weighing various flavoring methods

[spiff]

I'm seeing several different ways to flavor or achieve a flavor and am just curious to what people think the pros and cons are between them all.

For example.. let just take a peach schnopps

So I would guess that the "best" way to make it would be to start with fermenting peaches, take that result and either infuse or tincture it further with more peaches.

Or, you could put some drops of peach flavoring into it.

Using real peaches sounds time consuming and expensive and maybe not the best use of a seasonal fruit.

I realise there are million varibles here.. quality of the fruit, quality of the flavorings.. how well one can still, ect, ect.

So just looking for generalizations, experiences..

[pfshine]

If I wanted peaches I would do a neutral and then steep on peaches. I live in a desert waste land so peaches are not cheap or plentiful. But if you live in an area where you can get tons of them for cheap or free why not go all the way for the best spirit. Whatever works best for you is the way you should do it.

[spiff]

I did that with some strawberries and it came out great. But I didn't like the left over berries.. seemed like a waste of the berries and the alcohol left in them. I still ate them.. just didn't enjoy them. So this was a good example of where I thought just flavoring might be better if it can be made to taste just as good since there is no wasted time or fruit. It took a lot of berries to get the taste I wanted on just one mason jar.

[Aussiedownunder01]

Have you seen this
http://www.holyducttape.com/infusions/experiments.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[spiff]

No.. but I did just buy a 24 pack of Loann flavors off amazon where you can pick all the flavors. I haven't got them yet, but heard mostly good things about the brand. But I'll have to check that site out when I have some time, so thanks for that....
Part of me feels like this is cheating, just using flavors, but worth it overall. But if I was to gift something I might splurge on the steeping method.