Looking for a 5 Gal. Plum wine recipe.

[Hoonakwa]

Hi everyone. My nextdoor neighbour has a large amount of plums and asked if I would like some to make wine with. Any suggestions for a good 5 gal. recipe?

 

[Rice_Guy]

1) double or triple normal pectase at the primary
2) I use mine as a blending ingredient with more acidic, thin body, red color fruit as current. Since you have lots of fruit five pounds per gallon.
3) you are deciding when to pick, plum is one of the fruits that continue to ripen after picked so I pull at grocery store ripe, (fairly firm but sweet, TA 1% pH 3.5) and ripen a week in a flat box (more fruity, gravity 1.050, pH 3.8, TA .8%), then pit and then freeze. Plum will need less pectase if at grocery store ripeness but I aim for more fruity

 

[Hoonakwa]

1) double or triple normal pectase at the primary
2) I use mine as a blending ingredient with more acidic, thin body, red color fruit as current. Since you have lots of fruit five pounds per gallon.
3) you are deciding when to pick, plum is one of the fruits that continue to ripen after picked so I pull at grocery store ripe, (fairly firm but sweet, TA 1% pH 3.5) and ripen a week in a flat box (more fruity, gravity 1.050, pH 3.8, TA .8%), then pit and then freeze. Plum will need less pectase if at grocery store ripeness but I aim for more fruity

Thanks for your input. As a new wine maker, I only understand about half of what you said.

 

[Rice_Guy]

1) for crystal clear wine we add pectin breaking enzyme called “pectase”
3) some fruits (bananas, apples, plums, peaches) are picked fairly green and hard so they survive the grocery store. You will have the choice when to start making the wine and can use fully ripe fruit which will be low on the acids. I am doing a more natural style wine so I combine sour taste with ripe fruity taste.

 

[Hoonakwa]

Thanks for the clarification, . I have made a few batches of apple, and grape. I also made the famous dragons blood wine. This is the first time using fruit picked by me out of my neighbor's orchard. I hope it will turn out a good as the rest of my wines have.

 

[OrchardRoad]

Plum is the first wine I ever made 3 years ago simply because my friend's tree was so full! 1. Get yourself a plum pitter. 2. When you harvest the fruit, float it in a big bucket of weak sani-star solution to kill any yeast or grubbies living on the skin. Pull plums from the bucket as you pit the plums.
15-20 lbs plums. We have Santa Rosas and Goldens. Santa Rosa makes a beautiful wine. Golden with Santa Rosa (mine is Rosa Oro) is epic.
Stick the pitted plums which should be gushy and if not, mash it up, in a big hops bag in your 6.5g fermentation bucket leave it open (secure w drawstring to top exterior of bucket and pour everything in the bag
Heat up 2 cups of water with a cup or so of raisins and simmer for 15 min then puree it all when it cools a bit and add it to the plums
Pour 8 or so lbs cane sugar on top
Heat up about 3 gallons water and pour over all, stir to dissove sugar
Brew a cup of real strong black tea and throw that in
Put in some pectic enzyme and acid blend
I've never felt like I needed to use yeast nutrient but if you wanted to, add it here.
Top up water to almost 6 gallons or so and stir the living heck out of it
Crush up 5 campden tablets and add it.
Next day stir it, check your SG and record that, then sprinkle yeast (I have used D-47, KV11116 and Cotes du Blanc) on top of the must, making sure it makes contact with parts of the fruit that are wet. Snap on your lid and airlock and let it roll for a day before stirring. Some people say stir every day, I forget to stir but my wine still comes out mighty fine. After 5-8 days pull all that fruit out, squeeze the daylights out of that bag (make sure you're good with your hygiene with all this), put the spent fruit in a compost or throw it down gopher holes (I have a theory about this) and rack the beautiful wine off the crap in the bottom and into a 5 gallon carboy and stir hard to de-gas. Let it roll for however long (want it dry dry? want a bit of sweet?) until you get to 1.010 or lower SG Rack again and stir hard. If you want and have fridge space (I have a mini fridge just for this) you can chill it down for 2 days then rack it again to get rid of more lees/yeast. If you like how it tastes and it still has some sweetness you can add potassium sorbate at this point to stop the fermentation. A day after you can add a clarifying agent (clay based) if you'd like, if it's not clear by now. A week later rack again then bottle.
This is the recipe I used from the beginning except the raisins and tea I didn't know about at the time. It seems like a loose Danger Dave.
I drink this stuff pretty much the week after bottling but I have a few bottles that have made it to the two year mark. What tasted just a bit sweet at 1 week is sweeter at 1 year and 2 years later is bordering on dessert. My ABV on this is about 15%. Good luck!

 

[Hoonakwa]

Plum is the first wine I ever made 3 years ago simply because my friend's tree was so full! 1. Get yourself a plum pitter. 2. When you harvest the fruit, float it in a big bucket of weak sani-star solution to kill any yeast or grubbies living on the skin. Pull plums from the bucket as you pit the plums.
15-20 lbs plums. We have Santa Rosas and Goldens. Santa Rosa makes a beautiful wine. Golden with Santa Rosa (mine is Rosa Oro) is epic.
Stick the pitted plums which should be gushy and if not, mash it up, in a big hops bag in your 6.5g fermentation bucket leave it open (secure w drawstring to top exterior of bucket and pour everything in the bag
Heat up 2 cups of water with a cup or so of raisins and simmer for 15 min then puree it all when it cools a bit and add it to the plums
Pour 8 or so lbs cane sugar on top
Heat up about 3 gallons water and pour over all, stir to dissove sugar
Brew a cup of real strong black tea and throw that in
Put in some pectic enzyme and acid blend
I've never felt like I needed to use yeast nutrient but if you wanted to, add it here.
Top up water to almost 6 gallons or so and stir the living heck out of it
Crush up 5 campden tablets and add it.
Next day stir it, check your SG and record that, then sprinkle yeast (I have used D-47, KV11116 and Cotes du Blanc) on top of the must, making sure it makes contact with parts of the fruit that are wet. Snap on your lid and airlock and let it roll for a day before stirring. Some people say stir every day, I forget to stir but my wine still comes out mighty fine. After 5-8 days pull all that fruit out, squeeze the daylights out of that bag (make sure you're good with your hygiene with all this), put the spent fruit in a compost or throw it down gopher holes (I have a theory about this) and rack the beautiful wine off the crap in the bottom and into a 5 gallon carboy and stir hard to de-gas. Let it roll for however long (want it dry dry? want a bit of sweet?) until you get to 1.010 or lower SG Rack again and stir hard. If you want and have fridge space (I have a mini fridge just for this) you can chill it down for 2 days then rack it again to get rid of more lees/yeast. If you like how it tastes and it still has some sweetness you can add potassium sorbate at this point to stop the fermentation. A day after you can add a clarifying agent (clay based) if you'd like, if it's not clear by now. A week later rack again then bottle.
This is the recipe I used from the beginning except the raisins and tea I didn't know about at the time. It seems like a loose Danger Dave.
I drink this stuff pretty much the week after bottling but I have a few bottles that have made it to the two year mark. What tasted just a bit sweet at 1 week is sweeter at 1 year and 2 years later is bordering on dessert. My ABV on this is about 15%. Good luck!

Wow thanks for such a well thought out recipe. I don't have enough Plums to make this so I have resorted to using the 6 lbs I have to make a smaller 1.5 gal batch from the recipes out of the book I put on the recipe forum. Thanks a lot. Next year I hope to get more fruit from the tree and will try this

 

[OrchardRoad]

Yeah, sure. It can be easy to find plums when you start looking around your neighborhood. Most folks don't know what to do with them all and you can offer a perfect solution with a very nice gift at the end. I also gather up all the extra apples in my neighborhood for cider. Oh, I forgot, last year I added two cinnemon sticks to the plums and you can't really tell what it is by taste, but it's made a happy difference in the wine.

 

[toadie]

I made plum wine with Santa Rosas as well. Surprised by how it turned out. The colour was beautiful. I will add that I pitted and froze the fruit to kill the nasties and help break the flesh down. I also added an acid blend and some tannin.

 

[StephB]

Hi all! Great responses! One question from someone who has never made any wine yet but just bought a property with plums/cherries/apples/pears and a a small vineyard
For the plum wine which will be my first ever try- do i have to put the plums? The plums i have are small and yellow

 

[sour_grapes]

Hi all! Great responses! One question from someone who has never made any wine yet but just bought a property with plums/cherries/apples/pears and a a small vineyard
For the plum wine which will be my first ever try- do i have to put the plums? The plums i have are small and yellow

Welcome, StephB!

 

[OrchardRoad]

Hi all! Great responses! One question from someone who has never made any wine yet but just bought a property with plums/cherries/apples/pears and a a small vineyard
For the plum wine which will be my first ever try- do i have to put the plums? The plums i have are small and yellow

Yes, pit your plums. Buy a plum pitter on Amazon- I have a tabletop one with a plunger that is wicked fast, effective and a bit dangerous. I have another handheld one that is messier but can also be used for cherries. Bonus is that your plums will already be pretty squished up with juice everywhere, ready to ferment!

 

[Rice_Guy]

Welcome to Wine Making Talk

. . . a property with plums/cherries/apples/pears and a a small vineyard
For the plum wine which will be my first ever try- do i have to pit the plums?

I pit and then freeze plum till I am ready to process, and plum requires lots of pectase enzyme, ,,,
HUMM you didn’t say where you are located, a post might bring out a volunteer or ten to make wine out of your fruit.

 

[StephB]

Welcome to Wine Making Talk

I pit and then freeze plum till I am ready to process, and plum requires lots of pectase enzyme, ,,,
HUMM you didn’t say where you are located, a post might bring out a volunteer or ten to make wine out of your fruit.

Sicily anyone want to come - grapes will be ready in a few weeks