[Redwellies]

As I have recently acquired a significant amount of demijohns I am looking into all sorts of different wine, I am very much interested in elderflower and elderberry, what time of year are these available,

Bottoms Up!!!!!

[WG.]

Elderflower in June / July
Elderberry in Sept / October - perhaps August in the South

[Redwellies]

Cheers WG

[GrannieAnnie]

Carrot is a nice cheap one too RW, I buy the bags of horse carrots for 1.80  they are about 10kgs I think?  And a BIG bag of sugar £3.59 and that would make 5 gallons if I just used the carrots for the wine.  

Also as you only cook the carrots until they are just tender, and use the cooking water, I put the cooked carrots into bags and freeeze them and use them for soups and stews.

I have made orange juice wine too, but the last lot didn't clear as well, but as I'm so pleased with the carrot and the rice wines, I may leave he orange juice alone

[anatomick]

Elderfowers are starting to come in around now but please follow the advice of "dont use the ones that smell of Catpee" . There is definitely a difference. I've ignored it two years in a row and both years ended up pouriing it down the sink!
Then again maybe I should have tried the home distilling process -purely as an experiment of course
Elderberry wine - now that's just loverley!

Mick

[SkipRat]

This year upto now i have fermenting/maturing made, carrot, parsnip, rice n raisen, ribena, apricot, apple and orange, grapefruit, rhubarb, parsley, and of course the usual kits of red and white wines and have in use 25 demijohns and 3, 5 gallon fermenting bins. so looks like i,m going to have a very happy summer    

[lucywil]

Elderfowers are starting to come in around now but please follow the advice of "dont use the ones that smell of Catpee" . There is definitely a difference. I've ignored it two years in a row and both years ended up pouriing it down the sink!
Then again maybe I should have tried the home distilling process -purely as an experiment of course
Elderberry wine - now that's just loverley!

Mick

i am in the middle of making some elderflower cordial and i have a feeling that i may have the cat pee ones, it does not yet have that flowery smell. why is there a difference? surely elderflower is elderflower, one plant should smell the same as the next?

[kentishlad]

Hi there,

I just popped into the forum to see if anyone was talking about Elderflower and there is this post, well, I wanted to see if anyone else was talking about rank / sweet smelling Elderflowers and sure enough there is!

I have a number of wine making books and one of them (C.J.Berry) does indeed say pick sweet not rank variety. I went looking for some this weekend with the wife and found loads of rank ones and only one sweet one and what a difference in smell I can tell you! This one sweet bush is only just coming out so we'll have to wait a bit. It's funny that only one of my books mentions this fact.

Cheers,

Wayne.

[Redwellies]

Do they look any different or have I just got to go round smelling cat pee all day!!

[flatcap]

weve just set our first lot of elderflower away on sunday we picked flowers in the afternoon when sunny and ours were ok, we sniff ours and had no probs with rank ones yet

[David.]

Do they look any different or have I just got to go round smelling cat pee all day!! :D

You have to sniff. Some trees need to be avoided.

[Welsh Girls Allotment]

I've got an elderflower tree on the corner of my plot and was looking forward to making a few batches of wine - I shall head off in the mornong and sniff  :shock:

[Redwellies]

Well im blowed, I expected the elderflowers on my allotment to be of the cat pee variety, and I have sniffed my way round the entire lottie, and only one turned out to be cat pee smelling, guess Im gonna have a bumper load of elderflower this year.  Mind you I will be leaving some for the berries, have got a nice receipe forf a mixture of elderberry and blackberry, and an elderflower wine that I found on the internet, if anyone is interested.

Elderflower wine
Ingredients
Grated rind of one lemon
500mls (1 pint) of elderflowers - to obtain this pick or shake of the elderflowers
and place into a measuring jug. Don't push them down but do shake them down. Be careful not to add any of the bitter green stems.
3.5 litres (8 pints) of boiling water
1.3kg (3 lbs) sugar Juice of one lemon
25g (Half an ounce) yeast

Method
Put lemon rind with the elderflowers and pour over boiling water
Allow to stand for 4 days, stirring occasionally.

Strain through a fine sieve or muslin cloth
Stir in sugar, lemon juice and yeast
Keep at room temperature to ferment, try not to let it go down to 18c (65f)
When you are sure all the bubbling has ceased, stir the wine and allow to settle for 3 days
Strain again carefully
Put in a demijohn (not bottles)
After 3 months maturing, put into bottles

Blackberry & Elderberry Wine  
1 kilo of ripe blackberries
1 kilo of ripe elderberries
1.3kilos of sugar
1.5 tsp of citric acid
1 tsp of Pectolase
1 250gm tin of red grape concentrate
Burgundy, red wine or general purpose yeast
2 Campden tablets

1.   Remove the stems from the fruit and wash it thoroughly.

2.  Mash the blackberries and elderberries in a clean plastic bucket with a clean potato masher and pour over 2 litres of boiling water. Mix Well.

3. Allow to cool to about 21deg C. and add a crushed campden tablet and stir well.

4. Add the pectolase and citric acid, stir well and then add the yeast a day later.

5. Cover the bucket and allow to ferment on the “pulp” for 4/5 days stirring daily.

6. Strain through a nylon bag or sieve on to 1.3 kilos of sugar. Stir well to dissolve the sugar and pour into a demijohn.

7. Add the red grape concentrate and make up to 4.5 litres with more water.

8. Give a final stir, fit an air lock and leave the vessel in a warm place about 20-22deg C until there are no more bubbles passing through the air lock.

9. Add another campden tablet and syphon (rack off) into another demijohn and refit air lock.

10. Gradually the wine will clear and after about 6 weeks it should be ready to syphon into green bottles.

11. It is best to leave for about 9 to 12 months or longer before drinking.

12. You will have a lovely wine to be proud of! It will have a deep, rich colour too

[Eleanor]

i have never made any home brew before so ive got  questions,
do you steep the flowers in a covered bucket?
do you need special brewing yeast for the elderflower recipe?
i m going to collect the flowers tonight and bung them in the freezer until the weekend

[flatcap]

hi eleanor
                 we put flowers in covered bin with boiling water and suger then use wine yeast to make it. hope that helps