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  • Grow your Elders

    Hi, for those of you who like to grow your own, I spotted this in Hilliers spring magazine.
    It certainly looks good, but what it would be like for winemaking, your guess is as good as mine. It should be OK as it is Sambucus nigra.

    Regards to all, Winemanden.

    ELDER.jpg

  • #2
    I can confirm that the berries from that Genus do indeed make good wine, one of the members of a local wine circle makes a sweet red elderberry that always does well at comps

    regards
    Bob
    N.G.W.B.J.
    Member of 5 Towns Wine and Beer Makers Society (Yorkshire's newest)
    Wine, mead and beer maker

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    • #3
      See I'm too tight fisted to buy an elderberry plant, however good they may be......

      Did my collections today and while I've been spotting seemingly decent berry heads developing along my favourite parts of local roads, I'll be trying to work out how to pick the bushes in the open section of HMP "Butlins" (Ford)...... before the lags get 'em for a local version of "Pruno"........
      Women will never be equal to men until they can walk down the street with a bald head and a beer gut, and still think they are sexy.

      Some blog ramblings

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      • #4
        I am with you on that one John !!

        Are the cultivated varieties better than the wild variety then for winemaking?
        Gluten free, caffeine free, dairy free, fat free – you gotta love this red wine diet!

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        • #5
          There seem to be lots of different strains of the humble eldeberry - as you might expect - but I assume that many of the cultivated varieties are selected for their ornamental characteristices, rather than the quality of the fruit or flower for winemaking. I was recently looking at the web site for Belvoir fruit farm where they make elderflower soft drinks and they mention planting 90 acres of elderbushes - but they still buy wild elderflowers collected by the public - so they don't seem to consider any particular strain as superior.
          But many years ago I had a Great-Aunt who lived in a very rural village all her life and had been a local nurse of the old school type (pre-Penicillin) - and there was an elderberry bush neatly trained along the back of her C17 cottage - I remember being told how she made elderberry wine as a tonic - now I bet that old bush was an intersting strain - you can bet that it came from a cutting off some "venerated" specimen that probably had a lineage going back very many generations.
          It would be interesting to be able to compare wines from different bushes - maybe a trial with half a dozen DJ's all identical but fruit (or flowers) from different bushes. Then take some cuttings from the best!
          Cheers,
          Dave.
          If I won the lottery I'd spend half the money on wine, women and song.
          But I'd probably just waste the rest of it!

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          • #6
            Speaking from past experience, I have always enjoyed comparing bushes.
            Gluten free, caffeine free, dairy free, fat free – you gotta love this red wine diet!

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            • #7
              Oh dear. Don't forget your coat on the way out Brian.
              Simon
              "I can certainly see that you know your wine. Most of the guests who stay here wouldn't know the difference between Bordeaux and Claret." - Basil Fawlty

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              • #8
                ?
                Sorry Simon I don't understand.

                I have been conducting the same experiment with hop bushes. I am currently growing cascade, Northern Brewer, Mount Hood, Early bird, Goldings & Fuggles.
                Absolutely fascinating to see the difference using an identical recipe & the same quantity of hops, but from different bushes.

                I am not sure I would have the patience with elderberries though - they are rather fiddly things to separate & you do need a lot of them!
                Last edited by Cellar_Rat; 06-06-2013, 04:34 PM. Reason: patients error
                Gluten free, caffeine free, dairy free, fat free – you gotta love this red wine diet!

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                • #9
                  Well, we have a very old elder tree in the garden and lots of other elders round about. Why not everybody pick some for Grapefest (may need to freeze in advance depending on timings) and then steam juice everyones batch separately at GF for a scientific (sort of) taste off. I.e. Are there flavour profiles from different areas of the country? May be difficult to compare individual species as I expect that there are a lot of minor variations out there as the trees cross pollinate over time but at least it might be a taste test with a difference. Anyone up for that? We can then publish the results on here. What are peoples thoughts?
                  Last edited by SiSandrine; 06-06-2013, 04:26 PM. Reason: Bracket error
                  Simon
                  "I can certainly see that you know your wine. Most of the guests who stay here wouldn't know the difference between Bordeaux and Claret." - Basil Fawlty

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    General rule of thumb.....

                    cat pee smelling flowers are from a bush that will produce good berries for red wine, but poor white wine

                    fragrant flowers produce good white wine, but not so good berries forred wine

                    those sort of trials might be interesting, especially if we go frozen grapes, we can fill the extra time in with experiments and tests?
                    regards
                    bob
                    N.G.W.B.J.
                    Member of 5 Towns Wine and Beer Makers Society (Yorkshire's newest)
                    Wine, mead and beer maker

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                    • #11
                      Originally posted by SiSandrine View Post
                      Oh dear. Don't forget your coat on the way out Brian.
                      Well I understood the joke, even if trigger missed it......fnar fnar
                      Women will never be equal to men until they can walk down the street with a bald head and a beer gut, and still think they are sexy.

                      Some blog ramblings

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Thank you John. I thought it was just me for a while. Maybe it was double bluff.
                        Simon
                        "I can certainly see that you know your wine. Most of the guests who stay here wouldn't know the difference between Bordeaux and Claret." - Basil Fawlty

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                        • #13
                          Gluten free, caffeine free, dairy free, fat free – you gotta love this red wine diet!

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