Plum on target with this wine and gin

This year I am finally going to try my hand at plum wine. I have drunk homemade plum wine; it has a mellow almost brandy-like quality quite different from other fruit wines, but I have never made it myself. This is the recipe I’ve put together from internet sources but if anyone has any tips I’d love to hear them!

Plum wine

2.5kg plums (ripe but not mouldy) 4 litres water

1 tsp lemon juice

1.5kg sugar

1 packet Champagne yeast (available at brew shops)

Wash and sterilise everything you are going to use. Wash and pick over the plums, discarding any stems, and put them into a large pot. Mash them with a potato masher to break them open.

Bring the water to boil and pour over the plums to kill off any bacteria that might be on the skins (you can do this in batches with a kettle). Put a lid on the pot and leave for 24 hours.

Add the lemon juice and sugar to the plums and give them a good stir. Follow the instructions on the yeast packet (re-hydrating if necessary) and stir into the plum mixture. Give it another stir in an hour.

Cover the pot and leave it somewhere warm to ferment for 4-6 days, giving it a good stir once or twice a day.

Use a brewing bag (like a jelly bag) to strain out the solids and transfer into carboys fitted with airlocks. Leave to ferment for 2 weeks.

After 2 weeks, rack your wine into a clean jug for another round of fermentation. Racking basically means using a siphon to transfer the wine so that any sediment is left behind.

Leave the wine for 2 months and then bottle into sterilised bottles.

Leave the wine for another 10 months to develop that mellow flavour.

Take a small glass after dinner and enjoy the rewards of your labour and patience.

I love damson jam and I love damson gin. This is one I have made and it is a lovely treat in winter, so well worth making in summer when the plum’s little cousins are in abundance.

Damson gin

500g damsons 250g caster sugar 1 litre gin

Wash and pick over the damsons and then mash them a little to roughly break them up. Put into a clean 2 litre jar or divide between two smaller jars.

Add the sugar and gin, put on the lid and give it a good shake. Give it another shake once a day for a week until the sugar has all dissolved, and then leave in a cool, dark place for around 2 or 3 months.

Decant into a clean, dry bottle and seal. The gin is ready to drink now, although the flavour will develop over the coming months. You can keep it for a year, although it is doubtful it will last that long.

Cheers!