Elderflower Cordial

 

We are lucky enough to have an elder tree in the Hastings garden - just outside the kitchen window - and today I made my first ever Elderflower cordial!

June is the best time to gather Elderflowers. Pick them early on a warm, dry morning when the flowers are heady with scent but be sure to leave some flowers for elderberry picking later in the year - I've got a mind to make elderberry liqueur!

This recipe is by Pam the Jam and can be found in The River Cottage Handbook No.2.

You will need:

About 25 elderflower heads
1 orange & 3 lemons, zest and juice

1kg sugar
1.5 litres water  

And here's how:

Inspect the elderflower heads carefully and remove any insects; there were lots of little green spiders in mine! Place the flower heads in a large bowl together with the orange and lemon zest. Bring 1.5 litres of water to the boil and pour over the elderflowers and citrus zest. Cover and leave overnight to infuse.

Strain the liquid through a piece of muslin and pour into a saucepan. Add the orange and lemon juice and sugar. Heat gently to dissolve the sugar, then bring to a simmer and cook for a couple of minutes.

 

Use a funnel to pour the hot syrup into sterilised bottles. Seal the bottles with swing-top lids.

There you go, as simple as that! Serve diluted with sparkling water, sparkling wine or champagne, and undiluted to fruit salads. But my favourite of all has to be a cucumber and elderflower gin cocktail!

Gin
Tonic water
Elderflower cordial
Cucumber slices
Ice

Fill a glass with ice, mix a gin and tonic to your taste, add a splash of elderflower cordial and a few slices of cucumber. Perfectly refreshing.

Dark Star

Last weekend I was taken on a tour of the Dark Star brewery - a much welcomed birthday surprise from Simon! Originating in the cellar of a Brighton pub, The Evening Star back in 1994, the Dark Star Brewing Company takes it's name from the strong dark strong bitter brewed by the young Rob Jones (Dark Star's head brewer) for Pitfield Brewery in London back in 1987 which was subsequently named after the song of the same name by The Grateful Dead.  

The brewery has since grown in size and relocated twice to where it is now; Partridge Green, West Sussex - a bus ride through the beautiful Sussexian Downs from Brighton. Upon arrival to their warehouse brewery we were greeted with a "please make your way over to the crates where the talk will take place and start drinking." Well OK if you insist..

 

The talk was very interesting, informative and we learned all about the history of the brewery and the brewing process..

 

Whilst sampling a great many of the delicious Dark Star ales on offer..

And for afters we had a table reserved at the brewery tap in the village, The Partridge for a lovely lunch in the sunshine..

 

And of course, we procured a couple of pints to take home!!

Middle Farm, Lewes

 

Picture source: Middle Farm

I can't think of a much better way to end a looong week (and in fact it was even only a short one!) than to come home carrying a box full of English ciders, ales and crops. And this exactly what I did yesterday! Wey! I visited Middle Farm and oh my, what a discovery it was, it's my new haunt! Can't believe I've been just driving straight past it on my way to and from work without actually stopping in! You can read all about the wonders of Middle Farm HERE.

My box full of rough Somerset ciders, local ales, an organic perry, two different varieties of tomato plant, a small oregano bush, rhubarb chard seeds and a How to Grow Apples and Make Cider book!

As well as being a working family farm there's a restaurant, gift shop, farm shop, plant nursery and, you guessed it...an incredible CIDER SHOP!!! I was totally overwhelmed by the range and quantity of English ales, meads, country wines, fruit liqueurs, ciders and Perries! Just look...!

 

Picture source: Middle Farm

I also spotted this interesting looking book on the counter...'How to Grow Apples and Make Cider'. This year I will definitely be making my own cider! I didn't get round to it last year as the two weeks of the apple harvest transpired to be the two weeks that I was between the leaving of my old job and the starting of a new and the leaving of London for a new life by the sea. So not all bad I guess - but I think this book will be able to provide me with all the information I need and possibly more to get going on a batch of my own this year! It's written by Bill Bleasdale, a cider maker who lives high up on a magical mountain in Wales. Check out his website Welsh Mountain Cider.

 

Cheers and adieu!

Cider Making

Following the success of our home made perry last autumn we're now going to try our hand at cider making! We've found the source of our apples; an organic orchard just outside of Hastings. The apple harvest is at the beginning of October, so full coverage coming soon... Can't wait!

When to a pummy ground
You squeeze out all the juice Sir,
Then fill a cask well bound
And set it by for use Sir,
Oh, let the cider flow
In Ploughing and in sowing - 
The healthiest drink I know,
In reaping and in mowing.

Old Devonshire ballad

Bottling the Perry!

After 2 months of being in the demijohn, the Perry was ready for bottling! We managed to fill 5 bottles! We will now leave them to condition until Spring 2012 when we'll crack them open... Can't wait!!

The perry goes into the demijohn...

So after a week of the perry fermenting in the bin, it was time for it to be transferred into the demijohn where it will remain for the next month whilst it goes through it's second and final fermentation before bottling.

Perry Making

My parents have a Conference pear tree in their garden and this year was a very good year for the pears, so I took a trip up the ladder and collected all that I could reach and I've decided to make perry from them!

This is the first time I've made any kind of fruit cider so it's really exciting! Lacking a pulp an press (used for traditional cider making, where the fruit is crushed and then pressed through cloths to extract the juice) we decided to just go with what equipment we had and juiced the pears in a juicer, so we'll see how it goes! A pulper and press is now definitely on the wish list!

HERE is a useful guide on the process of perry making.

And here's how we prepared our perry:

First of all we washed the pears in water and cut out any hard or brown bits on the skins.


The next step was to put them through the juicer.


Then we poured the juice into a sterilised fermentation bin though a sieve to catch any lumps of pear.


Once all the pears were juiced we added wine yeast and a teaspoon of sugar to the juice to aid the fermentation. Just mix the yeast in some boiled-and-cooled-to-room-temperature water and leave for a few hours for it to activate before pouring and stirring into the juice. Put the lid on to the bin and leave it to do it's thing for about 5 days to a week.


There are two stages of fermentation when making perry; the first fermentation is carried out by the yeasts (in our case, the wine yeasts) and the second converts L(-)-malic acid to L(+)-lactic acid and carbon dioxide. (You can read the scientific part HERE).

The second stage of fermentation will be carried out in a demi john, which we will be transferring it into next week...

La Trappe!

Hello! Now where was I? Oh yes, I was going to tell you about my trips of course! Well I'll start with mid April which found me in the lovely little town of Tilburg, Holland, where the legendary Roadburn Festival is held, which was just truly amazing! Really brilliant fun this year! In between watching some amazing bands such as Pentagram!!! Candlemass!! Shrinebuilder and Voivod! we also made the most of what the town has to offer...

On one of the mornings, we made a pilgrimage to Abdij Koningshoeven which is a monastery of the Trappists where they make La Trappe beer! Excellent! It is the only one of it's kind in Holland (all 6 the other Trappist breweries are in Belgium).


We were shown around the old brewery where we learned all about the brewing process, which was very useful for me! (They have long since grown out of the old brew house due to the sheer demand of produce and now use a much larger, computerised brewery in a warehouse just a bit further along the site.)


The packing factory, where the bottle filling takes place...


and then ended with a short film on the history and present day activities of the monastery where we finally got to sample some of their delicious and wholesome (8%) wares!

Proost!