100% Elderberry Juice

[Cracked Cork]

My wife got a Mehu steamer and has been letting me use it for making wine. I steamed 50 lb of elderberries and got 5 gallons of juice. Added the sugar to the hot juice, let it cool and added acid blend and pectinase and then K1-V116. We have never done a steamed juice wine or 100% elderberry juice but I am hoping this will be a very good wine. Tasted it and it was good, no sharp bit from too many tannins and we also didnt include the pulp.

Crackedcork

 

[Wade E]

Did you check PH or TA?

 

[Cracked Cork]

Wade, the TA was .255 after being steamed and I raised it up to .65. Our elderberries are not very acidic even raw.

Crackedcork

 

[NorthernWinos]

Sounds good..keep us Posted on how it's going.


Wemake almost all our wines from steamed juices....my last batch of a Naking Cherry wine I used more juice than I normally would, used a Red Star Pasteur Red Yeast....it was a bit slow starting but is moving along now....Don't know if it was just loaded up on fruit, the environment or the strain of yeast that made it slower than normal.

 

[Dean]

That's a lot of juice. The berries we get wild up here in the North West Pacific Coast, I think are Sambuca Mexicana, and not the standard Canadensis. Our berries are very small, go black, then get a white bloom on them, like grapes do. When the berries are overripe, they almost look like white clusters. I got about 30lbs this year, so I cooked them up to get rid of the Anthocyanins and fermented pulp and all. 1 week on the pulp using Lalvin RC212. PH is 3.3 and TA is .65 as well. I had to add about 3 tsp of tartaric/malic blend to bring the TA up. The juice seemed quite tannic, but seems to have lost that in the fermentation. I just racked to secondary last night.

I have to say, the pulp, in a nylon paint straining bag, looked most disgusting

when I dumped it into the composter last night.

 

[Wade E]

Sounds great guys, makes me wish there were some of these growing near me.

 

[NorthernWinos]

Did you guys get the "Green-Goo" that everyone gets with the raw berries????

 

[Dean]

I don't get green goo when I cook them. I DO get green goo when I do them raw. The raw berries don't affect me, but I've had a few friends that found the wine made from raw berries has a laxitive effect on them

I've since moved to cooking them. No green goo, and no ill effects.

 

[Cracked Cork]

Northern Winos, I think the amount of green goo you get depends on how many stems and unripe fruit you have. We made some with raw fruit, having picked the berries off of the stems by hand and had 95% less goo. Picking by had eliminated all the green berries and 99% of all stems.

Crackedcork

Did you guys get the "Green-Goo"</font> that everyone gets with the raw berries????</font>

 

[lockdude]

I have never cooked my elderberrys,and always get a little of the green goo,but figured its just par for the course.Is the flavor of the wine different when you use cooked berrys?I have 30Lbs of them in the freezer,but have too many full carboys so Im going to make mine this winter with a slow,cool ferment.
lockdude

 

[Cracked Cork]

Dude, I havent bottled any from cooked berries yet so I have no idea, I would imagine its different. You have 30 lbs of fruit, enough for 2 different 5 gal batches, one cooked and one uncooked would be an interesting experiment. We are doing uncooked, cooked and steam extracted all at 3 lb/gallon and one batch at 100% elderberry juice steam extracted from 50 lb of fruit. This may turn out to be one of those retirment wines, not ready until I retire

Crackedcork

 

[jsmahoney]

I have some Elderberry's in the freezer that I would like to start this week.
One recipe that i do have calls for 10 pounds of elderberries per one gallon in which I will attempt for the "full bodied" wine taste. I will let them simmer on the stove top, for i don't have a steamer, (yet

,

)! Wish me luck for I've only attempted one other "fresh fruit" and that was Peach. It's coming along OK about ready to bottle!

 

[lockdude]

Cork,Have you ever thought about doing a really heavy elderberry,and do a tannin reduction on it to shorten the ageing time?I have wanted to try this for a while,but havent yet.I may have to do a gallon just to see what I get.
lockdude

 

[Cracked Cork]

Dude, I havent yet, I do have the cassinate but we make enough elderberry wine every year so we can wait for it to get good. If you want a faster elderberry just use 2 or 2.5 pounds gallon and add something for body? Crackedcork

 

[s.arkvinomaker]

I made elderberry wine a couple of years ago. I picked them myself along
the railroad tracts in Benton Ar. It takes alot of elderberry's to make a pound! They are about the size of the head of a pencil eraser. I dealt with the green glue, staining everything,and chiggers picking them. I would have to say it was a tie as to which of the three was the biggest pain the
a... Needless to say I won't be making anymore elderberry wine. And I never could figure out what would cut the green goo so I had to toss the equipment I made it in away.

 

[Cracked Cork]

Ark, too bad, a little vegetable oil cuts right thru the green goo, then just wash off the oil with soap and water. We grow our own so we dont have to deal with chiggers or RR right of ways, though are RR has thousands of elderberries growing beside them also. So how did the wine turn out, was it good stuff, worth considering another picking trip?

Crackedcork

 

[Cracked Cork]

An overdue update. This batch of 100% steamed elderberry juice turned out really well. We made a mead this way, 4 gallons of steamed elderberry juice and a gallon of honey got a gold at the Winemakers comp, but the pure juice one they didnt like as much. Crackedcork

 

[Wade E]

Gosh that mead sounds goooooooooooooood!

 

[Waldo]

An overdue update. This batch of 100% steamed elderberry juice turned out really well. We made a mead this way, 4 gallons of steamed elderberry juice and a gallon of honey got a gold at the Winemakers comp, but the pure juice one they didnt like as much. Crackedcork

How did you like the the pure juice batch? Would you post your recipe for the Mead? I think i'd like to try that one

 

[Cracked Cork]

Waldo, got them all listed on my elderberry webpage. The 100% juice is very fruity and smooth without the overwhelming tannin bite you get when you ferment on the skins for a week. I was already smooth and good when we bottled it and just keeps getting better. I made another batch of mead, this time with locust honey, it should be even better than the one from clover honey. Crackedcork