Brewing - Anyone ever make alcoholic beverages w/ wild fruit?

[bcubed]

Lizard wondered about this. Where he lives, there's lots of apple trees growing wild, and fruit from them is free--it eventually just falls on the ground usually from lack of interest.

Now, lizard is hesitant to eat these much, because of worms (apples untreated with pesticides get worms--just that simple, though the worms are probably better for lizard than the pesticides). He wouldn't, however, be all that grossed out if it were made into cider or brandy.

Anyone give this a go (whatever fruit or found ingredient)? Theoretically, any starch/sugar source would work, but "fermented dumpster diving" doesn't sound like anything appetising; "fermented wild apples" might.

[tryptamaster]

swim jsut mixed baking yeast with sugar water abd after a week he had some good ole ethanol. he didnt sue wild fruit because of fears of pechtin turinign into methanol.

Reputation Comments on this post:

True that. I had to read it twice because of your spelling, though. But it's good advice nontheless

[Jasim]

There are methods for fermenting fruit more naturally. Fruit will ferment on it's own to produce low amounts of ethanol. But yes it will work.

[helikophis]

I have found that gathering wild/feral/untended fruit is a wonderful thing, in general. I have never once found a worm in an apple that I gathered. If it has a hole in it or a soft spot or anything like that, leave that apple behind! Not just apples either, wild/feral/untended grapes, strawberries, pears, cherries, plums, sloe, mulberries, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, anything! They're all great. It's amazing how much food is just out there to be gathered. All of these can be eaten, used in baking, or fermented.

My home city has fruit trees on practically every block, and the only people who bother to eat them are myself and a small group of friends, possibly some homeless people, and the birds. It's not just fruits either, there are edible roots, seeds, greens, medicinal herbs, poisons, and psychoactives out there that are just waiting for you!

It's an amazing world.

[Potter]

Avoiding bugs in wild apples is simple, look for the holes and eat around them. For the most part the grubs that infect apples enter through the bottom and stay in the core, easy enough to cut around. If you see a large hole in the side, once again cut around it. Not all scars on the exterior are caused by grubs that burrow, after you open up a few apples, you'll know what to look for.

If you are fermenting, you do want to make sure to remove bugs as they, their poo, and the brown bruises they leave can be a source of not so great microorganisms, mostly the acid producing kind that can turn a batch to vinegar. This goes for bruised fruit in general. At the same time there is no reason to waste a piece of fruit because of damage, a few quick cuts of the knife and you've got some fine fruit. Don't worry about every little spot of brown, just the biggest ones.

Pesticide free fruit is wonderful! Nobody and their girl spent a good portion of the summer harvesting public fruit trees and were astounded at how much two people could haul back. We've got a cabinet full of canned goodness and a freezer full of frozen fruit, gallons of wine running and all at the cost of sugar and jars. Especially with wine making, when you start out you'll loose batches from all sorts of things you didn't think of, if you didn't pay for it, you won't really mind. Nobody lost 10 gallons of cider to fruitflies, it was sad, but not any real loss. Next year they won't make the same mistake.

Nobody hunts mulberries by laying out a giant sheet under the tree and banging the branches with a stick, moments later pounds of berries pour from the sheet to the bucket, along side a whole lot of spiders. We solved this by laying the berries out in the sun for an hour or so letting the buggies run away before processing.

The bestest part of wildcrafting in cities is all the amazingly stupid conversations...

"are you going to eat that"
"why yes, this is an apple"
"they grow on trees?"

"How do you know those aren't poison"
"well I'm guessing that they wouldn't sell grapes in stores if they killed people."
"what if someone did something to them?"
"you mean like spray bug killing poisons on them?"

"How can you be sure they are safe?"
"well this is called fruit, fruit is good for you. That ::: points to the 40 of malt liquor the drunk is holding::: is alcohol, alcohol is bad for you, says so on the label."

"Those are safe to eat?"
"nope, cherries will kill you dead, we're collecting them to protect the children"


Love.
Potter.

Reputation Comments on this post:

funny and informative

[helikophis]

Great post Potter, sorry I can't give you rep for it cause I have to "spread it around" first.

I especially like the quotes!