Blackberry Wine 2020 - Sixth Bottle (A3), 19th September 2021

Blackberry Wine feels like a proper Sunday night bottle. One that you can relax into like a favourite sofa. It had been a gentle weekend full of entirely pleasurable nothing much. On Sunday that involved walking the suburbs of North Leeds in search of elderberries and making both bread and a ginger & marmalade cake (note to self: the marmalade was a flavour too far). Then in the evening we had a Padian chicken curry, drank this wine and watched The Crown. The curry involved me sucking on a chili by mistake. Emergency yoghurt was required.

Ginger & Marmalade Cake

 

Blackberry Wine 2019 - Fifteenth Bottle (B3), 30th August 2021

Blackberry wine was the natural choice of wine after a day spent picking brambles for 2021's batch. The wine was delicious and bursting with bramble flavour. Rather better than the vegetarian moussaka I made to accompany it, which, despite its vegetarian credentials, would have benefitted greatly from a chicken stock cube. The rest of the evening was spent watching The Crown and then reading A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles, which is witty and beautifully written. One of those books that manages to be engaging despite a paper-thin plot.

A grave from which I picked brambles

Blackberry Wine 2019 - Third Bottle (B2), 20th September 2020

It has been a thoroughly satisfactory Sunday. After an early morning trip to the Asian supermarket, where we bought vast quantities of pulses, spices and exotic flour, I spent the afternoon gardening and then foraging for sloes. We are having my 50th birthday garden bench delivered this coming week, so needed to clear a space. This is the sort of gardening that I can do - unsubtle manual labour. Then in the evening I made a lasagne, we drank this bottle (entirely acceptable) and watched Line of Duty. A grand Sunday, followed by a night of anxiety dreams about Law Society Finals (sat in 1993). This coming week is likely to be difficult!

My 50th Birthday Garden Bench (which arrived on 25 September)

Elderberry Wine 2020 - The Making Of...

Sunday 6th September, despite being earlier than previous years, was really my only opportunity to forage for elderberries. Next weekend we are in Newcastle (before Leeds is put into quarantine) and the weekend after that would be too late. I had planned to go in the morning, but we were entertaining Jayne in the garden instead. Here I use 'entertaining' to mean 'making polite conversation and enjoying each other's company' rather than juggling fruit and eating fire.

Elderberries that made it into my bag

I drove to my usual parking spot and walked down Kennels Lane, noticing that there was little fruit in the hedgerows on either side. When I got to the field I always use, I discovered that it had been gated: the right of way has been diverted elsewhere. This, though, was not going to stop me! I climbed over the gate and picked the few elderberries there were along the previous right of way. My haul was clearly insufficient, so I wandered along the field side adjoining Kennels Lane, which was far more successful. Every now and again I head a tractor in a nearby field and I kept my eyes open for irate farmers, but my surreptitious plucking remained undetected.

A view across the field 

As usual I came away with two plastic bags three-quarters full, and this translated into 7 lbs of elderberries. It took a very long time to translate them, though - over 2 hours. During this time I listened to many episodes of Punt P.I., learning about Emile Zola's death and a mysterious low hum that certain people hear constantly. Separating elderberries from their stalks is a dull job.

7 lbs of elderberries, successfully stripped

I put 6 lbs of elderberries into my bucket and mashed them with the potato masher. These were covered with 5 lbs 8 oz (which is nearly exactly 2.5 kg) of sugar and 12 pints of boiling water. Next morning I added a teaspoon and a half of nutrient and a teaspoon each of yeast and pectolase.

Putting this into its demijohns was a Friday lunchtime job, so that we could drive to Newcastle in the early evening. I had limited time and was as efficient as possible. Including sterilising my equipment, it took about half an hour. The wine is as dark as ever and is bubbling enthusiastically.

Elderberry wine in its demijohns

Blackberry Wine 2020 - The Making Of...

What an unusually busy weekend we have just had. Saturday was spent yomping in the North York Moors with Bob & Judith - the first time that we have seen them since January. Then on Sunday, 23rd August, we went to York to pick blackberries and see my parents, whose 56th wedding anniversary it was.

Sarah Moore's grave

We arrived at the cemetery at around 11 and mostly went our separate ways to collect brambles. Claire found a bountiful patch that was sufficiently overgrown to be secluded and which led to a bee hive. I was rather less successful, finding the odd stem laden with fruit here and there, but mostly found whole areas where the blackberries were already rotten or covered in grey mould. 

Claire picking blackberries

During this search I coincided with a man and his pre-teen children: Elliot and Isobel, who were enthusiastic bramble pickers. Isobel had a large tub full of blackberries, reserved for crumble, and they were interested in how I turned blackberries into wine. The father commented that the beauty of the cemetery was that there was enough fruit for everyone. "Yes," I agreed, secretly not agreeing at all and seeing him and his children very much as the competition. We went our separate ways and finally, finally I found an excellent area for foraging - near to, but behind, the chapel. Here the graves were Mary Ann Nightingale and her husband George, Sarah Moore and Jane Oldfield. Earlier I had picked from Harriet Atkinson and Robert Burton. Thomas Douthwaite did not figure this year: his grave had been cleared of brambles.

Near the Chapel

Once back in Leeds I weighed the fruit. I had picked 4 lbs 1 oz and Claire won convincingly with 6 lbs 5oz. I used 8 lbs, putting the rest in the freezer, and mashed them in my bucket. I poured in 5 lbs 12 oz of sugar and 11¼ pints of boiling water (though could have used half a pint less). Next morning I added the yeast (Mangrove Jack's R56), 1½ teaspoons of nutrient and a teaspoon of pectolase.

Blackberries in their bucket

I put the wine into its demijohns on Friday 28th August whilst listening to the first Prom of 2020 - played to an empty Albert Hall. And now I have two demijohns of blackberry wine bubbling away.

Two demijohns of Blackberry Wine

If you want to see how this wine turned out, click here.

Blackberry Wine 2019 - Second Bottle (B1), 23rd-24th August 2020

Blackberry Wine felt like the appropriate bottle for Sunday. We had returned from York with 10 lbs of blackberries between us and I was in the process of turning them into wine. It had been a lovely day; as well as spending time foraging for blackberries, we ate Big Breakfast with my parents and Simon Weeds sat outside in the garden and then Claire won at Scrabble.

The wine was a solid red with an earthy taste. We saved half the bottle for Monday night where, unusually, we watched nothing on telly but had an early night instead.

Taken on 24th August - one of my regular walks

Mixed Flower & Nettle Wine - The Making Of...

Corona Virus may be a disaster in many ways, but it is doing wonders for my step-count. Ever since I started working from home, I have gone on a long walk before work, anywhere between seven and ten kilometres, as part of the government-sanctioned exercise. There are three standard walks I do involving Roundhay Park, Gledhow Valley Woods and Meanwood Park, but even within these I try to vary the route every time. From late March I used these walks to look out for magnolia trees, and then from mid-April my eyes were caught by different shades of lilac.

Magnolia Tree outside St Edmund's

After I had made last month's Magnolia Petal wine, I still had a bag of petals in the freezer, mostly foraged from St Edmund's Church in Roundhay and this gave me the idea to do a mixed flower wine. Dandelions are abundant in our garden and there are two nettle patches in the back, so I had a couple of sessions picking from these and freezing the results. (For the nettles, I only used the tips.)

Lilac Petals

As April reached its end, I would pluck a head of lilac flowers from trees that I passed, hanging over pavements. I found a couple of gorse bushes off Tongue Lane and plucked some petals from these. I even managed to get a couple of wallflowers.

Gorse flowers on Tongue Lane

Quantity-wise, I must remain vague. Probably two pints of magnolia petals, about the same of dandelion heads, a pint each of nettles and lilac, and only lip-service to gorse and wallflowers.

Flowers & Nettles defrosting in my pan

I started making the wine on Saturday 2nd May. I boiled the flowers and nettles, together with the thinly peeled rind of two lemons and half a grapefruit, and 2 lbs 10 oz sugar in 7 pints of water for 20 minutes. Whilst this was going on I squeezed both lemons and the whole grapefruit and put the juice (plus pips and excess flesh) into my bucket with 8 oz minced sultanas. After the 20 minutes was up I poured everything into the bucket.

The mix in the bucket

On Sunday I added a teaspoon each of yeast, nutrient, pectolase and tannin and stirred it once a day. Then on Friday 8th May, after a week's walking holiday spent in north Leeds, I put the wine into its demijohn. It is a pleasing orange colour, but I have my doubts as to how it will taste!

The end result in a bed of nettles

If you want to see how this wine turned out (surprisingly good!), click here.

Apple and Apple & Strawberry Wine 2019 - The Making Of...

Last year our apple tree was prolific, much to the joy of local blackbirds and squirrels. This year it is far less so and as of mid-October the apples have only just begun to drop. Those that have fallen are mostly half-gnawed - I suspect by the garden rodents - so I can only use those for apple wine with some judicious chopping.

Our crab apple tree has done better than last year - but has still only produced 1 lb 4 oz of apples. Each of these two wines require 4 lbs of apples, so I have had to look beyond the confines of our garden for additional fruit.

Pavement apples

On Saturday 12th October, after accompanying Claire back from a Park Run (I did not participate myself) I spotted windfall apples on the opposite pavement so, much to Claire's embarrassment, I crossed the road and started collecting them. She left me to it. These apples were small and bruised, but still worthy ingredients. I also noticed that a house round the corner had put some apples in a box outside their hedge for people to collect, so I made full use of these too and ended up with 8 lbs of apples (weighed after chopping out the bruises and the rot and the squirrel tooth marks) that I needed.

I made the Apple Wine of Saturday and the Apple & Strawberry Wine on Sunday. For both I washed the apples, cut away all rot, removed any invertebrates that I spotted (only one had a grub but several had woodlice) and sliced them using the food processor.

For the apple wine, I added about 1 lb of sultanas, minced in the food processor, and for the apple & strawberry wine I had already crushed 1 lb of strawberries in my bucket using a potato masher. To each bucket I added 3 lbs of sugar and 7 pints of boiling water (which was about half a pint too much, particularly for the apple & strawberry).

Once each had cooled (Sunday morning for the apple and Sunday night for the other) I added teaspoons of nutrient, pectolase and yeast to both buckets.

By Friday these were ready to put into their demijohns. I had returned home from Drinks with Work so had little inclination but knew this must be done, and so that's what I did to no great disaster. This year there is little colour difference between the two and I suspect substandard strawberries account for the lack of pinkness.

If you want to see how the Apple wine turned out, click here.

If you want to see how the Apple & Strawberry wine turned out, click here.

Elderberry Wine 2019 - The Making Of...

Fruit has generally been early this year. Actually, strawberries were not and our pears have yet to ripen. Perhaps what I mean is that blackberries were early this year. Therefore I was concerned that foraging for elderberries on 15th September would be too late.

I drove to my usual spot off the A58 on Sunday morning and walked to the farmer's field along Kennel Lane, noting that the few elder trees within the hedgerows had scant fruit. It was a longer walk than I had remembered - it always is. When I got to the field I made sure that the farmer was not around and began collecting elderberries. Whilst the trees were not laden with heavy bunches of dark fruit, they had sufficient for my purposes.

I noticed that many of the berries were smaller than usual and I may have done better leaving this a week. However, I three-quarters filled two plastic bags with elderberries and stalks and judged that this was probably enough.

As ever, stripping the berries was tedious, enlivened by old episodes of The Reunion and Desert Island Discs. It took about two hours and I ended up having picked 5 lbs 12 oz. For a double batch I should really have had 6 lbs, but I judged this Good Enough. What is 4 ounces between friends?

I crushed the berries with a potato masher in my bucket, added 5 lbs 10 oz sugar (I think) and 12 ½ pints of boiling water, stirring all round until the sugar dissolved. A teaspoon each of yeast and pectolase, and two teaspoons of nutrient went in the following morning, 16th September, and by the evening fermentation had begun.

When I remembered to, I gave the bucket a stir over the next few days and then on Friday night I transferred the liquid into its two demijohns. I have started keeping discarded fruit in a plastic bowl when I do this so that right at the end I can press it hard and collect the remaining liquid for topping up purposes. This time I weighed the discarded pulp - it was 2 lbs 8 oz. So, the liquid in each berry makes up just more than half its mass. But it is the liquid which is the important bit and I now have two demijohns full of it.

If you want to see how this wine turned out, click here.

Blackberry Wine 2019 - The Making Of...

Last year I learnt that sometimes Blackberry Wine is not exclusively to be made in September. I do not plan to make that mistake twice.

Fruit has generally been early to ripen this year, so Claire and I first visited York Victorian Cemetery to inspect blackberries on Sunday 11 August. Whilst it was clear that blackberry season had only just begun, the berries that were ready were the largest, most luscious blackberries that I have encountered. After only about half an hour's foraging we had more than 3 lbs between us.

The following Sunday we were in York again, making sure that Pop was alright in Mom's absence now Keith and Jaki had returned up north. He was fine and all three of us went to the cemetery to gather blackberries. This time we got nearly 7 lbs. For a triple batch I need 12 lbs of blackberries, so we went a third time on 25th August, making it a hat-trick of weekends in York - this time the excuse was to see Mom, freshly back from her 60th High School Reunion in Nebraska. It was a hot day and Pop and I went to the cemetery ourselves to finish the job. This was idyllic - the sun beat down and the place was full of birdsong. I had a lovely hour with my father, chatting about this and that, discussing blackberries and getting nettle-stung.

My father, picking blackberries

(I love this photo of him)

The graves I must mention are (as always) Thomas Douthwaite - though his patch is so overgrown you can no longer see his grave -; Margaret Ann, Corporal W and John Doughty Pratt; Dorothy and John William Dobson; George Carlill (a slater); and Walter & Annabel Chambers. Claire picked from Dorothy Akers, who was only 9 when she died, and possibly Fanny Taylor, the beloved wife of Alfred Watson (solicitor of this town).

On Monday morning, 26th August, I mashed the blackberries and added 8 lbs sugar and 16 pints of boiling water. This cooled over the (hot and humid) day and I added a teaspoon each of yeast and pectolase, and two teaspoons of nutrient that evening. By Saturday night, 31st August, the liquid was ready for the demijohns. This went without a hitch and I now have three demijohns full of potentially delicious blackberry wine.

If you want to see how this wine turned out, click here.

Dandelion Wine 2019 - The Making Of...

I was very much in two minds about making dandelion wine this year: the Magnolia Petal wine was to be its substitute. But as I have been driving home the last three weeks, the road verges have been golden with dandelions. Each journey has been a temptation, and my resolve to give dandelion wine a miss has weakened with each one. Therefore, on Good Friday, I struck out with my jug and a plastic bag to pick flowers. I had intended to walk all the way to the fields by Potternewton Lane, but thought I should have a quick look at Allerton Grange before making that half-hour trip. I am glad I did: there were dandelions in abundance and, whilst it did my step-count no good, foraging for flowers round the corner meant that I spent an hour less of my day with wine-making activities.

It was a glorious afternoon, picking dandelions in the sunlight, listening to a competitive father beat his under-tens at football. An Indian osteopath was interested in what I was doing and I had a long conversation with him about wine-making. At no point did he look as if he wanted to back away slowly.

I measured 6 pints of dandelion heads in my jug and took them home to boil up in 7 pints of water, 2 lbs 12 oz sugar and the thinly peeled rind of two lemons and one orange. This was brought to the boil and boiled for 20 minutes. I squeezed the citrus fruits and put the juice and half a kilo of minced sultanas into my bucket, pouring the contents of the cauldron over this once the twenty minutes was up.

Next day I added the yeast and a teaspoon each of nutrient, pectolase and tannin. I pretty much left the wine to its own devices until Thursday evening, 12th April, giving it only the occasional stir.

On Thursday, after returning from a solicitors' event involving beer and pies, I put the liquid into its demijohn, straining out the solids. The amount of water I had used was exactly right - nothing spare was left.

Dandelion wine at this stage does not suggest its eventual golden colour - though it isn't quite as brown as the magnolia.

If you want to see how this wine turned out, click here. 

Rhubarb Wine - Fourteenth Bottle (C3), 30th-31st March 2019

There are bits in this wine. Small flecks of brownness. At time of writing, there is still an inch left in the bottle and nearly all the bits remain in that. Tonight I shall be brave and will drink what is left, but to avoid foolhardiness, I will be aided by a sieve.

The majority of this wine was drunk on Saturday night whilst eating nut loaf and the first asparagus of the season (at great expense). Earlier in the day I foraged for magnolia petals for an experimental wine.

Aided by a sieve

Magnolia Petal Wine - The Making Of...

On Friday evening, 29th March, I posted a photo on Instagram of a magnolia tree in Horsforth Hall Park. [If you want to follow me on Instagram - my 'name' is @benswinemaking.] At this time of year (and I think particularly this year) magnolias are stunning. They are an attractively shaped tree anyway, with sparse branches at angles designed by architects, and their flowers are individual vases in delicate pink and cream. After posting my photo I received a comment from Lucy [@lajmmm] "Flowers are edible!". This, of course, made me wonder about turning them into wine.

I did a Google search, just to make sure that Lucy was not trying to poison me - she wasn't - and e-mailed Angie and Phil, who have a splendid magnolia tree in their front garden, to ask if I could collect their fallen petals.

Magnolia Petals on Angie and Phil's lawn

On Saturday morning I collected my first small bag of petals after biting into one - it had an odd but not unpleasant taste - took them home, put most of them into the freezer and made magnolia tea out of a couple. The tea had a subtle flavour, but again was not unpleasant. Therefore, I returned on Saturday afternoon, caught up with Angie and Phil's news and collected a larger bag - concentrating on the freshest, most recently dropped petals.

Back at home I followed my dandelion wine recipe entirely. I measured six pints of petals (those in the freezer turned brown on defrosting) and put them in our large pan with the thinly peeled peel of two lemons and an orange. I put in 2 lbs 12 oz of sugar and 7 pints or water, brought this to the boil (a long process) and let it simmer for 20 minutes. Meantime, I squeezed the lemons and orange and put the juice into my bucket with half a kilo of minced sultanas.

Me, looking pleased with my creation

When the magnolia mix had finished its 20 minutes simmer I poured all of it into the bucket. At this stage all the petals had gone brown and the wine looked unappetising (for which, read 'like vile dishwater'). I'm not certain about the smell either (though as the week has gone on, this became more floral with an element of spice, which makes me hopeful about the end result).

Vile dishwater, or something rather exotic?

I added a teaspoon each of yeast, nutrient, pectolase and tannin on Sunday morning, 31st March. On Thursday evening I put the liquid into its demijohn, sieving out all the solids. One might expect Magnolia Petal Wine to be white with a hint of pink. I can report that it is a rather nasty brown. This, however, will be a temporary state of affairs and it will (honestly) clear to a golden yellow.

This will clear to a golden yellow

If you want to see how this wine turned out (and if I was lying about it clearing to a golden yellow), click here.

Orange Wine - Fifth Bottle (A6), 8th September 2018

Saturday was one of those days taken up by wine making and chores. I put my blackberry into demijohns, racked my rose petal and picked elderberries. When not doing all that I was washing up, shopping for food and cooking fish pie. I fit in an episode of Doctor Who (all are currently on i-player and I am working my way through Matt Smith) and cut my finger badly when slicing a lemon. Plus we had a bottle of orange wine. So a thoroughly unremarkable Saturday and none the worse for it.

Rhubarb, Mint & Elderflower Wine - The Making Of ...

Quiet weekends are a marvellous thing. Whereas last weekend was a whistle-stop tour of Newcastle and family, this weekend has had nothing specific planned. A perfect opportunity to indulge in some wine-making. And, in fact, Rhubarb, Mint & Elderflower is one of those wines which requires much of the day to be set aside. I didn't help myself by also deciding to bottle 3 demijohns of blackberry wine. Rinsing and sterilising 18 bottles is perhaps not the speediest or most interesting aspect of the wine-making process.

And elder tree in bloom

On Saturday, 9th June, early afternoon, I set out to Allerton Grange fields with plastic bag in hand. The elderflowers are a week earlier than usual and gave off more pollen than I remember seeing before as I picked them. I concentrated on the blooms with a hint of citrus yellow and only took a few per tree. This bit of the elderflower process takes no time at all and I came away with less than half a bag full.

Not quite a pint of elderflowers and rhubarb sticks

It was the next bit that was tedious in the extreme; stripping the flowers from their stalks. I did this outside so that the tiny flies could roam free (and not end up covering our windows) and it took me over an hour. Even at the start I was not particularly careful about avoiding the thinnest bit of the stalks, and by the end I cared not a jot. This produced a little less than a pint of flowers, which is Good Enough.

Spear mint from our garden

I plucked just over 3 lbs of rhubarb stalks from our garden, sliced these up - they are starting to get woody - and put these in the bucket. I added the elderflowers and a medium sized handful of mint - both pepper and spear (but not water-mint which is unpleasantly bitter) - which I shredded.

The main ingredients in the bucket

I poured in 3 lbs of sugar and 6½ pints of boiling water, gave it all a stir and left it over night. On Sunday morning I added the yeast and a teaspoon each of pectolase & nutrient.

I put this into the demijohn on my birthday (Thursday) whilst drinking pink champagne. The wine will not be suitable for vegans. It has a number of black specks, which I assume are tiny drowned flies. Still, it is a pretty pink colour.

The end result