Heat-Damaged Fruits of ‘Čačanska Lepotica’ as a Raw Material for Plum Spirit Production: Possibilities for Improving Product Quality

Because of the rising occurrence of extremely hot summers linked to climate change, there is a mass appearance of heat-damaged fruits of ‘Čačanska Lepotica’, which are unsuitable for fresh consumption and processing into products in which the fruits’ appearance is a critical quality attribute. To address this issue, the aim of the study was to examine the possibility of producing plum spirits from such fruits as one of the potential ways to utilize them. Heat-damaged fruits were processed in nine different ways, including a traditional one. All produced plum spirits met legal requirements. GC-MS analysis of 39 volatile compounds revealed that the plum spirits made from heat-damaged fruits had different aromatic profiles depending on the processing method applied. However, the plum spirit produced in the traditional way had various sensory defects; the most notable were a lack of freshness and a distinctly unpleasant ′cooked plum′ aroma. Modifications to the production method led to an improvement in the sensory characteristics of the plum spirits. The obtained results indicate that modifications in small distilleries should include fruit crushing, stone removal and usage of baker’s yeast. In large distilleries, though, the best sensory characteristics for plum spirits made from heat-damaged fruits could be obtained using a production method that includes fruit pulping with stone removal and spontaneous alcoholic fermentation, with one additional step: lowering the pH of the mash before alcoholic fermentation to 3.0.