Newly created Čačak’s sour cherry varieties as a raw material for spirit production

Abstract

According to the average annual production sour cherries take the third place in Serbian fruit growing. In the assortment, the most represented is the autochthonous variety ‘Oblačinska’, which is characterized by a very small fruit. In recent decades, large-fruit varieties created by breeding work at the Fruit Research Institute, Čačak, have become more widespread in sour cherry orchards. Some of the newly created varieties are, similar to the ‘Oblačinska’ variety, varieties with combined properties and can be used as fresh fruit and for various types of processing. Sour cherries are used in Serbia as a raw material for obtaining numerous products. Frozen cherries dominate, but juices, sour cherry in brine, candied fruits, compote, wine, vinegar, liqueurs are also produced, and in recent years, sour cherry spirit has become increasingly interesting. The paper presents the results of two-year examinations of the suitability of two varieties of sour cherries with combined properties - ‘Šumadinka’ (‘Köröser Weichsel’ × ‘Heimanns Konservenweichsel’) and ‘Sofija’ (‘Čačanski rubin’ × ‘Heimanns Konservenweichsel’), which were created in Čačak, and standard variety ‘Heimanns Konservenweichsel’, for the production of spirits. Sour cherry spirits were produced from spontaneously fermented mashes of sour cherry fruits with stones, followed by double distillation in alambic of traditional construction. The obtained monovarietal sour cherry spirits differed significantly in spirit yields and contents of 10 major volatile components analyzed. Based on the results of sensory analysis in both years, all obtained monovarietal sour cherry spirits can be classified as high-quality spirit drinks.