Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Information about fruit/vegetable type washes.

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ro palinca
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by ro palinca »

Thank you and to all of the HD forum for what I learned and what I will learn in the future.
This year I want to try some whiskey for the first time, because after grapes there is nothing
else to make brandy, so until then I will read and ask.
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Odin »

Thanx for the invitation, Ro! Just pm-ed you. I am close to Siofok, just under Lake Balaton. Not sure we can meet due to a busy program, but lets find out!

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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Prairiepiss »

Odin wrote:Thanx for the invitation, Ro! Just pm-ed you. I am close to Siofok, just under Lake Balaton. Not sure we can meet due to a busy program, but lets find out!

Odin.
With Ro's knowledge in brandies and Odin's knowledge with grains and botanicals. Only good things could come from that meeting. Some very interesting stuff could come from that. :thumbup:
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Odin »

Even the mss is giving of good vibes. " shouldn't decline an invitation like that", " would love to see Ardeal (the region Ro lives). So if we can get the car fixed ... we just might go over there!

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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Bro-sephus »

Ro, thank you SO much for sharing your knowledge!! This is fantastic, I fell in love with Slibovita when I went to Romania as a young soldier before the war started!

Cheers, Brosephus
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by heyhaychapman »

Cheers Ro Palinka ! I came to HDF wanting to learn more about making Tuica the traditional way but hadn't been back for a while. I hit the jackpot finding your thread. So much information and such good answers. The little plums are on the trees here, about 3 months from harvest. I have even found an orchard with the European prune so after Christmas good slivovitz here we come. Got a big bucket of kiwifruit ready to run this weekend while I wait. I expect we will see Rachiu writing here soon.
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by ro palinca »

Glad I could help, cheers!
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Devonhomebrew »

Can we gte some pictures of your still and all that :D
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by thecroweater »

got 2 lots of sour cherry plums down at the moment have been told I can have all the plums next door that ya need a ladder to pick :mrgreen: these are the big sweet ones
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by KC_Masterpiece »

Thank you so much for all the info so far. I was recently turned on to Palinca by a Romanian friend of mine, and he served me Valco's Palinca de Maramures Slivovitz. I couldn't believe how many flavors come through in this stuff. I later bought a bottle of some other brand of Slivovitz, but it wasn't as good as the Valco brand. Could you give me a little more info on how the plums are processed? My biggest question is do you add water to the fruit mash? Or is it just pure plum juice and fruit pulp?

Could I take a bunch of plums, take out the pits and then run them through a grinder/cider press? I would then throw all the pressed fruit pulp back in the mash. Add water? Thanks again.
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by thecroweater »

Well got my first lot of plum schnapps following the recipe here pretty much . The yield was down a bit guess they had less sugar than thought but the flavour is very good. I did run them through the bubbler not the pot still so I wasn't to sure what flavour there would be but it was just perfect :thumbup:
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by MDH »

KC_Masterpiece wrote:Thank you so much for all the info so far. I was recently turned on to Palinca by a Romanian friend of mine, and he served me Valco's Palinca de Maramures Slivovitz. I couldn't believe how many flavors come through in this stuff. I later bought a bottle of some other brand of Slivovitz, but it wasn't as good as the Valco brand. Could you give me a little more info on how the plums are processed? My biggest question is do you add water to the fruit mash? Or is it just pure plum juice and fruit pulp?

Could I take a bunch of plums, take out the pits and then run them through a grinder/cider press? I would then throw all the pressed fruit pulp back in the mash. Add water? Thanks again.
Agreed. Sjlivovica should totally be up there with Scotch in terms of complexity; even Maraska (The Smirnoff of Slivovitz) has a ton of flavors in it, like white wine, peaches, almonds and something a little "meaty" all at once! I assume that it just isn't marketed as well but if it was you would find people creating a culture around it.
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Odin »

A friend of mine brought back a bottle of Valco Palinca de Maramures. 40%, plumes. Very nice!

Just tried a sip last night. And now again.

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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Jimbo »

I had the pleasure of trying some authentic Serbian village made Slivovitz recently. Friends wife is Serbian and they go once a year. He brought back some bottles. 1 was outstanding. The worst was some of the most foul crud I ever poured in my mouth,

He said that while the village shares the same still on a cart, different families have different methods of preparing and fermenting the fruit, and running the still. Obviously, I thought to myself.

This is an excellent thread. Thank you Ro Palinca for taking the time to share your traditions and knowledge with us. Very much enjoyed reading this thread.
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by donpelon »

A fun video about homemade Palinka production in Romania:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arHUmaVcdAo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Jimbo »

haha, great video, thanks for posting that. :thumbup:
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Fraser »

Wondering if anyone has had any success lately on working on a SE European style brandy? Sooner or later I'm going to give a go at a Bulgarian style Rakia from grapes. I've had some extremely good tastes while overseas and would love to work that into what I'm doing.
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Re: Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Fraser »

I thought I'd post an update here. I harvested more grape pomace than I can really quantify last fall from our vineyard. I rehydrated it with water, adjusted the pH and fermented it. I could post all the numbers that I have written down, but the final abv was generally around 8%. I did use some pectinase on some of the batches thinking it might help release some of the sugars from the skins. Not sure if it helped or not.

There was a big mix of varieties of grapes that I just mixed all together when I pressed them out. I ended up with about 2000 liters of pomace wine.

I ran stripping runs, then put it all through slow through a short-stacked column. Diluted it down to 63% in a tank and soaked coriander and dried cherries in it along with some french oak dominoes. After a couple of weeks I cold filtered it and diluted it down to 48% and bottled it. It ended up pretty fantastic.
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Re: Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Fraser »

I thought I'd throw an update on using grape pomace. We're almost wrapped up at the vineyard harvesting our grapes this year. Like most of the NE USA we had far too much rain and cloud cover this summer, so we're picking our grapes early. Too many birds going crazy looking for something to eat, even with the nets.

Anyway, after all the grapes are pressed out, I take all the pressed pomace and rehydrate it, then ferment that out. After about 2 weeks I press the pomace out again, pump the pomace wine into a tank and let it sit to settle out for awhile. Then I distill it into a nice Marc brandy with some coriander and cherries. Waste not, want not.

You could do the same with any fruit.
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Single Malt Yinzer »

Flavor profile wise - what's the difference with the grape brandy vs. pomace brandy? Did you use the same or different yeast? And are you selling it???? :)
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Fraser »

There's a lot of variables including the types of grapes/pomace used, method of fermentation and distillation, etc. Generally, I'd say that brandy itself (grape or other fruit) will have a deeper character than using the pomace. On distillation the pomace wine can take on more of a harsh edge that needs to be smoothed out. Then again I've had some brandy that had a big bite to it, and pomace/Marc brandy that was super smooth. But overall I'd say the brandy made from the fruit juice itself will be a superior product handled similar to the pomace. Just my opinion.

I do sell my Marc Brandy, under the label of a Rakia. I've traveled quite a lot to Bulgaria and they have limitless variations on this that are really great. Grape, plum, apricot and the pomace of all those too.
Single Malt Yinzer wrote:Flavor profile wise - what's the difference with the grape brandy vs. pomace brandy? Did you use the same or different yeast? And are you selling it???? :)
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Re: Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by The Baker »

I would like to try the Rakia style brandy. I have some brandy from old wine that is a bit harsh (though I am giving it time, and oak, and airing and will later cut it a bit from its nearly 50% with some white wine)...
Anyway could any of you suggest;
how much coriander (fresh? including roots? ground in a mortar and pestle? or dried?) and how much dried cherries? say, per litre.
and are there any other good ideas to flavour the brandy?

I've got a lot of it (for a hobbyist) and will have more...

Thanks a lot,

Geoff
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Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by thecroweater »

Wine and grape brandy will get you various fortified wines like port, muscat and sherry. You can for sure make wine and use pomace spirit for this, mostly that spirit is known as grappa here and is commonly used for various home made fortifieds back in South Australia.
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Re: Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by Fraser »

Hi Geoff- I want to first say that Rakia is really just a general term used there for their national spirit. There are limitless recipes there, often family recipes or village recipes. And they will be different from place to place there.

Some of the herbs they use in some recipes there are things I've never even heard of. One guy was telling me about some bitter sticks he puts in his recipe that he breaks off some bush over there. What kind of bush? I have no idea! It just grows in his village and they've always used it. So by no means do I want to give the impression that my Rakia is THE recipe. It's just my own that I made based on some flavors I tasted while over there.

That being said, I do standard stripping runs of my pomace wine to end up with my low wines. I then macerate the coriander and cherries in the low wines at 50% abv for about a week. I put the coriander and cherries in a brewing bag.

I had to do a little math, because I run mine through a 200 liter boiler. I'd say that I macerate about 8 grams per liter of coriander and about 4.5 grams per liter of cherries in the low wines at 50% abv.

I only used the coriander seeds, not the roots. I didn't grind the coriander, just threw it whole and figured time would extract the flavors.

I tried macerating the coriander and cherries in the finished spirits after the spirit run, and that gave a stronger flavor. But the spirit seemed to dissolve a lot of the pectin in the cherries and it ended up with a big haze of suspended particles whenever there was a temperature change. I had to cold filter it TWICE to get it clear, which was a pain. So now I just macerate in the low wines and problem solved. But if you don't mind the haze you'll get more flavor doing that post-spirit run for sure.

It definitely benefits from a bit of airing out pre-bottling, and you can't go wrong letting it rest on some oak. I have a couple of barrels of it resting right now.
The Baker wrote:I would like to try the Rakia style brandy. I have some brandy from old wine that is a bit harsh (though I am giving it time, and oak, and airing and will later cut it a bit from its nearly 50% with some white wine)...
Anyway could any of you suggest;
how much coriander (fresh? including roots? ground in a mortar and pestle? or dried?) and how much dried cherries? say, per litre.
and are there any other good ideas to flavour the brandy?

I've got a lot of it (for a hobbyist) and will have more...

Thanks a lot,

Geoff
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Re: Re: Tuica, Rachiu, Palinca, Slibovita

Post by The Baker »

Thanks, everybody, and thanks in advance for more experiences and ideas.

Geoff
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