Elderberry and other fruit juices

[Delmonteman]

I realise everyone is grapefest obsessed at the moment.... But for other fruit juices.... I have been in touch with a company about getting some elderberry and blackberry juice concentrates from them. They seem to be able to decant any volume into 25l drums before despatching ready for dilution and making wine from. To make it potentially more cost effective, would any others on here be interested in splitting a drum? I'm in leeds. If you've got any questions i'm happy to go back to them too.

[lockwood1956]

I might be interested......

[billybuntus]

Me too.....More details required though

[fatbloke]

Also interested...... though more info would be good i.e. types available, cost per gallon etc etc......

regards

jtfb

[Cellar_Rat]

Me too. Is this the 65 brix super concentrate stuff? They will more that likely do a tech sheet on it.

[Original Mac]

Depending on cost I am in for one of each elderberry and blackberry as would split with brother in law. Do you know what the concentration is? The fact you get a food grade 25 litre container with it is a bonus. Frees up a better bottle for bulk aging

Reminded me of this recipe http://www.winesathome.co.uk/forum/s...ead.php?t=4094

[Delmonteman]

Ok. I'll post up their response to my first email when i get a mo later. I don't have costs yet so still early days. But just to be clear my idea is for delivery to me here them for people to collect their share from me. Unless anyone has a better idea! It's pretty fresh stuff too so it's a case of whacking the yeast in as soon as it arrives!

[Delmonteman]

The smallest current pack sizes we have available would be 11kg of Elderberry Concentrate 65 °Brix and 22kg of Blackberry Concentrate 65 °Brix. Both of these juices have been clarified (filtered to remove the bulk of the natural suspended fruit solids), so will produce clear rather than cloudy end products. This does not affect the flavour, colour or aroma of the juices as the constituent compounds responsible are generally all dissolved within the liquid and so cannot be readily filtered out in this manner.

Unfortunately we would not be able to supply this in an aseptic format at the volumes you are looking for. Aseptic packing refers to the use of pasteurisation and sealed, sterile packaging to preserve the product by maintaining effective sterility (even under ambient conditions), thereby removing the need to use Sulphur Dioxide or similar preservatives. However, due to the nature of the packing process we aren't able to produce small one-off products in this way.

We can supply this material in plastic jerry cans (part-filled 25L), which are decanted from bulk containers. These will need to be stored frozen before use (ideally at or below -16°C), although if you are intending to use them promptly after delivery you could store in chilled conditions for around a week and the naturally high sugar level in the concentrate provides some measure of protection against microbiological growth, and so greatly slows the rate of development of unwanted yeasts and moulds. Nonetheless, if you are intending to ferment the juice it will be worth treating with SO2 or similar to remove any unwanted varieties of yeast.

The high sugar level will also assist with delivery costs, as it means the product is sufficiently robust to be able to deliver under ambient conditions, greatly reducing costs compared to temperature-controlled delivery vehicles.

In terms of dilution, we would advise approximately 166g of Elderberry concentrate will make 1L of 'natural strength' juice, and 145g of Blackberry to make 1L juice.

If you have access to a Refractometer, the target Brix for the reconstitution would be 8.8 for the Blackberry and 10.0 for the elderberry as a minimum these are the absolute minimums defined in UK and European law at which the resulting product called still be called a juice, so you may find a slightly higher addition rate of the concentrate gives a stronger flavour which may suit your blend better; I'd therefore advise caution whilst diluting, tasting the results as you add the water until you get to a level where you are satisfied with the flavour and character of the product.

I'm not quite sure if the 11/22kg minimums are in different packages to the 25l jerry can so I'll go back to them on that. 11kg of elderberry conc. should make 66l of wine!

Anyone looked into this before? I'd really like to go for the elderberry and could probably go it alone on that if no-ones bothered but would anyone be interested in splitting the blackberry? 120l of blackberry wine is a lot for me!

It would be good to split if poss to try different recipes etc. and understand what works best?

I'll ask for costs (which could be the catch!) and then a tech sheet.

[goldseal]

Normnally I'd be interested, but I'm knee-deep in fermenters at the mo. I'd be interested in hearing how you get on though.

[Original Mac]

If you have access to a pasteuriser then a .75 litre bottle would make a gallon of juice or 1 litre would make 6 litres (at the minimum concentrations) and should keep pretty well. Otherwise it would be pet bottles and the ole chest freezer. Its all going to boil down to cost of juice and delivery v how long it would take to pick, process and steam juice enough berrys to provide those amounts.

[lockwood1956]

11kg of elderberry conc. should make 66l of wine!

I am very interested in this, and will be happy to split batches with you, price being right of course

66 brix?

I would want my wine to start at around 22 brix, so my figures give me 33 litres wine from 11kg of conc. I know its heavier than water, but I wonder how much per KG it weighs? the spec sheet will tell us no doubt

regards
bob

[Delmonteman]

Prices are (unfortunately!):-

Product: Elderberry Juice Concentrate
Pack Size: 11kgs
Price: £9.64p +VAT per kg (delivered)

Product: Blackberry Juice Concentrate
Pack Size: 22kgs
Price: £7.20p +VAT per kg (delivered)

So a wee bit on the pricey side. By my reckoning, for elderberry juice that makes a 'natural strength juice' £2 per litre (compared to maybe £1.10 for a litre carton of supermarket juice).

They said the price comes down as the volume goes up, so if we could get a lot interested then we could maybe do a big bulk order... Until then, we pick elderberries (if your lucky enough to find them!)

[billybuntus]

Prices are (unfortunately!):-

Product: Elderberry Juice Concentrate
Pack Size: 11kgs
Price: £9.64p +VAT per kg (delivered)

Product: Blackberry Juice Concentrate
Pack Size: 22kgs
Price: £7.20p +VAT per kg (delivered)

So a wee bit on the pricey side. By my reckoning, for elderberry juice that makes a 'natural strength juice' £2 per litre (compared to maybe £1.10 for a litre carton of supermarket juice).

They said the price comes down as the volume goes up, so if we could get a lot interested then we could maybe do a big bulk order... Until then, we pick elderberries (if your lucky enough to find them!)

Is it not the delivery thats knocking the price up?

[Delmonteman]

Yes it is Billy, so if more people were interested, the price per litre would go down.

Unfortunately, they didn't quote with a breakdown of juice+delivery+vat. What I put above is a copy and paste from their email...

Thinking about it now, I'd pay £2 for a litre of elderberry juice in the supermarket... But do I want 66l of it...?

[David]

Its all going to boil down to cost of juice and delivery v how long it would take to pick, process and steam juice enough berrys to provide those amounts.

I made it £1.23/litre for reconstituted blackberry juice, and the 22 kg costing £186.12 would make 151.72 litres of pure juice equivelent.

It takes me about an hour of fast picking to fill a 5 litre bucket (hung around my neck so I can used both hands) with 8 lbs of blackberries, so 4 hours picking for 32 lbs, then another 3 hours to steam them in two batches and clear up.

With 70% juice extraction yielding 10.16 litres of pure juice (together with about 4 litres of condensed steam), that's 7 hours work for what would cost £12.46 to buy (and less bulky to store), so by doing it yourself you'd be saving £1.78/hr.

However, as I'm retired buying it would not be a saving for me and there would be a dog that would miss out on an awful lot a blackberrying walks.

I suspect the figure would be much the same for elderberries as despite the higher cost there's all the additional preparation, but I wonder if the commercial process used actually involves removing all the stalks and floating berries,