Sweet Elderberry Wine

[DonnaFlood]

http://pickmeyard.wordpress.com/tag/...-with-flowers/

Today I watched the Anthony Bourdain show and saw a French chef cooking fish with Elderberry flowers. I’m wondering if the hedge of these are blooming at the old ranch house.

The dreams of that place still come. Last night I dreamed of my brother Mike. We were all standing inside the ruined house and he walked up the front steps to where we were.

“The major support for this house is coming loose,” he said. It won’t take much to fix that.

Then when I see the Elderberry flowers on Tony’s show I find myself wishing to go back over the roads of the prairie to that lost outback to check on the flowers.

Dad made the wonderful wine, threw out the seeds along side one of the tenant houses and they sprung up there in great profusion. When Rod and I lived there I gathered them to make the wonderful Elderberry jelly everyone loves. The color is so deep and rich and if you add lemon juice the taste is okay. However, the wine is so much better, really rare and sweet.

Seeing fish cooked in the flowers makes me want to try that, too.

[Alastair]

Re: Sweet Elderberry Wine

You got a recipe for Elderberry wine Donna?

Alastair

[DonnaFlood]

Re: Sweet Elderberry Wine

Alastair,
My sister has the recipe. She gave it to me once and I can't remember now. I'll get it again and post it
here, very simple and is something like what are called those "garage wines."

A firemen here told me one of the firemen made it in his "garage." :)

Donna

[Alastair]

Re: Sweet Elderberry Wine

I was just thinking... I don't think I've ever tasted Elderberries. They look similar to blackberries.

Alastair

[DonnaFlood]

Re: Sweet Elderberry Wine

Alastair,
Sorry I'm so slow about responding. Elderberries are about the same color as blackberries, some of which I
have on the front fence. The shape is different. Eldererries are round and singular like a sphere. Blackberries,
of course, you now are a small little clump of spheres.

We put 24 gallons of apricots away. Anyone know a Apricot Brandy recipe? :)

Donna

[Ranald]

Re: Sweet Elderberry Wine

Hello Donna

A Google search brings up a lot of links, and although I have not looked at many, I thought the following had potential.

http://www.countryliving.com/recipef...ot-brandy-3102

The site itself is also worth a look.

Regards

Ranald

[DonnaFlood]

Re: Sweet Elderberry Wine

Thanks Ranald,

I'll keep this recipe for Apricot brandy.

My daughter loves the Apricot syrup and I do too. On pancakes it is wonderful. Never enough time here
to keep up. I spoke with a friend in Tulsa, Ok. yesterday. It was kind of nice to commiserate with someone
in the same shoes. Her house is 30 years old, too, and she is in the place of having to do fix up stuff.

Yesterday a helper put down about twenty new tiles in front of my kitchen sink to bring that area back up
to looking new. That along with new looking cabinet doors makes me feel so good. I'm so allergic to those
materials though today I'm itching all over. The stain for the doors is the culprit. Years of painting!
Donna