form to a cold place for several months.

The ripe cherry liqueur prepared in this way will be ready in just 4-5 months. In finished form, to your taste, it is more like wine. As for the possible storage period, it can be maximum three years.

Fragrant

The liqueur made on the basis of two types of combined alcohol will learn especially fragrant and unusual in taste. To prepare it, you should take a kilogram of ripe and properly selected berries, rinse them. Now you need to separate half of the total mass of the berries and remove the seeds from them. After that, the fruits must be combined inone dish, add half a kilogram of granulated sugar to them, and then, after mixing, let it brew for a certain period.

As a rule, this process takes several days. Ultimately, the sugar crystals should completely dissolve, and juice should form from the berry mass. As soon as this happens, alcohol should be poured into the berries. To prepare a tincture according to this recipe, add 750 ml of fruit brandy and a third of this volume of rum (both light and dark can be used). For a change, brandy can be replaced with the same volume of cognac.

Now you need to mix the ingredients well, close them tightly and send them to a warm place to infuse for one month. After this period, you need to strain the mass and pour the liquid into a glass container. Experienced moonshiners do not recommend trying such a drink earlier than six months later.

Useful qualities of liqueur

Perhaps now someone will be surprised, but home-made cherry liqueur has a number of beneficial properties for the body. However, in order for them to appear, it is necessary to consume it in small quantities.

In particular, the regular use of such a tool allows you to stabilize the level of hemoglobin in the blood, as well as the metabolic process.

If you drink cherry liqueur without vodka in small quantities every day, then this process improves the composition of gastric juice, as well as stabilizes the level of appetite in humans. In this casefood will be much better digested.

Some immunologists claim that modest consumption of the drink during the cold period will significantly improve the body's immunity. This is due to the fact that the berries on the basis of which the drink is made contain a large amount of vitamins and useful components necessary to maintain the normal functioning of the body every day.

What is the optimal portion of the drink? Doctors recommend drinking no more than 50 ml of liqueur before meals every day.

Why the liqueur tastes different

In practice, it often happens that following the same technology, using the same ingredients in exactly the right amount, you get a different drink. What is the secret of this phenomenon? It is quite simple and lies in the fact that the taste of home-made cherry liqueur directly depends on the quality of its main ingredient.

It should be noted that the taste of the finished drink is influenced by the weather conditions under which the berries ripened, in particular, the amount of precipitation - this, first of all, affects whether the fruits are juicy and sugary. The taste of the drink also depends not only on the variety of the berries themselves, but also on the quality and degree of purity of the water on the basis of which it was made.

Practice shows that the taste of cherry liqueur is negatively affected by how much chemical fertilizer was used in the process of growing trees, as well as directly during the ripening periodharvest.