With the explosion of the DIY movement in recent years, more people seem to be returning to old-school food and drink traditions, many of them involving fermentation.
In this post, we are sharing how to make a lightly sour, refreshing brew of herbal beer! Also learn its use in history and its benefits in modern times.
If you love charming cities and delicious food, you’ll love Strasbourg. Plan the perfect city break with this travel guide to Strasbourg, France.
This plum wine is quick and easy to make, not requiring the months of aging that other country wines need. Most importantly, it is very, very delicious.
Use fresh rhubarb to make a clear golden dessert wine. Great for early spring rhubarb harvests.
Just like with red wine, there are quite a few varieties of white wine as well. And for a true wine enthusiast, especially a ‘beginner’, it helps to start with these
If you enjoy making wine then you need to make this homemade dragon's blood wine. This recipe makes 6 gallons of wine so you can be ready to give some at Christmas as gifts or if you prefer just cut the recipe down to the amount you wish to make.…
This sweet summer honey wine captures the flavor of rhubarb in a bottle. Since it's a small batch, you can make this recipe with just a few handfuls of chopped rhubarb.
Use fresh rhubarb to make a clear golden dessert wine. Great for early spring rhubarb harvests.
Everyone has a bad batch or two a year, that is just the way of things. Do not fret though, for there is something you can do with it - turn it in to vinegar!
Lilac wine captures the sweet floral flavor of lilacs into delicious wine.
What to learn how to make Dandelion Wine? Pick Dandelion flowers and make your own wine. Here's how to ferment, process and bottle your wine.
Rhubarb cherry wine is an easy country wine that combines two abundant local ingredients - rhubarb and tart cherries - into a bright and fruity homemade wine.
Dandelion wine has been around for about as long as there have been dandelions and wine making - so it's no surprise there are about a gazillion ways to create it. However, most recipes use very large quantities and call for removing the petals from the dandelion flowers. This recipe is different. Not only is the quantity small (about enough to fill a gallon jug), but it saves a ton of time because you don't need to remove the petals from the flowers. The process is also about as simple as you can get, making it a great choice for beginning wine makers. A Few Notes on Making Easy Dandelion Wine: * Be sure to collect dandelions you are 100% sure have not been exposed to chemicals (like weed killers). * Collect only dandelion flowers. It's fine to keep the green leaves (sepals) at the base of the petals, but don't include any stems. * Choose only fully opened, fresh flowers. Avoid partially-opened blooms or blooms that are wilted or are turning brown. * It's fine to freeze dandelion flowers until you have enough to make wine. However, measure the flowers before you freeze them, not after. * Use wine or champagne yeast or your wine will end up way, way too sweet. Regular baking yeast dies before it can fully eat up the sugar in this recipe. Wine or champagne yeast lives longer, and eats up more of the sugar. * You'll need something to help you cap or cork your bottles. The easiest and cheapest is a bottle caper and caps, like this one. Dandelion Wine Recipe 8 cups dandelion flowers 1 gallon boiling water 9 cups granulated sugar (you can experiment by using less) juice from 4 oranges juice from 3 lemons 2 1/4 teaspoons (1 packet) wine or champagne yeast 1/2 cup lukewarm water Large, non-reactive pot with lid Mixing spoon Colander Small bowl Funnel (I used a new, never used car oil funnel) 1 gallon glass jug Balloon Fine mesh strainer Wine or beer bottles with new corks or caps How to Make Dandelion Wine, the Easy Way: 1. Pour the dandelion heads into a large, non-reactive pot. Pour 1 gallon of boiling water over the flowers. Cover with the pot lid and steep for two days. After two days, it will look like this: 2. Place a colander over a large bowl and strain the flower mixture. Reserve the liquid, but discard the dandelion flowers. 3. Clean the pot so no trace of dandelions remains. Pour the liquid into the pot. Stir in the sugar and citrus juice. 4. In a small bowl, dissolve the yeast into the lukewarm water, stirring a couple of times to combine. 5. Pour the yeast mixture into the dandelion mixture and stir until sugar is completely dissolved. 6. Place the funnel in the jug and pour the liquid into it. Cover the opening of the jug with a balloon, to prevent bugs, dust, etc. from getting into the wine. Store in a dark location until the mixture stops fermenting. 7. Keep an eye on the balloon for a few days. If it grows quite large, lift up part of the balloon end, releasing the gas. After about 5 weeks, the balloon will probably be only slightly inflated. Release the gas from it periodically; when the balloon stays deflated for one or two days, the wine is done fermenting and is ready to bottle. (Don't bottle before this time, or you risk having your bottles of wine explode!) 8. Strain through cheesecloth until you are satisfied with the clarity of the wine. Funnel into bottles and cork or cap. For best flavor, allow the wine to sit in a dark, cool location for at least 6 months. As the wine ages, it will become lighter in color. I can't show you my dandelion wine all bottled up yet, because it is at the final stages of fermenting. But once it's bottled and aged, it should look something like this: You May Also Be Interested In: For more information about harvesting and using dandelions, see these posts: "Ah Sweet...Dandelions?" (including a recipe for cooking dandelion leaves) How to Make Dandelion Tea (from the roots of the plant) Making Dandelion Jelly Teaching Children to Forage (with dandelion cookie recipe) Eating Dandelion Flowers How to Preserve Dandelion Greens Dandelion Flower Fritters Dandelion Leaf Noodles Dandelion Medicine Dandelion Leaf Green Smoothie Dandelion Root Medicine: Where to Find It, How & Why to Use It Cautions: According to the University of Maryland Medical Center, very rarely, people have reactions to dandelion. If you're allergic to "ragweed, chrysanthemums, marigold, chamomile, yarrow, daisies, or iodine, you should avoid dandelion. In some people, dandelion can cause increased stomach acid and heartburn. It may also irritate the skin. People with kidney problems, gallbladder problems, or gallstones should consult their doctors before eating dandelion." Dandelion is a diuretic, which means it may also make other medications less effective. To learn more about this, visit the University of Maryland Medical Center website.
Don't waste the weed. If you have a lot of Dandelions then learn how to make dandelion wine with these 2 easy-to-follow recipes.
One gallon mead recipes and basic techniques for homebrew, including dandelion mead, blackberry mead, and more.
How to make dandelion wine, step by step, with photos and videos included.
Making Elderberry wine is easier than you think! You need a bit of equipment, elderberries, sugar, lemons, yeast-- and time to let it develop. Delicious.
Whether you're a Moscow Mule fan or just enjoy sipping it with ice, making alcoholic ginger beer at home will mean the end of store-bought ginger beer days.
Elderberry mead is a great drink: delicious and nutritious, and cures what ails ya! Great choice for when you feel yourself coming down with a cold and need some rest.
Alcoholic Ginger Beer: Recently, my girlfriend and I discovered hard ginger beer and decided it was delicious. There a couple versions for sale at BevMo, but it's pretty expensive stuff. I do a lot of homebrewing, but had never made anything but beer. I thought this would…
Dandelion and burdock roots, being perennial, are available all year, but it is important to collect them only when the leaves are visible so that you do not confuse them with anything nasty. Spring or autumn when the roots are at their fattest is the best time to search them out. Burdock has large, heart-shaped, furry leaves and a habit of providing us with those tiresome burs that accompany us home after a country walk.
Chef Jeremy Nolen updates German classics at Brauhaus Schmitz in Philadelphia, including this intense mustard for sausages. More Condiment Recipes
Everything from bread and cheese to beer, wine, and things like sauerkraut, Kimchi, and yogurt are the result of fermentation.
There are a lot of great reasons to make a micro-batch mead. A super tiny batch is a great place to start if you're just learning the process of mead making or if you're an
This homemade spruce beer is made with foraged spruce tips and fermented in a one gallon jug.
It turns out that the crispy, tender beer hall pork shanks enjoyed all over Austria, Germany and Eastern Europe are shockingly easy to make at home.
Brew a primitive mugwort lemon brew with foraged ingredients. This home brew is easy to make and so delicious! Mugwort is easy to forage for, smells delicious, and is a great herb to use in a homemade beer recipe
We used our Roma Wine Press to squeeze every ounce of juice we could from fresh, autumn pears, added some fancy cider making stuff, let it sit, and got a crisp, hard cider with a perfect pear finish just a few weeks later. Makes 2 gallons - Ingredients - 20 lbs pears, quartered 2 campden tablets wine yeast yeast nutrient pectic enzyme 1/2 cup water 1/4 cup sugar - Tools - Roma by Weston Apple Crusher Roma by Weston Wine Press Bucket with lid* Hydrometer* Carboy or fermenting bucket with airlock* Siphon* Racking Cane (optional, but helps)* *Sanitize with sodium metabisulfite before using Bottles 2 gallon jug or (22) 12 oz bottles (We used eight 18 oz bottles and siphoned the rest into a gallon jug for immediate consumption.) Pressing Place your Roma Apple Crusher above the Roma Wine Press. Drop the pears into the crusher and turn the handle to prepare them for pressing. Next, set aside the crusher and place your Wine Press into the elevated spot. Place a bucket below the lip of the wine press. Place your semi-discs over the crushed pears and begin ratcheting the press. As you get close to the cage, you will need to add the wooden blocks. The juice will be pouring out of the cage and into the bucket. Once you have collected all of the juice you are going to get from the pears (when you cannot ratchet anymore), it's time to move on to sanitizing it. You may also use a cheesecloth at this point to strain the juice again, but it was unnecessary for us. Sanitize Crush the two campden tablets and drop them into the bucket with the juice. Mix well. Place the lid onto the bucket and allow to sit for two days. Fermentation After two days, use a hydrometer to measure the initial specific gravity of your cider. Be sure to write that number down and keep it for the end of your fermentation process. Boil one cup of water, then add one teaspoon of yeast nutrient. Remove from heat and stir. Add in 1/2 teaspoon pectic enzyme. Pour the nutrient and enzyme into your juice then pitch your yeast according to the directions on the packet. If your bucket is a fermentation bucket, simply cover and attach your sanitized airlock. If using a carboy, siphon the juice into the carboy and attach your plug and airlock. Allow the pear juice to ferment until the airlock activity subsides, about two weeks. After the activity subsides, give it another week. After a week, use your hydrometer to measure the final specific gravity of your cider. Subtract the final from the initial to get your percent alcohol content. Ours was a safe 12% when we bottled it. Bottling At this point, you can bottle your cider. Make sure you give it a taste to see how sweet it is. It should be somewhat dry. If so, boil 1/2 cup of water, pour in 1/2 cup of sugar, and then stir until dissolved. Mix this syrup into your pear cider to sweeten. Set the carboy in an elevated position. Place the racking cane into the carboy and fill your siphon with water. Attach the siphon to the racking cane, holding the opposite end (so the water doesn't release). Place a bucket under the carboy. Let go of the siphon and allow the water to flow out, then quickly move the siphon into the bucket to capture the cider. Stop the siphon before the sediment on the bottom flows into the bucket. Replace the carboy with the bucket of cider and place your bottles under the bucket. Repeat the siphoning process, filling your bottles, and allowing 1" head space. At this point, you have several options: You can drink it now. You can place the sealed bottles into a warm environment and allow the cider to carbonate for a week or two. Then, either drink it or let it age in a cool, dry environment. *** You can place them in a cool, dry environment to age for 3-6 months, without carbonating. Refrigerate up to a year. ***Update: You should place your bottles into the refrigerator after you carbonate them to stop the fermentation process so that the bottles do not explode.
Tangy and mineral rich, this wild harvested and fermented nettle beer recipe is a delicious drink, reminiscent of hard cider, and easy to make at home!
If the dry weather's affecting your rhubarb fear not - with this recipe everything's coming up rosé
Wonderfully delightful minty liqueur. Perfect for any St. Patrick’s Day cocktail or goodie such as Grasshopper Pie or your favorite cake.
Ales (beer) have been around for literally thousands of years, and most of these ancient recipes called for using herbs. In this manner, they became "healing" in nature. Since they are also a fermented drink, they are good for you in terms of gut health too.
Did you know that there are numerous ways that one can make peach moonshine? In this article we'll describe the entire process, step by step, for making 3 types of alcohol using peaches.
Country wines are so much fun and perfect for those of us who aren't brewing or wine-making experts! Here's a simple recipe with easy-to-follow instructions for making peach wine from whole peaches.
Use fresh rhubarb to make a clear golden dessert wine. Great for early spring rhubarb harvests.
Making Rum From Scratch: Making rum from scratch using molasses and sugar. I wanted to make some rum so that I could make my own Captain Morgans Spiced Rum you will need 1 x 25L fermentation vessel a long spoon, you can get these from homebrew shops yeast nutrient, you…
Beef and beer are a classic match for good reason. Here, ale brings a natural sweetness and savoury depth to this comforting one-pot
For all you homebrewers and mead-drinkers out there, we put together this handy poster illustrating the the most common types of mead! If you want to
A relatively new beer style, Belgian IPA is the result of an American IPA colliding with Belgian yeast and brewing practices. Learn more about it here.
Watch the recipe video here: What is tepache? Tepache! Pronounced teh-PAH-chay. A delicious pineapple drink that originates from Mexico and is the best way to reuse pineapple skins (peels/rinds) I&…
Traditional Makgeolli (Korean Rice Wine) recipe that you can successfully brew at home with no special equipment. Ready in 10 to 14 days. Yields 5 to 6 cups.
This homemade spruce beer is made with foraged spruce tips and fermented in a one gallon jug.
Try these DIY recipes for strawberry, elderberry and dandelion wine.
Making Rum From Scratch: Making rum from scratch using molasses and sugar. I wanted to make some rum so that I could make my own Captain Morgans Spiced Rum you will need 1 x 25L fermentation vessel a long spoon, you can get these from homebrew shops yeast nutrient, you…
