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ubza_1234

cactus fruit question

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long story short i had a crazy idea to make a cactus fruit liquor so i need some info.

First up! My first thought is to use fruit from the prickly pear because of its abundance, but what other fruits are large, tastey and abundant? When i say abundant, i mean can i get enough of them to fill say, at least a 1.5L jar? Being large is to make it easy to harvest and process.

anyway, thoughts anyone?

Cheers!

Edited by Evil Genius

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dragon fruit!

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cereus (peruvian apple) would be sweeter & crisper taste than Opuntia fruits

i found Opuntia fruits a bit bland & furry compared to Cereus also no glochids to deal with

Edited by mac

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i had a mad feast of cereus fruits the other day... similar to dragon fruit... the only problem is they are more powdery/grainy than juicy... at least the vars that i've tried.. they can fruit in fair abundance & they're a pretty common plant around the place... you might be able to get a fair haul if you drove around some suburbs & asked owners if you could pick em... might be a bit of a challenge though

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Is there any problem with the flavour degrading? Cactus fruits tend to lose their flavour really quickly, and not knowing the cause of this loss of flavour, I don't know whether the flavour would be preserved in beverage form. Also, did you mean liqueur, not liquor? When I first read it I was thinking of liqueur, but then realised you said liquor, which would be illegal to actually do, but an interesting concept, san pedro brandy :drool2:

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pilocereus have heaps of fruit and a sweet red/purple juice you could look into those. The juice looks irresistible.

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yes, i ment ment liqueur :S specificly distilling is illegal. Other forms of purifying alcohol are fine, like freezing.. And... Umm... Well, thats all i know in terms of purifying alcohol :P

i dont even know how compatible cactus fruit will be as a liqueur, but what the hey, i'll give it a go :) hopefully the alcohol may help to preserve it. I hope to get it close to 30% if possible so that should help and the low juice content may work to my advantage. Usually i need to use 85%-92% alcohol because if i use just 40% it will come out at 15%-25% which is ok, but if done correctly, will have a much better mouth feel at the stronger alcohol content. If it turns out i plan to bring it to a melb meet :D wont be ready till say, autum-winter meet, but should be worth the wait! :D

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yes, i ment ment liqueur :S specificly distilling is illegal. Other forms of purifying alcohol are fine, like freezing.. And... Umm... Well, thats all i know in terms of purifying alcohol :P

i dont even know how compatible cactus fruit will be as a liqueur, but what the hey, i'll give it a go :) hopefully the alcohol may help to preserve it. I hope to get it close to 30% if possible so that should help and the low juice content may work to my advantage. Usually i need to use 85%-92% alcohol because if i use just 40% it will come out at 15%-25% which is ok, but if done correctly, will have a much better mouth feel at the stronger alcohol content. If it turns out i plan to bring it to a melb meet :D wont be ready till say, autum-winter meet, but should be worth the wait! :D

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Freeze distillation is still a form of distillation, and I always assumed it was illegal in Australia, but I could be wrong. Not that I expect to be arrested for making myself a batch of eisbock, but if one was making something stronger like applejack, I would expect them to get done for more than just selling without a liquor license if they got caught.

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www.nationalgeographicstock.com/comp/MI/001/1147282.jpg

holy poop thats a dam sexy fruit :D i like the pink bits :o

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i'm pretty sure if you brew up a sugar water wash its legal, to put that fermented product in the freezer is legal, and to tip it upside down and to collect the alcohol that drains out is also legal too. I could be wrong too. To behonest, i dont realy care :S besides, you'd need a dam strong wash, (not hard to get over 18%-22% if done correctly with the right yeast) and a dam cold freezer to get it freeze the water and leave the aalcohol, especially if the sugar isnt completely fermented out...

Anyway, i love the sugestions already! Your making my job alot easier :D

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I just edited out the parts that were about the ingestion of berries from mescaline containing cacti! I know that they are probably not active and might also be legal somehow but i want to be on the safe side. No Discussion about the Ingestion of ANY Part that was harvested from mescaline containing cacti! Any other cactus berries are fine and can be discussed freely though. bye Eg

Edited by Evil Genius

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I would like to make a margarita cocktail with a high% agave tequila & dragonfruit, if my plants fruit this season i may give it a go :drool2:

Edited by mac

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the cactus wont flavour your booze at all. Here in Taiwan one of the islands (Penghu) makes wine/liqueur out of Opuntia dillenii fruit. I will post a picture of hte box if interested, but its just a wine bottle with cactus (in chinese) written on it.

What you want is the colour. use red fleshed fruit. Dragon fruit would work wonderfully, but avoid the white fruit type, use the red or purple types. Cactus fruit are generally not hugely falvourful like other fruit, so its hard to really create a huge cactus taste in meads and the like....but maybe if you have enough it could be done? Dragon fruit are some of the best tasting IMO. and they also have the bulk and advantage of being cultivated a lot for fruit production already.

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interesting.. Perhaps it may be a matter of doing something like soaking the fruit pulp in the alcohol for a while, filtier soak that alcohol in fresh fruit, repeat untill a reasonable amount of colour and flavour comes thru...

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yes i think that would work far better/easier than distilling it or trying to make a wine/mead. you wouldnt need as much fruit either.

Maybe grab a decent vodka and polish it then add some pulp and filter?

ps. red cactus fruit makes you shit all pretty like...dont worry you are not bleeding.

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hahaha ya. Well i have aquired some 92% alcohol which from past experience is perfect. Remember that fruit has a whole lotta juice in it so that can drop the alcohol down by half usually, then you add your sugar and other additives and it usually drops it down more. Finally, water can be added if absolutely needed but by that time its usually good ;)

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you would think you would need a lot. but i used 1botu 1/10 of a red dragon fruit for colour in a 1 liter bottle of vodka. if colour is all you want, dont need much. if taste is what your after, then ya you will need a good amount. but cacti are not so flavourful anyway....using mango and red dragon fruit, now that is yummy!

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