Probably Random

Dandelion Wine

April 26, 2009 9:49 pm tonkas Food Related

What a great excuse to pull up the ‘weeds’ (it’s only a weed if you don’t want it there!) and make some wine!
Now, this was my first attempt ever at making wine, I did try to make beer once and well it was a disaster, it tasted a bit like shandy which had been made with vinegar instead of lemonade! so my track record isn’t the greatest at this brewing malarky.

Anyway I’ve got a couple of books, the one with the most detail is C.J.J. Berry’s First Steps in Wine Making so I started out using that, but again there were some bits that perhaps weren’t fully explained for the novice, so I did a google search too and there are loads of recipies, mine ended up as a bit of a mish mash, but there were sooo many recipies and they were all so similar.
Basically:
1.5 kilos of sugar
4.5 litres of water (1 gallon)
4 citrus fruits (Oranges or lemons, seem to be able to use whatever you have to hand, I used Oranges)
2-3 Litres Dandelion Flowers (I used 2)
Yeast (as per packet for the quantity your doing)
yeast nutrient.

First off pick the flower heads (St Georges Day in full sun so the flowers are open is the recommended time), no stalks or leaves but mine still had the green bits from around the bottom of the flowers. I was surprised at how many you need, but that it doesn’t take too long to get them, I avoided getting them from too close to the road or path! (yeah okay so most of them were from the garden).

Put all the flower heads into a bucket, and pour over your boiling water, cover it (I used a tea towel tied over the top of a bucket) for 2 days (this varies from 2-3 days depending on the recipie I did 2 days).

After that reboil the mixture (You need a big pan! I got a 10 litre ’365′ one from Ikea) with the peel of your chosen citrus fruits. (recipies vary here from 10 – 20 minutes, I did 10 minutes).

Clean out the bucket you used to step the flower heads and put the sugar in it.
Strain the hot dandelion mixture into the bucket.
When the liquid has cooled ( to room temp.) add the yeast (some recipies also add the citrus juices at this point too I think it’s either the juice or the nutrient… I used the yeast nutrient).
Fill up your fermentation vessel and leave it to ferment.
When it’s done fermenting let it clear in a cool place and bottle.
All the recipies say it’s best left for a while!