How to make Umeshu - 2013 Season

We're in the middle of plum season as of this post (generally the end of May to early July) for the purpose of making umeshu. If you plan on trying to make this Japanese specialty drink you have about one month to buy your plums, and they are in the stores now.  Although you may see the "plums" in the stores still until mid July, those tend to be riper and used for other purposes such as pickled ume (umeboshi) or jam. Most umeshu is made from unripened to just barely starting to ripen ume.
I'll call it "plum wine" here only once because people are more likely search for "how to make plum wine" than they are "umeshu." For those of you yelling at your computer, I agree with you - it is not a wine, it's a liqueur.

Since making the first batch of Umeshu last year I've learned a few things. You can check out that old post though as I do cover a few things that will not be repeated here. This year I'll be making the umeshu with a plum called the "Kishuu Plum."  The kanji for it is

南高梅 - nankou ume

Literal translation of the kanji - "south high plum." This is the gold standard for plums in Japan. It's from Wakayama prefecture, a region known for having the best plums.  I explained this a bit more in the umeshu buying guide. . The Wakayama area used to be called kishu 紀州.  Many umeshu bottles use Kishu on the label. 

There is also a Kishu Plum Society with their own "Miss Plum Girls" and here.  Lets not leave out Prime Minister Abe either here.

First picture below is the regular plum. The label says "green plum" or 青梅

This particular kanji 青 I actually learned as "blue" but it can also mean green. Here is a very interesting Japan Times article on green and blue in Japan for those interested. In the black section of the label, the kanji 佐賀 means the plums are from Saga prefecture. The first two kanji are Saga, and the last kanji  産  means product.  On the lower right label in parenthesis the kanji 梅酒用 means "umeshu use."

Run of the mill plums 

Last year when I bought plums and had no idea what I was buying.  After reviewing the old photos, I used plums from Kanagawa prefecture. Not the "South high plum." Not a big deal, just not the best.

Next picture below is the recommended "South high plum" or "nankou ume." The price is significantly higher than the Saga plums. It's hard to tell from the pictures, but the plums are slightly meatier and they have a reddish tint on one side of the plum.  Found these at a small vegetable grocer. 

South High Plum ー南高梅

nankou ume ー南高梅

Above is another package of nankou ume from Daiei market.

This year I'll be using the nankou ume along with a few other recipe variants. One batch will use Brandy, and another plain white alcohol. I'll also be adding some cherries to one batch as I came across someone else doing that with excellent results.

If you reside in Japan, you should be able to find both the ordinary green ume and the kankou plum in any respectable store. I picked up some at Daiei market and at a small neighborhood vegetable store

If you don't live in Japan, my understanding is that many Japanese and Korean markets sell them, and you can call  Mitsuwa market at 1-877-MITSUWA (877-648-7892) and they'll send you some.  They have several stores in the U.S. The window to buy them is very small though.

You may see some smaller plums like in the picture below. The Japanese websites generally advise against using these for umeshu.

The other ingredients:

 On the left is the standard white liquor that will be sold next to the bottles and the plums. On the right is Brandy for use in fruit liqueurs. The katakana on the right side of the label is サントリ (Suntory) ブランデ or brandy.  The brandy flavor pretty much disappears over time and just leaves you with a richer umeshu than you would have with the white alcohol.

Rock sugar sold in convenient 1kg packages. The sugar package directions call for 1kg sugar to 1 kg plums. Recommend you only use 300-500g and then add more if you like later.  You can always add more sugar but you can't take it out. If you buy the specialty umeshu jars from the store made just for making fruit liquor, they will also have directions for making various fruit liqueurs. I've found these directions to be more reliable. 


Step 1.  De-stem the ume. A wooden skewer works best for this.

Step 2. Wash the ume well. Pay attention to the area around the stem as this is where pesticides, if used, will concentrate.

Step 3. Soak the ume overnight. Apparently this will remove some of the bitterness.

Soak in water

Step 4. Remove and place on a towel to dry. Here you see the cherries drying after they were cleaned as well. The drying step is important.

Step 5. Clean your jars. After washing in the dishwasher and thoroughly drying, I used some 35% alcohol that I had left over from last year for additional disinfection. Clean the covers as well.

Jars

Step 6. Add the ume and the sugar in alternating layers. For a 3 liter bottle as I've shown here, you'll use one kg of plums (they are sold in 1kg packages) and 300-500grams of rock sugar. When you only use 500 grams of sugar it's hard to get nice layers. It doesn't matter though as it will all dissolve in a week anyway.  In one bottle I added the cherries and just placed them on top.

Step 7. Add the white alcohol or brandy. For a 3 liter container you'll add the entire 1.8L of alcohol. Remember that any alcohol that you choose should be at least 35%. As the batch matures, the sugar interacts with the ume and the alcohol to lower the alcohol content to less than half of the original value. If you use 20% or less the batch may go bad. And using less than 20% is against Japanese law for home or professional brewing. The alcohol containers located next to the jars, sugar, ume, etc. at the store are always the right stuff. You'll see the alcohol content clearly labelled on all of the bottles.

With brandy

With white alcohol

With brandy and cherries

Step 8: Wait a long time. Keep them in a cool (lower shelf) and dark place. For the first week or two shake the bottles gently once in a while to redistribute the sugar. Then do it maybe once a month. It's best to wait a full year before drinking. Since I've added cherries to one batch, I'll have to take those out after a few weeks as they won't survive a whole year. Then they'll have to be eaten.

Many Japanese add some of last year's brew to this year's brew and have done that for many years or even decades. In this way they have some umeshu from way back (over a hundred years I've heard) in their jar and makes it a very nostalgic drink.

June 2 2013

Brandy - ume - cherries after one month (July 1 2013)

The above photo shows the brandy, ume and cherry mixture after one month. It's time to take the cherries out as they're time was certainly up. I fished them all out and then the bottle goes back to sit. Only 11 more months to go. 

Last year I was wondering why the ume didn't get wrinkly like others had described or as I'd seen in many photos online. This year you can see the ume are getting wrinkly. This is certainly due to the type of plums I used this year over last. The kankou ume are a bit fleshier and softer than the other types of ume, and as such it's easier for them to undergo osmotic furrowing.

Above is another bottle just after the cherries were fished out (after one month). This one was made with white alcohol so appears lighter than the one above. Some of the plums have achieved what few others have been able to do - a perfect state of suspension.


Here is an update photo below after a year of brewing (taken June 2014)

after one year

 From left to right: brandy with cherry umeshu, brandy umeshu, umeshu with "white alcohol"

Interestingly, plums brewed with the Brandy have wrinkled a lot more. The wrinkling comes from removal of the water by osmosis.  While I'm not sure of the science, it could be that the white alcohol molecule is able to replace the lost water (in the bottle at the right) so that the internal volume does not change. Perhaps the brandy molecule is too big to penetrate the skin and hence the water is extracted without replacement, leading to the shrinkage.