I think maybe I overdid it on cherries this year. For me, cherries are the epitome of the “get ’em while you can” mentality that comes over me every time some new type of produce comes into season. Cherries just seem so fleeting, and they’re really at their best eaten fresh, unadultered. They can be expensive, but usually there’s a week or two when stores are trying to clear out their supplies before they go bad when you can get better prices. Long story short, a few weeks back, when Wholefoods announced a one-day sale on cherries for $1.99 a pound, I went a little crazy and bought 7 pounds. On top of that, I still had 3 pounds in the fridge from a previous grocery store shopping spree. I can tell you from personal experience, 10 pounds is a lot of cherries, even for the most rabid cherry consumer.

So I got out my cherry pitter and went to work. Plenty of the cherries got put aside for eating fresh and several pounds got simmered in brandy and red wine and packed away in jars for holiday eating. After this, I had about 2 pounds of cherries left, all of them a little sadder and more bruised than their fresh-eating counterparts. I toyed with the idea of making more jam to add to the pile of newly-filled ball jars that has been slowly building on our shelves, but really, the thing I couldn’t get out of my mind was fresh cherry soda. So I turned to my copy of True Brews and quickly whipped up a batch of Cherry-Vanilla Soda. If you have cherries to spare, please make this soda – it is so sweet and fizzy and refreshing, and it’s a gorgeous clear cherry-red color. Just a little glass feels like a special treat. And it’s even more of a special treat if you add a dash of bourbon and chocolate extract, like we did for this cocktail. The mixture of cherries and bourbon and chocolate feels very Southern and indulgent, a drink for sipping slowly on your porch at twilight, when the heat finally begins to fade.

Ingredient note: I’m not sure you can still buy the Taza Mexican chocolate extract we used for flavoring – I looked for a link to direct you all to, but learned that it was only produced from 2010-2013. You can read about it here, but I couldn’t find any online vendors selling it. It’s more similar to a chocolate baking extract than a chocolate bitters – something like this might work in its place.

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Cherry-Chocolate Bourbon Soda

Serves 1.

• 3/4 c. homemade cherry-vanilla soda (recipe below) or other cherry soda
• 15 drops Taza Mexican chocolate extract
• 1 oz. Bourbon

1. Add the soda, chocolate extract, and bourbon to a glass with several ice cubes in it. Stir gently, then serve immediately.

Homemade Cherry Vanilla Soda

Recipe adapted from True Brews. Makes 8 cups.

• 2 lbs. of pitted fresh cherries
• 4 limes
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 c. water, plus more to fill the bottles
• 9 TBS sugar
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp dry champagne yeast

1. Place the cherries, lime juice, and vanilla in a large bowl. Bring the cup of water to a boil, then stir in the sugar and salt until dissolved. Pour the mixture over the cherries and let macerate for 10 minutes.
2. Place the cherries and their liquid in a blender and blend until smooth. Strain the puree through a fine mesh strainer, catching the juice in a bowl. Pour the cherry juice through a funnel into a clean 2-liter soda bottle (do not use glass, as it may break under the pressure of the fermentation process). Add water to the bottle to fill almost to the top, leaving at least 1 inch of headspace between the top of the juice and the cap. Taste and add more lime juice, sugar, or vanilla as desired.
3. Add the yeast to the bottle. Screw on the cap and shake to distribute the yeast. Let the bottle sit at room temperature out of direct sunlight until the bottle feels rock solid when you press against the sides. This carbonation process usually takes 12 to 48 hours: check the bottle periodically to avoid overcarbonation and a potentially bursted bottle. Once the soda is carbonated, place it in the fridge to slow the carbonation process. Open very slowly over a sink the first time you serve it, to avoid bubble-ups. Serve cold. Refrigerate for up to 2 weeks.

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I’m teasing you a little bit with this headline: you don’t get recipes for all three home brews in this post, only the soda. For the other two, you’re going to have to go out and get a copy of Emma Christensen’s True Brews. And it’s not because I don’t want to share, I do. It’s just that I couldn’t make the daunting process of brewing your own beverages at home seem nearly as clear and easy as Emma does, so I want to leave most of the explaining to the expert. Because that’s exactly what Emma is, and True Brews is a fantastic (and fun) resource for anyone looking to get their hands dirty with fermenting their own soda, kombucha, kefir, cider, beer, mead, sake, or fruit wine. Certainly, you could find much larger tomes dedicated solely to the science behind brewing any one of these beverages, but for someone who just wants an easy introduction or who likes to dabble, True Brews is the perfect starting point.

This review has been a long-time in the making. For three months there have been buckets of brews bubbling away in our new house, turning rice into sake, blackberries into blackberry wine, and homegrown watermelon into fizzy soda. Now that all three recipes are finished, it’s time to have some friends over for a tasting party – that is, before we get started on our next project! (Cranberry mead, if you’re curious).  Like most DIY food projects – cheese-making, charcuterie, bread-baking, canning – home-brewing takes time, practice, patience and a small investment in the necessary equipment. I have to say, so far, brewing is a bit more rewarding than the other projects we’ve tried – it’s less labor-intensive and the results are faster and more consistent. Plus, drinking a glass of mead that’s a little too dry is a lot more enjoyable than trying to eat a piece of cheese that didn’t cure properly.

True Brews both clearly covers the basics for all kinds of brewing, and provides a number of appealing recipes to get you started. I’m really impressed by how not-daunting this book makes the whole process. Any questions we’ve had have been explicitly answered, and all three of our recipes worked out, even though Trevor wanted to start with the “advanced” sake recipe, which requires feeding the sake a little specially prepared rice every few days for almost two weeks. I started more simply, with the watermelon-mint soda, which was a snap to make – 24 hours after cutting up the watermelon, I was sipping a super fizzy, refreshing, slightly sweet soda. I can’t wait to make a few more varieties; it’s really the best soda I’ve ever tried. And the blackberry wine was enjoyable too, in a completely different way – it’s sort of thin and has a bit more tang than most wines, but with a pleasant aroma of ripe berries and a uniqueness that makes you want to finish the glass. Not to mention, it’s a gorgeous, gorgeous color, and completely translucent. I’m not really a sake drinker, but the sake is OK too – it’s breadier than sake is supposed to be, but a chilled glass is still good, if not craveable. Because the first three recipes were successful, I’m eager to try more recipes – besides the cranberry mead, I have my eye on the Sweet Spiced Apple Cider, the Jamaican Ginger Beer, and the Apricot Wheat Ale. I feel like my drinking choices just got a whole lot more awesome.

The bottom line: True Brews is an excellent primer on fermenting your own home-brews, both alcoholic (cider, beer, mead, sake, wine) and kid-friendly (soda, kombucha, and kefir). Emma covers the basics clearly and succinctly, making home-brewing accessible, appealing, and fun. The recipes are diverse and turn out impressively, and the enticing photography and clean design make this book the complete package. This may be a little light on new and detailed information for a seasoned brewer, but for someone just starting out, it’s perfect.

Disclaimer: I received a review copy of True Brews from Ten Speed Press, but was not otherwise compensated for writing this review. All opinions are my own, as always.

Watermelon-Mint Soda

Recipe from True Brews. Makes 2 liters.

• 4 pounds seeded, cubed watermelon (from a 6 pound watermelon)
• 1/2 c. packed fresh mint leaves
• 1/2 c. freshly squeezed lime juice (from 4-5 limes)
• 1 cup water, plus more to fill the bottle
• 9 TBS white sugar, plus more to taste if needed
• pinch of salt
• 1/8 tsp dry champagne yeast (purchase at your local home-brew store)

1. To make soda you will need a clean, 2-liter plastic soda bottle, a blender, a fine-mesh strainer, and a funnel. Make sure all of your equipment is clean before you start.
2. Combine the watermelon, mint, and lime juice in a large bowl and set aside. Place 1 cup of water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Remove from the heat, add the sugar and a pinch of salt, and stir to dissolve. Pour the hot syrup over the watermelon, stir briefly to coat all fruit in the syrup, and let stand for 10 minutes.
3. In batches, blend the watermelon mixture into a smooth puree, then strain the puree through a fine-mesh strainer into a clean bowl, stirring the puree to allow as much juice as possible to run into the bowl without pushing any of the solids through the strainer. If you want a very smooth soda, line your strainer with a piece of cheesecloth.
4. Pour the juice into the the clean 2-liter soda bottle. Add water to almost fill the bottle, leaving around 1 inch of headspace at the top. Taste, and add a little more sugar or lime juice if desired.
5. Add the yeast to the bottle. Screw on the cap and shake the bottle to dissolve and distribute the yeast. Let the bottle sit at room temperature out of direct sunlight for 12 to 48 hours – the soda will ferment more quickly in a warmer room. When the bottle feels rock solid, with very little give, the soda is ready. Place it in the fridge overnight or for up to two weeks. Open slowly over a sink to release the pressure (sodas can easily overcarbonate). You can transfer to pretty glass bottles to serve the soda, but always store it in the plastic bottle to prevent explosions.

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