I had another flush of seasonal food excitability about a
month ago, and went out to pick a lot of elderflowers. I came back with maybe
100 heads of elderflowers, plus a whole lot of bugs. Two years ago, I made
elderflower cordial from this recipe- it was really good, so I made some more-
I think I had just over two litres of cordial, which I mostly mix with gin,
fizzy water and lemons for a very refreshing drink. I am considering trying to
turn some of it into sorbet too.
As well as the cordial, I made three alcoholic drinks:
Gooseberry and elderflower vodka- a few elderflower heads, a
punnet of gooseberries, and about 8 tablepoons of sugar, and topped up with
vodka. I made this last year, and it was really successful, so I felt it was
worth repeating. I am going to leave this to steep for a tear again.
Elderflower liqueur- from the Wild Cocktails book- This had
20 heads of elderflowers, some sugar and vodka. You then cut up two lemons, and
use it to help keep the elderflower heads under the vodka. This was left to
infuse for a month. The elderflower flavour of this is incredibly intense. I
have tried it out in the book’s suggested recipe of an ‘Elder sour’, but found
it a bit too sour- I think it needs a touch of sugar syrup so it tastes more balanced-
at least for my tastes.
Cherry, elderflower and honey gin- A more improvised recipe-
I had used up all my sugar making the cordial, but had some orange blossom
honey- I am hopeful the honey flavour will come through too. I crushed the
cherries (about a punnet, but left the stones in, as they add to the flavour. Like,
the gooseberry vodka, I just added a few heads of elderflowers. This was just
topped up with gin, and I will try it over the next few months until I get a
strong enough flavour.
No comments:
Post a Comment