Elderflower champagne

[piagio2000]

Hi,
I followed this recipe to try my hand at this stuff for the first time:

http://www.channel4.com/food/recipes/chefs/hugh-fearnley-whittingstall/elderflower-champagne-recipe_p_1.html

Basically it's the River Cottage recipe.

So mine didn't start fermenting itself so I had to add some yeast after two days. It's now been fermenting or four days and we are at the stage where the recipe states that I should decant onto bottles.
I had a taste last night and the elderflower taste is very impressive I have to say...but it's very sweet.

I think I should really be taking the flowers out as I don't want it to be overpowering. The recipe doesn't state the SG it should be for bottling.
Anyone give me advice on the SG I should be bottling at? I'm aware it shpuld be sweet and pretty low in alcohol...but I'm also worried that of I bottle while it's too sweet it will over prime and explode....I'm going to use 2ltre coke bottles.
Thanks a lot in advance.

[benarnold]

I think there's a mistake in that recipe, it makes 5 gallons not 1. If you have a spare large fermenter you could just add more water to dilute the sugar.

[Duffbeer]

Holy mackeral, 2kg for 6 litres yup somethings not right for sure.
Only guessing here, but I would NOT bottle until sg is 1.005 or less.

[piagio2000]

Thanks guys....I had my doubts!
As It happend I bottled last night and took a SG reading whilst doing so....1.085!!!!
And that was going into the bottles!!!

I'll take it out tonight, dillute it and maybe make two gallon of wine instead.

Any idea's how much sugar that recipe for six litres should have?

[Rich]

Any idea's how much sugar that recipe for six litres should have?

This isn't meant to sound smart.. But enough sugar to make the starting SG around 1.080, always use your hydrometer to guide you. Depending on what your making that can vary from no added sugar to about 900g in the gallon in my experience.

[benarnold]

Don't worry, I did a similar thing. I wasn't thinking / paying attention and emptied three 2kg bags of sugar into the bucket instead of two 1kg bags, and didn't realise until I'd added everything else - though I did think it looked like a lot of sugar!

I decided to try and ferment it in a beer barrel under pressure so as to carbonate it with less of a risk of exploding bottles. I put it in the barrel at 1.040 (probably still too high) and it leaked out of the barrel tap overnight, straight onto the kitchen tiles and newly washed rug - wasn't very popular there.

I poured it all back into the fermenting bin this morning, tightened up the tap and put it back, and left it on the counter with the tap hanging over the sink just in case. I had a call from my wife earlier, it's done it again and still gone all over the floor, and the counter this time.

It definitely wasn't leaking for the hour before I left for work, so I guess that the pressure build up has caused it. I'm thinking I'll leave the top slightly unscrewed to release the pressure until it gets to 1.005 or so and try again.

It tasted good though, and actually not outstandingly horribly sweet, even at 1.040 or whatever it had gone down to this morning.

[piagio2000]

This isn't meant to sound smart.. But enough sugar to make the starting SG around 1.080, always use your hydrometer to guide you. Depending on what your making that can vary from no added sugar to about 900g in the gallon in my experience.

Did a bit of googling and it seems for a gallon batch of this stuff then 1.5 lbs should be enough. That wouldn't take it to 1.080 but then it doesn't need to be that high as it isn't a wine.

Deffinately going to get the stuff out of bottles and make two gallons of wine with it...see how that goes...maybe add some sultana's for a bit of body.

Then start a new gallon batch with MUCH less sugar for a batch of the champagne!

[lockwood1956]

maybe add some sultana's for a bit of body.

you dont want too much body....this is a light style wine

[danpug]

What's the purpose of white wine vinegar in this recipe?

[piagio2000]

you dont want too much body....this is a light style wine

Thanks Bob!
Didn't see this till this morning, by which time I had already thrown in 250g of sultana's to each gallon...I'll get them out after a day or so!

Here was me thinking I was being real smart in adding the sultana's as well!

[Her Lushness]

Oh dear, this whole thread seems to be a lesson in NOT using recipes that haven't been tried & tested, and making sure that they come with proper instructions!

I'm in not picking on anyone here as I've done some pretty stupid things in my time (like when I put a gallon of honey beer into glass bottles waaaaaaaay too soon, and they all exploded at the same time in the garage. It sounded like a bomb going off - to the point where a neighbour asked me a few days later if I'd heard what sounded like a bomb... We're still finding bits of glass in there 2 years on!) I'm also certain that every single person on here has plenty of tales of doing daft things that caused explosions/mess etc etc so none of us are squeaky clean on that score!

I'm just glad that you brought your doubts & questions to the forum so that any similar disaster could be avoided. Maybe next time/year you could do a batch of elderflower champagne without any of the stress you're clearly having with this one.
Either way, do keep us informed, and I hope your wine turns out ok in the end.

I also think it's very irresponsible of the various television channels in publishing potentially explosive recipes for people to try without warning them of the likely pitfalls first. If anyone had been in the garage when my beer blew up, it would have caused serious injury, and that was because of a recipe that with hindsight and a bit more knowledge was a seriously bad recipe.

Okay - rant over, I'm going back to my glass of tropical fruit #1 wine.

[piagio2000]

Got to agree on so many points herlushness.

I really shouldn't have blindly followed the recipe. The thing was I had my doubts from the start but it didn't stop me bottling the stuff!
As it happens it was in pets for less than 24 hours and they were rock hard, so I realised pretty quickly there was likely to be a problem. The brew had a lot of fizz when it came out. I think I'll end up with a decent wine in the end though.

I have to agree as well on your point regarding C4 publishing this recipe. There is no doubt that the bottles would have exploded. Mine were in the basement and only plastic..horrible to think if the brew was sitting in glass bottles in someone's kitchen.....horrible thought.

One good thing though is that up here in Scotland there is still plenty of elderflowers around...I'll have a go with a realistic amount of sugar at the weekend!

[Her Lushness]

I'm glad you didn't take offense at what I said, and I'm glad I came over in the manner that I hoped I would.

It sounds like you'll remember this lesson, which is a good thing - especially as you've not blown anyone/thing up (yet) Thank god it was in pets, not glass...

In the Midlands there are also loads of elderflower trees winking at me begging to be picked, and to that end I made some gorgeous Elderflower cordial this week, as this seasons experiments are going to be with the cordial rather than brewing wine with the flowers; this is of course assuming that I don't mix it with sparkling water and drink it over ice

(EEEK! I've caught JTFB's disease, I'm considering drinking fermentables - someone whip me!)

One thing I NEVER seem to remember is how much I HATE pulling the flowers off the elderflower stalks!

[spritzer]

One good thing though is that up here in Scotland there is still plenty of elderflowers around...

There is loads around my way too

I only made elderberry wine for the first time last year, and didn't start looking for the trees until the berries were out, which made it more difficult.

But this year, I thought I would check out were all the trees are, during flowering, as they are much easier to spot.

I cant wait till September to go elderberry foraging again

[lockwood1956]

(EEEK! I've caught JTFB's disease, I'm considering drinking fermentables - someone whip me!)

ooooo


see Luc volders wineblog for handy hints on how to deflower them......