The sun, the bottle and the brew

This morning we woke to blazing sunshine, we thought great, off the the markets and then breakfast. I checked the temperature and it was nearly -20C, we thought we should go and support the markets anyway. Off we rolled all dressed up like teletubbies going out in the snow. We get to the market and only about 10 stalls from a normal 100 or so were there. Yes, you guessed it, we weren't too happy. Luckily it was only a short walk there and back and whilst there we were still able to visit our favourite apple and pear stall, to grab some much needed vitamins and healthy snacks. Not much else was available and with the limited stalls each was packed with elbowing grannies and sniffling old men. So we darted home and nipped up to the local fruit shop for the other things we were missing. On the return I wanted to get a move on with the brewing culture I have. So I went and finally bottled my nettle beer brewed here. I have been dabbling in the Wisnowka every now and again such as at Christmas time, but I am still yet to commit that to bottles it sits safely in the corner enjoying the parrots chirps above it.

13 Green and one brown bottle sitting on the wall

Then I decided to rack off the elderberry wine. I probably should have done this about 3 months ago, but, m'eh I was lazy. I must tell you the elderberry wine is amazing. I really am shocked at just how good it tastes! For such a poor sorry bunch of late season berries (you can see that post here)it has really come on well. It has a scent of stewed fruit on the nose, then a strong alcohol entry onto your palette but then finishes with a has a really lovely long finish of rich cherries, almost like a dry port. I don't think it will win any awards, but I really wasn't sure what to get from it. I will certainly make it again next year and with more "prime" fruit.

Bucket o' wine

The old workhorse Demijohn

The now removed elderberries

Has a nice deep red colour

Swirled.

Brewing up a storm.

So, a quick World Of The Alcohol, or WOTA for short, update. It is always a busy time at this time of year, as there is so much produce popping up. Most of it of course needs to be formulated into some form of alcoholic beverage. Some of the latest things I have been up to.

plus

                                                                          when using this

 like this

You get this

 

and if you add it all together you get this.

 So ingredients are as follows:
1.4L of Vodka
1.5L Brandy
600mL Warm water which is mixed with 500g Dark Muscovado sugar
2.8kg of sour cherries most pitted but leave about 20 or so with stones.
easy as.

I have also made a black currant nalewka in a similar format, however, as yet I have not added any sugar as I want to see how sweet it turns out. It is already getting that great colour of cassis.

 What else has been on the boil? Oh, so apt. I have been making nettle beer again. This time the nettles are a little older than last time and maybe we didn't collect as much because of this.

So nettles plus water

Gives boiling water with nettles.

Strain them

Then you get a beautiful nettle tea which is great too. I decided to follow a different recipe this year to last which had good results and even better ones with time. So this year I used this one I think I like it because it was posted by the author on my first Polish birthday. So that is bubbling away still even after moving the liquid off the lees. So we will wait a little long till I bottle it. Hopefully avoiding any accidents

Like this one. The exploding world of elderflower champagne. Thanks Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall. So if you want to ever make elderflower champagne, use the recipe that I linked, and made, on here but not Hugh's. This explosion happened at 4 in the morning and as you can see destroyed the plastic container that I thought would hold any leakage, the biggest piece of the Grolsch bottl was the upper neck all 5cm of it! Certainly some power. That said the other recipe makes a delightful brew, of which I thoroughly recommend. Those who have tried it really enjoy it, like Spumante but more floral and less sweet.

Happy brewing!