has anyone ever tried using Jujube 's?

[Ben Stillin]

I have a couple of sizable jujube trees on the property. I tried one and they taste a little like a dry apple. They seem to make a huge number of the small appleish looking fruits. I will be stripping the tree next year to try a ferment (my rig is being upgraded now anyway), but I was wondering what would be the best way to do this. If I grab them when they are ripe they are firm and crunchy like an apple. If I let them sit on the tree they turn brown and wrinkly and ooze a syrup. The flavor is very different though. I wonder if it matters to the liquor in the end.

[Badmotivator]

I had to look that species up as Id never heard of it.

Here's a funny bit from Wikipedia: "On his visit to Medina the nineteenth century English explorer, Sir Richard Burton, observed that the local variety of Jubube fruit was widely eaten. He describes its taste as "like a bad plum, an unrepentant cherry and an insipid apple." "

[Ben Stillin]

ACK! that doesn't sound promising, or does...I can't decide. Really sour plums make great brandy.


The sugar content varies from food site to food site. It does appear however that its sugar calories are 95% of the entire fruit calories. So that is promising, I cannot find the sugar content for a wrinkled up one (bletted I think its called?). It looks like a medjool date.

[cranky]

If it were me I'd pick at least enough now to check the S.G. and try a ferment and see how it turns out. Sanitize the fermenters good and it will keep until until you are ready to run it. I would probably go with the unwrinkled ones unless I got enough to try both ways. I love trying different fruits.

Interestingly enough I checked Jack Keller's wine sit and he doesn't have a wine recipe for them. However I did find an explanation of why on another site

When you said you couldn't find jujube on my site I went off on a 35-minute scouting trip looking for it. I was sure I had one because in 2001 a fellow in northern Texas with a jujube orchard contacted me about developing a recipe for him. He shipped me 42 pounds of refrigerated fruit and I stayed up half the night culling, cleaning, chopping, sulfiting, etc. I made batches using 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, and 10 pounds of fruit per gallon (the rest were damaged or had brown spots). Most were cold pressed but I boiled the fruit for two batches -- won't swear which two but I think it was for the 2- and 3-pound batches.

As I recall, 6 pounds per gallon made the best wine with least trouble, although 8 pounds made a better wine but took a lot of tweaking to get the balance right and when I did I couldn't follow my notes, which were incomplete, so couldn't swear what I did.

And I found out why I didn't publish the recipe. I was paid for the work that I did, shipping 2 bottles of each "interesting batch" to him along with the recipes and wine logs. I did find some photographs I took of the jujubes -- whole, chopped and fermenting -- plus a copy of our contract and a ledger entry for the amount I was paid.

Sorry I could not be of help, but if I ever get any more jujubes I know what to do (and will be able to publish that).

I like to use Jack Keller's recipes as a starting point but most of his wines are pretty close to the same, Juice, sugar, various wine stuff like acid blend and such. For distilling we just juice, ferment and distill. I think it's worth a go and would like to hear the results when you are done.

[pfshine]

I skipped over this initially because I thought you were talking about the candy. I thought to myself my god why? I am glad that it is fruit you are talking about. I say give it a shot and see how it goes. It might be awesome and everybody here will buy jujube trees.

[MDH]

Literally right in the wikipedia article is this:

"In Croatia, especially Dalmatia, jujubes are used in marmalades, juices and rakija (fruit brandy)."

[Ben Stillin]

Very cool! mine all had bird hits by the time I got to them. Since I know what they are now I will net the trees next year.

[Ben Stillin]

Birds got em again :-(

[yakattack]

Aww. Was really hoping to hear about how this turned out for you..

[Ben Stillin]

They weren't even done yet! Tried one a week ago and they barely had any brown. As soon as we got a brown spot the birds made a hole in it on that spot. I need to net the tree I guess.

[Tortuga]

or buy a cat...

[Ben Stillin]

I have one

[cranky]

That cat looks like an excellent mouser, unfortunately you need an excellent birder, I have one of each

[Ben Stillin]

I think the cardinal in the photo agrees with you:-)