Alcoholic Lemonade

[chum]

Have you guys tried using lemonade fruit? (they are real, not a myth) It should come out even nicer than lemons I would think. The problem is no one really stocks them.

[Chris]

From memory they are expensive.

Aside from that, they tend to be a bit lacking in flavour. Remember that you'll be diluting the flavour by adding 20 odd litres of water. The main feature of them is the lack of bitterness, and the higher fructose levels. The fructose will ferment out anyway.

If anyone tries it, let me know how it turns out.

[NTRabbit]

Have you guys tried using lemonade fruit? (they are real, not a myth)

They are an Orange-Lemon hybrid, but as I understand it will only grow well up in Queensland, hence its difficult to find them anywhere but.

[rwh]

Hey Cat,

If it doesn't ferment, take my advice and get yourself some sparkling wine yeast... mine was called SC-1118 I think.

[Cat]

Yeah, no action in the airlock yet. I'll give it another day or so and then if nothing happens, I'll grab a champagne yeast.

[ernie]

I have added a rasberry lemonade to my (long) list of brews to do. Was down the supermarket the other day and thought I'd do some market research.

So far there has only been mention of the frozen fruit. Can one use canned fruit??

I note that you can get about 500g of the frozen gear for $7-odd or you can get some canned rasberries, 425g for $2-odd. I also spied some fresh strawberries for around $3 for 375g.

Given that I need about a KG of gear there would appear to be a fair price differential between frozen, fresh and canned....

Can anyone convince me to spend $14-odd on frozen rasberries when i can spend $6 on canned or $9 on fresh strawbs? Is there a scientific answer?? Something to do with preservatives maybe??

Many thanks

[Chris]

Fresh are the best. Get them if you can at a reasonable price.

Frozen beat canned, as they are literally fresh fruit, that's been snap frozen. Canned also have syrupy stuff in them, and often preservatives.

If using fresh, put them in a plastic bag, and freeze them. Then thaw, heat, and off you go.

Freezing helps rupture the fruit's cells to release the fruity goodness.

[rwh]

If there are preservatives in the tinned ones it should say so on the tin. As for the syrup... I have no idea what that'd do.

Canned stuff generally does without preservatives as far as I know, the way they preserve it is seal it in the tin, then heat the whole thing to pasteurise it. The possible problems I can forsee would be:

- syrup creating strange tastes
- the pasteurisation changing the flavours somehow

Really though, seeing as you're using sucrose as the fermentable anyway (well, that's what I did) the syrup shouldn't be too much of a problem. I suppose the other side of the argument is that this is a pretty expensive brew as it is, so a few extra dollars for the good fruit might be worth it. Hope that helps!

[Matt Wilbur]

My lemonade has been going for 3 weeks... cant wait for it to stop.

I think I will put a cerveza in the fermenter next, just in case the smell of lemons remains after the lemonade.

[Wassa]

I live in Sydney and hve a lemonade tree that is growing beserk.

Oneof the best citrus fruits i have tried!!!!!!!!!!!

[rwh]

Finally bottled the raspberry lemonade. Tastes pretty sour despite the kilo of lactose. I'll see how it carbs up and let y'all know. Was in primary for 21 days with the EC-1118 sparkling wine yeast, which always seemed to be fermenting relatively slowly. Quite a small yeast cake afterwards too.

Numbers:
Specific gravity at 13/7/06 (cascade kit yeast added): 1.050
Specific gravity at 20/7/06 (coopers kit yeast added): 1.050
Specific gravity at 22/7/06 (yeast starter saflager/cascade ale added): 1.050
Specific gravity at 24/7/06 (EC-1118 sparkling wine yeast added): 1.050
Specific gravity at 30/7/06: 1.030
Specific gravity at 13/7/06 (bottled): 1.010