Chapter 13a. Liqueur Recipes

This recipe is considered among the best liqueur recipes. To start with you need 1½ lb. black cherries, 8 oz. white sugar, 1 bottle brandy, 8 blanched almonds {these are usually added, but personal tastes must decide).

Wash the cherries and let them drain. Pour the brandy into a four-pound Kilner jar (these are best), then stone and halve the cherries carefully and add them to the brandy. Add the almonds if you like them.

Screw down tightly and put in a cool, preferably dark, place for six to eight weeks. Give the jar a good shaking twice a week.

Strain and squeeze and put the liquid into a smaller jar and then put away as before and leave to clear. Then pour or siphon into two wine bottles putting exactly half into each. Then boil the sugar in one pint of water for two minutes. When this is cool, fill the bottles to within one inch of where the cork will reach. Shake well to ensure thorough mixing. Seal and keep for one month.

1 l. damsons, 3 oz. sugar, 1 bottle gin. Wash, dry, stone and halve the damsons carefully and put them in a four-pound Kilner jar. Sprinkle the sugar over them and then pour in the gin.

Screw down tightly and leave in a cool dark place for three months (or two months if you are in a hurry to use the product), giving a good shaking once or twice a week.

Strain and squeeze and put the strained damson gin into a smaller jar, screw down again and put it away to clear. Then pour carefully (or siphon) the clear gin off the deposit putting exactly half into two bottles. Then fill the bottles to within one inch of where the corks will reach with boiled water that has cooled naturally. Cork hard, seal and keep for one month.

1 l. sloes, 5 oz. sugar, 1 bottle gin. Wash the sloes and let them drain.

Prick the sloes all over with a silver, or stainless-steel, fork or large darning needle and put them in a four-pound Kilner jar. Sprinkle the sugar over them and then pour in the gin.

Screw down tightly and put in a cool dark place for six weeks. Give the jar a good shaking once a week.

Strain and squeeze and put the strained sloe gin into a smaller jar, screw down tightly again and put away until clear.

Pour carefully (or siphon) the clear sloe gin off the deposit and put exactly half into each of two bottles. Fill the bottles to within one inch of where the corks will reach with boiled water that has cooled naturally. Mix well by shaking, cork, seal and keep for one month.

4 oranges, 2 lemons, 2 Seville oranges (or an extra ordinary orange and lemon), 4 oz. sugar, 1 bottle whisky.

Peel the fruits and remove all the white pith. Crush well and put the pulp in a four-pound Kilner jar. Grate the rind of one orange (not a Seville), avoiding any white pith, and add this to the pulp. Sprinkle in the sugar and pour on the whisky. Screw down tightly and put the jar in a cool dark place for a week giving it a shake every day.

Strain into another jar and squeeze and screw down again tightly. Then put it away to clear.

Pour or siphon the clear whisky into bottles, putting exactly half into each. Then fill the bottles to within an inch of where the corks will reach with boiled water that has cooled naturally.

Cork hard, seal and keep for at least two months.

6 oranges, 1 lemon, 2 Seville oranges (or an extra ordinary orange and lemon), 5 oz. sugar, 1 bottle gin.

Proceed as for orange whisky.

There is no need to give separate liqueur recipes for each fruit because the same process may be used for all suitable fresh fruit of your choice. The following lists the most suitable fruits for liqueur-making and the amounts given usually produce sufficient flavor though not enough juice to make two bottles of liqueur when using one bottle of brandy. If not enough juice is produced from the amounts of fruit given, make up to the amount required with boiled water, bearing in mind that half a pound of sugar occupies the space of a quarter-pint while one pound occupies half a pint space and so on.

All these liqueurs will have a spirit content of 40° proof which, as we have seen, is a high spirit content.

As we shall be using a spirit of 80° proof, we could make two and a half bottles by using a little more juice, a little more water and an ounce or two more sugar and still have a product of 32° proof which is a nice spirit content.

If at party time economy is essential, three or even four bottles of a liqueur-type wine could be made from one bottle of brandy or, say, cherry brandy, sloe gin or whatever you have in mind, if it were intended to use them up over a weekend or over a three-day Christmas. See 'Making Liqueurs from wines', page 127, and 'Making Liqueurs from Extracts', page 122.

One bottle of liqueur may be made by using exactly half the amounts listed below and a little water.

Fresh fruit	Quantity	Sugar	Brandy
Lb.oz.			1 bottle
Blackcurrants	1	4	,,
Redcurrants	1½	5	,,
Strawberries	1½	3	,,
Cherries	2	4	,,
Raspberries	1	5	,,
Loganberries	1	4	,,
Blackberries	1	5	,,

Crush the fruit by hand, put in a basin and keep in a very warm place for twelve hours, well covered. Strain carefully through several thicknesses of fine muslin or other suitable material. Allow to drain rather than squeeze.

Put the strained juice into a bottle of the same size as the brandy bottle and fill with boiled water that has been allowed to cool. Mix well by shaking, cork hard and put in a cool place for one hour. By this time a deposit will have formed. Pour the clear juice off this deposit, leaving a little juice rather than allowing any deposit through. The deposit may cause permanent cloudiness if boiled with the clear juice.

Put the clear juice in a small unchipped enamel saucepan with the sugar and boil gently for two minutes. When cool put exactly half into two bottles of the same size as the brandy bottle and then fill up with brandy. Add a few drops of boiled water if the liquid does not reach to within one inch of where the corks will reach. Then cork hard and seal after giving a good shaking to ensure thorough mixing and keep for a month at least. If a film of deposit forms at the bottom of the bottles, decant before serving.

This field of liqueur recipes is the most modern and simplest, and I am proud to be the first to offer details of it in a book. All that has hitherto been heard of this method of making liqueurs has been in the form of unadvertised leaflets. It was through one of these leaflets that I stumbled on to what I believe to be one of the greatest boons ever to come the way of ordinary people. True, one needs a bottle of brandy or gin or some other spirit to start with, but as Christmas begins to come along or at party times at any time of the year, reckoning the cost of the drinks bill is always a headache; economy is often essential. Economy frequently means being satisfied with inferior products, but this is now unnecessary. Top-quality products at half the price of commercial products are within the reach of everybody.

The trials I have carried out with these extracts both for making liqueurs and wines have proved one hundred per cent successful if they had not, I would not be passing on details to my readers. I do not publish a recipe until it has been tested several times by myself.

The following are amongst the many extracts known as T'Noirot Extracts. I have added a description to the first four to give you an idea of their value and also an idea of what they are actually made. All are scientifically blended for the purpose for which they are designed and are not in any way synthetic. They do not contain substitutes for the genuine ingredients.

Distillation and maceration of orange zests and green bigarade, caramel.

Distillation of caraway seeds, aniseed, mint leaves and peel of citrons.

Extracts of cherry by distillation and macaration, and hydrolats of fruits.

Ratafia des Quatre Fruits otherwise extract of mixed fruits.

White Curacao	Prunelle
Mirabelle	Sloe Gin
Juniper Gin
(commercial gin flavor)	Yellow Convent
Green Convent	White Mint
Green Mint	Cream of Apricot and others.

Note

The 'mints' above do, incidentally, make very excellent hot drinks for winter time if diluted with hot water at the rate of one bottle of extract to a wine bottle of water in which four ounces of sugar have been dissolved. More sugar may be added to taste and if the flavor is too strong for you when diluted to this extent, dilute even further. I usually make nearly two bottles of hot mint drink from one bottle of extract.

To begin with, most of you will plump for extracts whose flavours you are familiar with sloe gin, cherry brandy and juniper gin. But whichever your choice, the method is the same with all. The extracts cost about two shillings or two and six a bottle and are obtainable from dealers in Home Wine-Makers equipment.

Directions on the bottles of extracts are for making one bottle of cherry brandy (or whichever you choose), from one bottle of the extract and a bottle of brandy (or gin, according to which you are making), and if you want to follow these directions, all very well.

But I fancy that the cost will deter many of you from doing this. Therefore, I feel that you will prefer the following directions.

As we have already seen in this chapter, gin and whisky of 70° proof (forty per cent by volume) may be diluted to 35° proof (twenty per cent by volume), by making one bottle into two, and still have a high percentage of alcohol.

Brandy may be diluted even more owing to its higher alcohol content. By making one bottle of brandy into two and a half bottles of cherry brandy we shall be diluting to 32° proof which is the alcohol content of the higher-alcohol wines.

One bottle of gin may be made into two bottles of sloe gin while one bottle of whisky may be made into two bottles of Ratafia liqueur or, with whisky, almost any of the extracts may be used.

As these extracts are designed to flavor one bottle of liqueur it might be necessary to use one and a half to two bottles of the extract to flavor the two bottles of the wine that we shall be making from the one bottle of spirit. But much will depend on personal tastes. In the tests I have made with these extracts, I found that when one bottle of extract was mixed with a wine bottle full of sugar water (syrup as described later on) and then mixed with one bottle of spirit, the flavor was just to my liking. If the reader prefers a slightly stronger flavor a little more extract may be added.

Select the extract you propose to use and decide on the spirit of your choice, see 'Suitable Combinations', page 126, and proceed as follows. Put one pint of water and six ounces of sugar together in a small unchipped enamel saucepan. Bring to the boil and cut off the heat at once and add the extract. Leave to cool, but give a stir occasionally.

When cool stir well to keep any deposit distributed and, using a glass or polythene funnel, put exactly half into each of two wine bottles of equal size. Then fill each with the spirit. Add a few drops of boiled water (or a little more extract if you wish), if the level does not rise to within an inch of where the corks will reach. Several of the extracts contain a tiny amount of minute solids so that a slight film of deposit sometimes forms during storage. Pour the clear wine carefully or siphon into fresh bottles before serving. Simple enough. Where two bottles have been made, as above, the alcohol content will be high and the product will keep well if the bottles are sealed and stored on their sides.

Where economy demands more than two bottles of liqueur from one bottle of spirit, certain points must be borne in mind. The main one is that if the percentage of alcohol by volume is reduced to below sixteen (28° proof), there is a risk that the wine will not keep for more than a few days. On the other hand, if the bottles are sterilized along with the corks and the bottles are then sealed and stored on their sides, there is no reason why the wine should not keep well until opened. But once opened it should be used up within a few days.

To give a guide to the limit you could dilute safely and still have a nice percentage of alcohol, the limit would be to make one bottle of spirit into three bottles of wine by using more extract, more sugar and water. Such dilution would give you thirteen per cent of alcohol by volume or 22° proof. This alcohol content is that found in less expensive wines.

Extract	Spirit
Red Curacao	Whisky
Ratafia	Whisky
Cherry Brandy	Brandy
Sloe Gin	Gin
(sweetened or unsweetened)
Juniper Gin	Gin
(commercial flavour)	(sweetened or unsweetened)
Extract	Spirit
Cream of Apricot	Brandy
Cream of Peach	Brandy
Cream of Green Mint	Rum or Gin
Cream of White Mint	Rum or Gin

The above extracts and spirits are those usually used together, but there is nothing to prevent you using a combination that you might prefer.

Most of us have stocks of home-made wines and, at party time or at Christmas, we often wonder how we can turn them into 'party specials' and do so inexpensively. The main question always is: how much spirit to add to get a given percentage of alcohol.

Firstly, and in the ordinary way, a well-made wine will not need doctoring of this sort because if fermentation was satisfactory the alcohol content will be in the region of fourteen or fifteen per cent by volume (24° to 26° proof). This is the alcohol content of most commercial wines; indeed, some are lower in alcohol than this while others are, of course, higher.

Come party time the question is often one of economy how to make that one bottle of Scotch, or gin or rum, go farther without the economy being noticeable. As already mentioned, spirits are rarely drunk neat; additions of some sort are usually employed, such as ginger, orange or lemon cordial, and these reduce the alcohol content to about a quarter. For those who want to experiment a bit on their own accord, the table on page 128 shows the relation between alcohol by volume and proof spirit, and the range covered by this allows for the limits within which they will be working.

Those not wishing to start from scratch will find the following guidance useful.

Let me begin with whisky, gin or rum of 70° proof.

Wines made with the following fruits are ideal for mixing with gin, either sweetened or unsweetened damson, sloe, lemon, orange.

We have a bottle of one or the other of these wines and a bottle of gin handy.
 
The gin contains forty per cent of alcohol by volume and a bottle of wine fourteen per cent. Mix the two and you have (for the sake of simplicity) twice as much of both. Therefore you have twenty per cent by volume (the gin) and seven per cent by volume (the wine), total twenty-seven per cent by volume.

To make it even simpler:

The gin 40 per cent by volume

The wine 14 per cent „   „

54 per cent

But because the volume (amount) has been doubled, the alcohol content has been reduced by half twenty seven per cent by volume. As we can get fifty-four per cent of alcohol in this way we could use two bottles of wine and one of gin and get three bottles of a product containing eighteen per cent. Note

It is important to understand that when two bottles of wine at 14% of alcohol are put together you have twice as much wine still at 14%. But when you do this for the purpose of fortifying, the alcohol in each bottle must be accounted for. Therefore, three bottles of wine each containing 14% equals 42%, plus one bottle of gin at 40% = 82%. Divide this figure by the number of resulting bottles in this case four bottles and each will contain just over 20%. Going further 5 bottles at 14% = 70%
One bottle gin at 40%
total 110%

In this case six bottles result, therefore 110-÷-18% approximately. The same would apply when whisky or rum are used.

Wines more suitable for mixing with whisky are:

Root wines (not beetroot).

Root wines made with cereals such as wheat, and with raisins, or both, or with wheat or raisins alone added.

Grain wines those made mainly with wheat or maize, etc.

Orange.

Dandelion.

Wines more suitable for mixing with rum:

Root wines with a rather higher than average acid content.

Other more acid wines such as rhubarb.

Orange.

Lemon.

Grapefruit.

Wines more suitable for mixing with port and other high-alcohol red wines:

Elderberry and all other red wines whether made from one fruit or a mixture of fruits, or mixtures of fruits and grains such as wheat or maize.

White wines or the paler-colored ones made from such fruits as raisins, raspberries, loganberries, red or white currants, etc., may be mixed with the higher-alcohol white 'ports' or high-alcohol white wines.

Owing to the lower alcohol content of port as compared with spirits, the mixing should be confined to one bottle of wine to the bottle of port if they are required for keeping. Two to one mixing may be practiced where it is intended to use up the product within, say, three or four days.

Home-made wines make splendid liqueurs.

The usual practice is to use strongly flavored wines, sugar and whisky or brandy. But there is nothing to prevent you using gin or rum if you prefer.

If the wine you propose to use is sweet use only three ounces of sugar. If it is a medium-sweet, use five ounces. If it is dry, use seven ounces of sugar to one bottle of wine. Warm the wine and dissolve the sugar in it. Be careful not to let the wine become hot or even over-warm. When the sugar has dissolved, pour into a bottle large enough to hold both the sweetened wine and the spirit and mix well together. Then bottle, and you have two bottles of first-class stuff.

Where economy is essential, a half-bottle of brandy or whisky may be used with one bottle of the wines of your choice.

The following table gives the comparisons between alcohol by volume and proof spirit. Bear in mind that it is wisest not to dilute to below sixteen per cent by volume. This does not mean that the diluted product must of necessity 'go off' if kept; indeed, wines as low as fourteen per cent of alcohol by volume keep well, provided the bottles and corks are sterilized before the wine is put into them and the bottles are then sealed and stored on their sides until used. For the best sterilizing solution for our purpose see page 26.

Degrees Proof	Alcohol by Volume
	per cent
80	46
70	40
61-2	35
52-4	30
43-8	25
35	20
331	19
31-4	18
29-7	17
28	16
24-5	14
22-7	13
21-6	12

Do not imagine that a wine or a diluted spirit is low actually low in alcohol because the alcohol content has been reduced to fourteen per cent by volume. When we refer to a low-alcohol wine we really mean a wine that is not high in alcohol. A high-alcohol wine is usually in the region of eighteen per cent by volume while the low-alcohol wines are usually in the region of ten per cent or even just below this. Wines lower than fourteen per cent by volume are usually preserved with sulphur dioxide to prevent souring or certification vinegar ness. From this it will be clear that if you want to dilute to lower than fourteen per cent by volume you may do so provided you are prepared to preserve your products. Preservation is necessary because an alcohol content of below fourteen per cent by volume will not preserve a wine by itself. I have already mentioned that a good percentage of alcohol acts as its own preservative; below fourteen per cent by volume is not strictly speaking a good percentage of alcohol. But many people like the lower-alcohol wines more than others; indeed, many imported popular wines are in the region of ten per cent by volume some are as low as eight per cent by volume. The fact that they keep well is because they are preserved.

Preserving is easily carried out by using Campden fruit-preserving tablets bottles of twenty tablets are obtainable at all chemists for about ten pence.

Two of these tablets will usually preserve a gallon of wine, though one tablet is often enough for one gallon. Therefore, if you are making half-gallons of the products in this chapter and are making them below fourteen per cent by volume, clearly one tablet will preserve half a gallon while half a tablet will preserve a quart. Note here that a quarter-tablet will be enough if the alcohol content is to remain above ten per cent by volume, but do not reduce to below a quarter-tablet per quart of the product.

 Just crush the tablet or part with something non-metal, then dissolve the powder in a little of the liquid and then stir into the bulk.

In the ordinary way, and where the alcohol content of your finished products is to remain above fourteen per cent by volume, thorough cleansing of the bottles and boiling of corks before fitting them is usually enough, but where the alcohol is to be reduced to below fourteen per cent by volume it is wise to sterilize the bottles in the following manner: Crush four Campden fruit-preserving tablets and dissolve the powder in a pint of warm water. Rinse the insides of the already cleaned bottles with this solution and then rinse them out with boiled water that has cooled a bit. All this may seem rather a bother, but it takes only a couple of minutes.

Having filled the bottles to within an inch of where the corks will reach, ram the corks home hard and then seal with sealing wax. Store bottles on their sides.

These precautions while trying liqueur recipes are necessary only when it is intended to keep the lower-alcohol products for more than a few days.

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