Adding sugar to brandies?

[Adam1983+]

Im not a fan of adding sugar to my recipes. I never put it in my grain bills. I tried my first attempt at making peach brandy and added no sugar to it. I broke the tube to my hydrometer and havent bought a new one yet do i dont know the starting gravity. After it fermented and distilled there wasnt much alcohol in it. I could tell by taste and smell. So my question is, when making fruit brandies is it necessary to add sugar or do you get enough from the fruit itself?

[Expat]

Adding sugar adds more potential alcohol, but dilutes the flavor. Hard enough to come by with peach. So not recommended. YMMV

[MichiganCornhusker]

You can have the best of both worlds here.

Ferment only the fruit juice and run it.

Then add a bunch of sugar to the remaining fruit pulp, ferment, and run that as its own separate batch.

I don’t know about peaches, but I had excellent results with cherries.
I prefer the fruit brandy, but some who have tasted both actually like the sugar batch more.

[Adam1983+]

Good idea. Definately going to try it. Sounds cost effective too

[NZChris]

To re-ferment on the pulp, include the dunder, then add all of the heads and tails, to the stripping runs. Even the foreshot may have something to add if you still have it.

[jonnys_spirit]

I’ve saved the dunder and skins from my last grappa to use again in the fall grappa coming up. I’ll be adding some sugar and also incorporating last grappa feints into strips.

-jonny

[Adam1983+]

Do you put pectic enzyme? Or amalase enzyme?

[The Baker]

Im not a fan of adding sugar to my recipes. I never put it in my grain bills. I tried my first attempt at making peach brandy and added no sugar to it. I broke the tube to my hydrometer and havent bought a new one yet do i dont know the starting gravity. After it fermented and distilled there wasnt much alcohol in it. I could tell by taste and smell. So my question is, when making fruit brandies is it necessary to add sugar or do you get enough from the fruit itself?

I have fermented peaches.
Added just enough water that it wasn't thick gunk.
Then added just enough sugar that it tasted very slightly sweet, like other washes. Very high tech!!

Geoff

[RockyMountainHigh]

To make a good brandy you have to make a good wine. To make a good wine from fruit other than grapes you have to add sugar. There are good recipes on line for peach wine. They all make a mash of pitted peaches cut up, water, and sugar to get the SG up to about 0.080-0.090. You can easily get to 12-14 ABV palatable wine. Use a good wine yeast, ferment the mash to 1.000 or below, rack the juice off the mash, let it sit for a few days, then siphon into your still. No need to do a stripping run, just make your cuts. Age your brandy or not. Sugar is your friend, not your enemy in making fruit wine for Distilling.

[Oldvine Zin]

To make a good brandy you have to make a good wine. To make a good wine from fruit other than grapes you have to add sugar. There are good recipes on line for peach wine. They all make a mash of pitted peaches cut up, water, and sugar to get the SG up to about 0.080-0.090. You can easily get to 12-14 ABV palatable wine. Use a good wine yeast, ferment the mash to 1.000 or below, rack the juice off the mash, let it sit for a few days, then siphon into your still. No need to do a stripping run, just make your cuts. Age your brandy or not. Sugar is your friend, not your enemy in making fruit wine for Distilling.

Not sure if I agree with you on your adding sugar approach. What kind of sugar?? And what are you calling a palatable wine? Fruit flavor or just ABV. For me a palatable wine is one that no yeast stress and tastes like the fruit not like added sugars. sugar washes aged or not is just rum for me and I think that it's what you are talking about - brandy is not what you think it is - just the fruit

OVZ

[goose eye]

It depends on the fruit an process.
You can add suger an not tell any been added if you cookin. It ain't gotta taste like liquid barbed wire cause of it. Start with 1/4 lb a gal. Do a test . one with one without.

Blueberry you caint
Apple you can
Peach you can
Pear depends
Plum depends
Grape depends
Blackberry you can
Strawberry you can

So I'm tole

[Flatlands_Hillbilly]

It isn't quite a yes or no answer. There are a lot of variables to look at. Depends mostly what you're gunning for in a finished product. Goose Eye's got a fairly good list and accurate. But to expand on his depends or you cans... A lot depends on the variety of each fruit. Apples for instance go from pucker your lips sour, to sweet as honey right from the comb. Take crab-apples or granny smiths, they are sour and will need sugar to sweeten them up a bit. Depends on where the fruit was grown and the weather condition of that year. Best to just taste the fruit and use your best judgment from there. Depends on how many times you run it. How deep into the tails you run it. How much of the heads you pull as some like myself, I will leave in a little of the heads, not much just a little. I like the little hint of bite it adds. I use sugar in my Apple Jax. I also use a variety of apple varieties. Granny Smiths, Honey Crisps, Fuj and Red Delicious. Sometimes I add honey, sometimes sugar. I've added pure maple syrup as well. I also end up adding cinammon, nutmeg and a bit of ginger to the mix, ferment it about 2 weeks and run it. It comes out with a nice clear warm flavored liquor. It also depends on your taste, what ABV you wish to end up with. Like any other kind of liquor, as long as you maintain the basics, brandy is only as good as you believe it to be. Depends mostly, I think, on the maker. lol Now you are back to where you started.