Seasonal Wine, Early June - Elderflower Champagne

[LordEoin]

I hope your recipe turns out nice but with 5 gallons of elderberry and aphid wine you're going to be so sick of the taste of elderflower. 
I've never seen an infestation of little black bugs on the flowers, but they'll be a lot harder to see on the berries later on...

[Boycott]

Only made 20l but ill be giving most of it away id say.

[LordEoin]

"Don't promise mongrels 'til they're born"
The polar opposite of "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched".
Basically, see how your recipe turn out before plannning to get rid of it 

[Andrew]

I found a massive amount of ground elder today. Anyone know if the flowers can be used the same way?

[LordEoin]

Nope, it's a completely different plant. It only gets it's name because the flowers look similar.
You'll find tons of it along the sides of any country road at the moment, but to me it's a weed.
The leaves can be eaten before the flowers bloom.
Another name for it is Goutweed because it has medicinal uses for gout and arthritis.

[Greg2013]

Ok guys i went elderflower picking today as its getting kinda late in season for picking them, got a fair size plastic shopping bagof nice flower heads. Where i live is just polluted with elder trees, and i mean polluted. Just weighed them and i have 1.3kg of flower heads Now i dont fancy doing the Champers so any receipes for elderflower beer or wine?

[loftybush]

Dont have apple cider vinegar, or white wine vinegar.

Can I just use malt vinegar? It is added to change the ph, or for flavour. If its for the ph I'm sure any vinegar will do?

[LordEoin]

Just leave it out. It's fine 

[loftybush]

Too late, threw in some white rice vinegar, hope it.cone out ok 

[loftybush]

One more question, can I let this ferment out fully, and prime it before bottling as we're used to, or will I get a very dry wine?

[Boycott]

One more question, can I let this ferment out fully, and prime it before bottling as we're used to, or will I get a very dry wine?

I think it will be very dry by all accounts but it will also take ages to ferment out. Im going to backsweeten it with stevia

[LordEoin]

Very dry. The point of bottling it before it's finished fermenting is to keep it refreshing and sweet, similar to ginger beer.
But I suppose baksweetening it would be fine

[johnrm]

Theres elderflower everywhere down this neck of the woods.
I must collect some and do something with it.

If left till later in the season you get the berries, right?

[LordEoin]

Yes. The berries have a very different taste and make awesome wine.

[nigel_c]

I got a 15 L batch on the go early in the week. Smells amazing. I love elderflower .