5 Easiest Liquors to Make at Home with Fruit, Yeast and Sugar

If you are feeling creative and want to make homemade alcohol, check out these 5 easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar.

We have prepared a list of easy recipes for making homemade liquor that you will love. But first, let us clarify the difference between liquor and liqueur. While very similar, the two words are not interchangeable and it’s easy to get confused about this. Basically, liquors aren’t sweet while liqueurs are and they are sometimes used as flavoring agents in various drinks. Liquor or spirits include vodka, tequila, gin, rum, drinks made thanks to the distillation process. They are very strong and have a higher level of alcohol than let’s say, wines. Spirits or liquors are not very sweet. Flavored varieties are available today but the flavor is usually added after the distillation process. Liqueurs are sweetened spirits that feature different flavors. We can use rum or whiskey as a base spirit to make liqueurs. However, many people confuse the two words or use the same term for both varieties, hence the title of our list.

Now that we’ve made that clear, let us talk about how to make homemade alcohol fast, since so many people out there are wondering how to make instant alcohol and is it even possible to make alcohol in an hour.

There is an abundance of homemade alcohol recipes online, but a great number of them are either too complicated for us to follow or they require expensive ingredients. Since most people want a quick and easy way to make cheap liquor, you can see how this can be troubling. We’ll save you the hassle of having to go through hundreds of different recipes and we compiled a list of the easiest ones instead. But did you know you can learn how to make alcohol from rice at home? You can also make a good homemade saki and there are plenty of easy recipes online. Here’s one way to make sake, the national spirit of Japan.

But, there is another common misconception regarding liquors. While you can make a cheap homemade wine using fruit, sugar, and yeast in no time, when making liquors, however, yeast is not required. Recipes for making easy homemade liquors usually include only fruit, sugar, and spirits. So if you were wondering how to make alcohol from fruit, you can choose between making a wine or a cider using the three ingredients in our title or you can make a homemade liquor with higher alcohol content. Speaking of liquors, take a look at 7 Best Liquors and Drinks to Drink Straight for a Newbie.

Due to these common misconceptions, our list of easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar, includes drinks you can make using fruit and sugar, as well as those using all three ingredients. When it comes to recipes on how to make homemade alcohol with yeast and sugar, the majority of them refers to wines and ciders but you can pretty much make alcohol from any juice you like simply by adding yeast to it and allowing it to ferment. When it comes to liquors, the process is slightly different and the drinks also require more time to distill. As a result, liquors are much stronger than wines and ciders. All store-bought alcoholic beverages contain yeast, as it is used in the first stage of alcohol production. However, the distilling process concentrates the alcohol and the yeast is left behind. Aw wines and ciders are not distilled, the yeast remains in these alcoholic beverages with lower alcohol content. Curious to learn more about yeast? Here are a few other interesting facts about it.

We visited websites such as The Spruce and Clawhammer Supply to find these easy recipes for homemade alcohol and so we did. All our recipes for homemade alcohol are simple as they require only several ingredients that can be found everywhere. The instructions are also quite clear and simple for each recipe that you can follow them with no difficulties. And don’t worry, the ingredients used in these recipes are also relatively cheap.

Let’s take a look at 5 easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar.

5. Polish Blueberry Cordial

Ingredients: ½ pounds of blueberries, 1-quart vodka, 2 cups of sugar

This unbelievably easy recipe for homemade liquor is so simple that anyone can follow the instructions. First, you need to wash and prepare blueberries and combine them with vodka in a large sterilized container. Seal the container and leave the mixture for about a week. After a week, pour the mixture through a sieve and transfer the blueberry-infused vodka into a sterilized container. Add 2 cups of sugar to the reserved blueberries, mix it, and transfer to another container. Leave both mixtures in a dark place for about a month. After one month, combine the two mixtures, strain, and pour into a sterilized container. Seal and allow it to age for a few months. Here is the entire recipe for making this delightful blueberry cordial.

And now, let’s see what else we have on our list of easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar.

4. Blackberry Moonshine Recipe

Ingredients: 1 cup water, 1 cup sugar, 2 cups blackberries, ¾ cups moonshine (or vodka), lime zest and lime juice

Start by making a simple syrup. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of sugar on high heat and then squeeze a few blackberries into the mixture. When it’s mixed well, add the mixture to a mason jar and refrigerate. Wash and dry blackberries and then place them in a mason jar. Ad the moonshine or vodka too as well as lime juice and lime zest. Now add 1 cup of blackberry syrup and seal. Let it sit in a low-lit room and shake the mixture daily. Once the sugar is dissolved, let it sit for at least 24 hours. The longer it sits the better but if you are in a hurry 24 hours are fine. Now, that the infusion is complete strain the mixture with cheesecloth to remove any seeds. You’ve got your blackberry moonshine! You don’t have to throw the strained blackberries away. You can use them the next time you make ice cream or garnish mixed drinks, for example. You can take a look at the detailed instructions here if you need more clarification.

Up next, we have top three easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar.

3. Homemade Rum

Ingredients: 2.5kg brown sugar, 3 liters of molasses, 1 tablespoon of Diammonium Phosphate, 1 tablespoon of citric acid, 1 pack of baker’s yeast, water

Take a large pot and add brown sugar, molasses, citric acid, and Diammonium Phosphate into it. Heat wash the mixture on the stove until it boils, then take it off the stove and let it cool a bit. This will allow the yeast to convert into alcohol more easily. Pour the mixture into a fermenter and top it off with water (about 25-30 C). The next step in making the liquor number three on our list of easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar, is to add the packet of yeast. Make sure water is no hotter than 30 C as this will kill the yeast. Leave the mixture set for an hour and then stir in the yeast. Leave it for about 24 hours and then stir again. Make sure the temperature of the sugar wash is about 20-25 C during the fermentation process. When bubbles stop passing through the airlock, the fermentation process is over and now you can transfer the mixture into another container after a day or two. Again, wait for about 2 days and then transfer the mixture to a fermenter. You can add a bit of flavor to your rum like cinnamon, nutmeg or vanilla if you want. With a simple recipe like this, you can make a delicious homemade rum in no time.

2. Homemade Raspberry Liquor

Ingredients: 5 pounds of raspberries, 6 pounds sugar, 1 tablespoon of yeast, water

This is one of the easiest recipes for homemade alcohol you can possibly find on the Internet and therefore, it’s ranked second on our list of easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar. To make this delightful raspberry moonshine drink you should first prepare the raspberries by washing them an removing the stems. When you’ve done that, you should boil the raspberries with about 1.5 gallons of water. Mash them up and then add the sugar. Let the raspberries simmer for about 20 minutes and then pour them into a fermenting bucket, add more water add the yeast once the temperature drops. The mixture should ferment for about one or two weeks. When the process is complete, strain out solids and then distill the drink using a pot still.

1. Homemade Cherry Liquor

Ingredients: half a pound of sour cherries, 1 cup of sugar, 2 cups rectified spirits or vodka

This is another Polish recipe and it is so simple we had to rank it first on our list of 5 easiest liquors to make at home with fruit, yeast, and sugar. Start by washing the cherries. Remove the pits and place the cherries in a jar. Pour sugar over cherries and slowly pour the vodka over them until the jar is full. Don’t shake or stir the mixture. Close the jar and leave it for about 3 months at room temperature. After 3 months, you should strain the liquor and pour it in a bottle. You can use the strained cherries and serve them with ice cream, for example, so don’t throw them away. Enjoy your liquor! You can find the entire recipe on The Spruce, as well as many other interesting recipes.