The Novocastrian Vintners Gazette is now two years old and making elderflower wine inspired me to start making wine and eventually writtering aboot it azwell! Elderflower is a nice familiar ritual that kind of kicks off the year as fermentation starts I need to think about bottling the older wines I made last year to make way for any new plans I have now. The wine has a few detractors but almost all sane people know it is an easy delicious wine to make, has a refreshing fresh summery taste and is excellent for the beginner.

CLICK HERE FOR A STILL ELDERFLOWER WINE

This year I am making my first elderflower champagne rather than my more traditional still elderflower wine. It will have less punch using only 25 flowers rather than the 30 or even more I use usually as the bubbles will be the main attraction. Another difference is using 250ml of white grape concentrate rather than raisins I use for body. Substituting citric acid for a more wine like tartaric acid which I plan to do for all my wine form now on will hopefully give a mellower less “artificial” sour taste. There is certainly nothing wrong with using citric acid if that is all to hand though.

GUIDE TO FORAGING ELDERFLOWERS

Flowers were picked and plucked of their petals on a hot morning to maximise the pollen content and then steeped in boiling water and left to cool. The CY17 yeast is a white wine yeast so I have used a large metal pan as my primary fermenter to dissipate heat and keep the yeast from over heating and boiling off aroma and flavour. To further keep it cool and create a long(ish) ferment it was kept in the coolest part of the house – the cupboard under the stairs. As elderflowers are so aromatic and delicate I wanted to keep as much as I could in the wine. With the grape concentrate substituting the raisins for vinocity there was only a small crown of petals that did not need a stir to agitate back into the must. A small shuffle of the pan soaked the leaves without a need to open the lid and expose it to possible oxidation and contamination.

Initial fermentation took a leisurely 10 days and it is now gently rolling along in an airlocked secondary demijohn. Racking in two months will remove the finer leas as the exhausted yeast settles the the bottom. When the wine is six months old I intend to add an EC1118 yeast and sugar solution to get a traditional “Methode Champenoise” carbonation in bottle. If you want this chemical additions like campden should be kept to a minimum and as I boiled my must and opened it only a few times without the need to stir my wine has no sulphites so far.

ELDER FLOWER CHAMPAGNE 4.5litres

Suitable yeasts – white wine yeasts like EC1118, CY17, SN9, CL23

RECIPE

25 elderflower sprays

1kg-ish sugar to 1.08SG

250ml white grape extract (or 250g of raisins roughly chopped)

1/2 mug tea

1 and 1/2 tsp tartaric acid (or zest and juice of 3 lemons (no pith)

1 tsp yeast nutrient

White wine yeast (plus another for chaptalising at six months)

4.5L boiling water

METHOD

Pick 25 elderflower heads as early in the morning as possible on a warm day.

Pluck the elder flowers from the stems removing as much green as possible.

Place the elderflowers, (and the chopped/minced raisins & lemon zest if using) in pan and pour over the boiling water, add half of the sugar and stir in thoroughly so the flowers are submerged.

Leave to cool to room temperature then fine tune to the desired starting gravity of sugar at 1.08 or Add the wine concentrate, citric acid and a cup of strong tea made with one tea bag.

Ferment in a covered primary container in as cool an area as you can. Agitate to submerge the flowers once a day (if using raisins a stir with a sanitised ladle will need to be done)

Rack and filter to secondary though muslin to remove the solids when fermentation starts to really slow. This will be at 7 to 10 days after pitching the yeast. Squeeze the muslin thoroughly to get all the taste you can!

Rack at about five weeks then another 10 to 12 weeks after that.

FULL GUIDE TO MAKING SPARKLING WINE HERE!

When six months in age syphon 750ml of wine into a sanitised jar or bottle and add a packet of champagne yeast, half a tsp of nutrient and 13g of sugar. Leave for 20 minutes then stir in the yeast.

After 24 hours add another 13g sugar and 40ml of boiled and cooled water and leave for a further 24 hours.

Mix thoroughly into the elder flower wine with 102g of sugar and bottle in sanitised champagne bottles immediately (That is the equivalent of 17g per bottle)

Ready to drink six months later at 12 months in age.