Seasonal Wine, Early June - Elderflower Champagne

[LordEoin]

Sunny weather! Blue Skies! And the first elderflowers are out 

Elderflowers have a strong and great taste and are mostly used for champagne, cordeal, wine and also in beer as aroma.
It can be tempting to lash the stuff in but it can taste quite strong, and a little goes a long way.
I'm going to go over the Champagne Today as it's been a few years since I've made it and I haven't brewed with wild yeast in quite a while.

Brewing with wild yeast can be frustrating, as you don't know what other goodies are on the flowers and it can get an infection, but it's worth it.
I've never tried washing the yeast afterwards, but if there are any yeastheads about it might be a good one to play with.

For some reason, you're supposed to ask the tree for permission before taking it's flowers, but don't worry, I've not known one to say 'no' yet 
Oops, I forgot to show you what they look like. Here's one i googled earlier:

They grow on a tree with dark green leaves. Don't confuse them with the weed you see growing at the side of the road at the moment. The flower heads look similar.
Smell them if you're not sure. If it smells tasty, you've probably got the right one 

The clumps of flowers are referred to as 'heads' but for some reason I got the word 'plates' stuck in my head at some stage. Dunno if I made it up.
Most recipes you'll find out there call for a certain amount of heads, not a particular weight.

The flowers are suposed to smell better in the morning, but so long as you're early in the season I don't think it makes a difference.
When you pick them, just clip the whole head off the soft green stem, i use a knife to make it even easier.
You'll be throwing the whole head into this, not just the flowers.
Give the head a shake for bugs before putting them into your trusty tesco plastic bag and moving on.

Recipe for a gallon (4.5L)
5 large elderflower heads
2 lemons
800g sugar (or honey if you want to be a dandy fancypants)
2 tablespoons (25-30ml) of apple cider vinegar

• Bring the gallon of water to the boil and let it cool down to room temperature
• Slice one lemon and juice the other.
• Add the sugar, vinegar, lemons and the elderflower heads.
• Stir it all up and cover it lightly.
• Because you let the water cool, you didn't kill the natural yeast in the flowers, which will steep into the water and start fermenting the sugar
• After 3 or 4days you should see signs of fermentation.
• Strain the liquid into loosely capped bottles for fermentation, then tighten the caps when fermentation slows (about 2 weeks)
• After a few days the pressure in the bottles will build and it will carbonate but continue to live and build pressure
• By refriferating it, you can halt the fermentation when you're happy with the fizz and sweetness.
  
• Enjoy a)young b)cold c)as a cocktail mixer d)with gin e)naked f)regularly

Warning:
- If using glass bottles, make sure that they're strong and thick glass. This will have a lot of pressure.
- To prevent damage from bottle bombs, store it away from important stuff.
- This is not intended for longterm storage because of the unpredictability of the wild yeast, and it would also end up too dry and not very nice.

[Will_D]

Also to note:

1. Remeber where they are as when in flower they are easy to spot, in autumn "in berry" - impossible

2. Only pick about 1/4 of the flowers from a bush as that way you can go back in the autumn to get the berryiess.

3. As well as wine/champagne make elderflower syrup. This can be stored in freezer and used as required in cocktails/over ice cream in white wines etc.

[LordEoin]

Yes, great points.
Even if you don't pick the flowers, note where you saw them and come back later for the berries (which make awesome wine)
Locate as many trees as possible and spread your flower picking over them.


Cordial:
15 heads
1.2kg sugar
1L water
1 sliced lemon

Boil water. Add sugar, flowers and lemon. Stir, cover and leave to cool.
Bottle, refrigerate, dilute to taste.
Awesome with Gin.

Syrup:
To make a syrup, just continue simmering the cordial until it thickens up.

[Metattron]

Just remember that elderberies are poisonous when uncooked.  I take it for the wine you boil them to a syrup?

[Metattron]

Nice timing on this by the way.  Just came on to do a search on elderflower as I've noticed it's just starting to bloom behind my house and I thought I should do something with them this year.

[Will_D]

Just remember that elderberies are poisonous when uncooked.  I take it for the wine you boil them to a syrup?

Not as far as I know!

Says Who? Citation Please?

[Metattron]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambucus_nigra#Culinary_uses

Many other sources state the same, and I was always told as a kid they were poisonous.   It does look like the poison (a cyanide-producing glycoside) is mostly in the seeds of the fruit though, so if you are pressing and straining it may not be an issue. 

[Will_D]

Like many plants don't eat when green! Like the green of a light struck potato!

From the wiki:

The dark blue/purple berries can be eaten when fully ripe but are mildly poisonous in their unripe state.[10] All green parts of the plant are poisonous, containing cyanogenic glycosides (Vedel & Lange 1960). The berries are edible after cooking and can be used to make jam, jelly, chutney and Pontack sauce.

I know Wiki is not the absolute reference but the above sounds reasonable. Even if it is a bit contradictory

Eating a few raw black ones won't hurt you and they are far to sharp and tannic to ever replace strawberrys and cream! They need cooking with sugar!

[LordEoin]

I always munch away on the berries. I think they're delicious.
I know the wood contains cyanide, and cutting it down or burning it is supposed to bring bad luck.
That leads to a lot of superstition about them protecting your land (and graveyards) etc.
Wands and witches brooms are made of the wood.
The tree itself represents both birth and death.
The leaves, bark, berries and flowers are all used in traditional remedies, mostly for sore throats.

But back to the question...
Yes, I generally boil the berries for a few minutes, but just to pop them and extract their juice.
I'll get to that in a couple of months. For now I'm just going to enjoy the flowers 

[Boycott]

• Strain the liquid into loosely capped bottles for fermentation, then tighten the caps when fermentation slows (about 2 weeks)
  

I dont really understand this step. why are you doing this? why not just bottle at 2weeks?

[LordEoin]

Do if you want to.
This way works for me. It takes a lot of the guesswork out of it.

[Boycott]

Made mine last night, while not a diaster it was a horrible experience and took hours!

Picked about 25heads and when i got home i had 1 spider, 3 aphids and about a million tiny black crawly jumpy bastarfs all over the place.

Simple shaking was not enough (lost a lot of pollen too). I decided id soak them in water to kill them which did get about 50% of them but of course i lost flavour :-( 
2 water soaking and many bucket to bucket transfers to shake them off and i think i got about 97% of them out.

I couldnt be bothered getting the last of them and figured ill try some strainer after fermentation so in went all the heads which i had trimmed to the small stalks.

Also added:
syrup from 6 boiled teabags plus a cup of raisins (which were boiled for 15mins or so.
Juice of 3 lemons
50ml white wine vinegar
Hydrated cider yeast.
2.5kg of brewing sugar =1.040

Im wasnt sure about adding all of the above. Im going to ferment until dry and added stevia as a sweetner.

Ill never brew it again unless there is an easier way to get rid of those black yokes

[johnrm]

...1 spider, 3 aphids and about a million tiny black crawly jumpy bastarfs...

Never reveal your 'secret' ingredients!

[Will_D]

I know its a smart arsed hindsighted suggestion but: If you inspect a couple of flower heads and they are "alive" move on to a different tree / location!

[Boycott]

Well yes that would have been great to know beforehand and i didnt notice this while picking.  Guess i picked the wrong bush so and its not a common occurance.