Homemade Dandelion Wine

Here's some summer fun for everyone. If you've never made your own homemade wine, don't be mistaken, it isn't easy. But, then again, it isn't hard, either. It does take a bit of effort, a few tools and patience. But there is a big plus: the dandelions are free. Feel free to pick any kind of dandelion you can locate, from your yard, the neighbors yard, wild fields or someone's garden. It actually doesn't matter if it's a pretty one or a ratty one, but be sure they haven't been treated with pesticides or fertilizers. It's worth the money if you have a local organic farmer that grows them or florist that has organic flowers; the cleaner, the better. You can sometimes buy them dried in health food stores but fresh is much better. What you will need is fresh blossoms and it doesn't matter what genus or strain of flower. Wild or cultivated. Just pick or otherwise obtain fresh flowers and you are ready for wine!



Ingredients:

3 quarts Dandelion Blossoms
Confectioners Sugar
2 Lemons
2 Oranges
1/2 tsp Grape Tannin
Montrachet Wine Yeast (follow package directions)
Yeast Nutrient
1 gallon fermentation container (made of wood, plastic, glass or stainless steel)
fermentation locks (for the wine bottles and gallon container)
Wooden Utensils (including a dowel)
Saccharometer or Hydrometer
Corking Device
Corks
Sterlized Glass Wine Bottles

You can get the tannin, saccharometer, corking device, corks, fermentation locks, yeast nutrient and the yeast in speciality shops, from a winemaking supplier or from various vendors on the net. Shop for the best prices. You can get a wooden utensils set at Walmart for a few pennies. Once you have the various sundries you can then go looking for flowers. Pick the blossoms while they are fresh and fully open. Fading blooms lose their flavor. Discard the stems and leaves as you go, putting the blossoms into the bucket or hat or basket you brought along. Do not pick flowers from lawns or byways where you are not sure if they have been sprayed with chemicals. If you are not sure you will need to wash the flowers carefully but even such washing does not guarantee that there are no chemicals in the genus itself. Some chemicals take up residence in the actual cell structure of the plant. I would suggest for those of you who can grow stuff to grow your own dandelions. They are weeds, after all, and don't need a lot of talent. They grow pretty much on their own even under the worst of conditions.

Once you have the blooms and the sundries, rinse the flowers in cold water and then place them in a fermentation container. Pour one gallon of boiling water over the blossoms. Cover the container with plastic wrap. You must leave them to steep in this water for five entire days; no shorter. No hurrying. This will extract the essence from the blossoms for use in the wine. As well, you must stir the blossoms every single day and always replace the plastic wrap after every stirring.




After five days, remove the dandelions and wring them through double folded cheesecloth until they are dry. Return the pressed out liquid to the fermentation container along with the remaining water. Throw away the flowers. You are done with them. Peel the lemons and oranges thinly (without the pith) and add the peel to the must. Cut the lemons and oranges and squeeze the juice into the must as well. Remove the seeds and skin the pith off and toss the rest of the oranges and lemons into the must. Be careful not to add the seeds or pith as this will make the wine tart.

Take a saccharometer reading and adjust the sugar level per instructions. This is done by pouring the must into the cylinder until the saccharometer floats. The higher it rides, the more sugar is present. If it floats near the bottom, add sugar to the must and test it again. If it is riding high, then no more sugar is needed. Just follow the instructions that come with the equipment. Once the sugar level is adjusted, add the wine yeast in a starter solution. Follow package instructions for the yeast. The starter solution is made by boiling 1/2 cup of water and then allowing to cool to a tepid temperature. Add 1/2 tsp of the confectioners sugar, stir it in and then add the wine yeast, using the full amount that is needed for the must (directions are on the package). Add a pinch of yeast nutrient and then let the mixture sit until it starts to foam and smell like yeast. Once it is foaming, add it to the sample of sugar corrected must that you used for the saccharometer readings. Put the whole solution in a bottle and stop up the bottle with either sterlized cotton, a clean cork or a plastic cap. Then let it sit in a warm area for 24 hours.




Sterilize the bottles before using. You can be doing this while you are waiting on the starter solution. You can sterilize them with tablets of potassium metabisulfite (available from winemaking suppliers; follow package directions) or by boiling each one in a large pot of water and then soaking in cold water treated with bleach. Once they've been soaked in the bleach, they must be rinsed completely until the slickness and smell of the bleach is entirely gone. You can also place the bottles in a dishwasher with no soap and run them through a hot cycle to remove the last of the bleach. Set them aside to dry completely.

After the 24 hours has passed, add the starter solution to the must. Recover the fermentation containter with the plastic wrap after adding the solution. Once this is done, start preparing to rack the wine. Once the bottles are clean and dry the wine can be racked directly into these bottles. While filling each bottle, allow for a small amount of air between the level of the wine and the cork. Drive the corks in as far as you can but don't get too rough or you can crack the bottle. Store the bottles by laying on their sides so that the corks remain wet with wine at all times. Wine racks are ideal for storing wine this way. This wine, made this way, should be aged for up to a year but no longer. In fact, it should be ready to drink within 8 - 10 months.

Variations on this wine can be made. You can use 1/4 oz of Ginger Root per gallon of wine for a different flavor. You can also use 1 lb of Raisins in place of the Lemons and Oranges. You can also use other kinds of citrus fruits like Mango or Kiwi.

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Homemade Strawberry Wine

Homemade Strawberry Wine

Recipe Makes 1 Gallon

Ingredients:

2 lb Strawberries
8 oz Raisins
Confectioners Sugar
1/2 cup Grape Tannin
1 tsp Pectic Enzyme
Sauterne Wine Yeast

Method:

First of all, select or purchase your fermentation container, a large funnel, a large amount of cheesecloth, a box of plain gelatin, saccharometer (hydrometer), a bottle of yeast nutrient, fermentation locks and a gallon glass container with cork or stopper. Two half gallon glass containers may be substituted and if you choose to go for smaller bottles, then use 4 one liter sized glass bottles and settle for the 4th being only about half full. Just be sure that all of your glass bottles are stoppable and have locking stoppers or corks. Any unfamiliar items I have mentioned can be purchased in large liquor stores, online or in brewery supply shops.

Wash all the strawberries and cut off the stems and leaves. Cut the strawberries into quarters and place them in the fermentation container. Cut the raisins into small pieces and add them to the mix. Crush the berries and raisins with a wooden utensil like a meat hammer or potato masher. After it is well mashed, pour over with 1 gallon of boiling water (use distilled, purified or filtered water). Cover the container at this time with plastic wrap and leave it to ferment for 24 hours. Stir the mix well late the next day and then recover it. Leave it sit for another 3 whole days.

On the second day, prepare the wine yeast according to the package directions. Make your starter solution by first boiling a half cup of water and then letting it cool back down to tepid and add 1/2 tsp of the confectioners sugar. Add the wine yeast to the sugar water for the full amount needed for the must (check package directions). Add a pinch of yeast nutrient to the mix and let it sit for an hour or until it starts to foam and smell like bread

Late into the third day what you have is the must. Add the pectic enzyme and the grape tannin to it and stir them in. Make the sugar correction at this point, using the saccharometer and a sample of the mix. This keeps the wine from ending up like kool aid. Add the sample of must that was used for the readings to the starter solution you made yesterday and stop it all up in a bottle overnight. Once you have corrected the sugar level, leave the mix until the next day (another 24 hours) and then add the starter solution. Once all of it is in the fermentation container, cover it over with plastic wrap and leave it to ferment. When the fermentation slows down and sediment starts to collect, it is time to bottle the wine.

Because the strawberries have pulp and seeds that are undesirable in the wine, they will have to be strained out over the cheesecloth. Place small amounts of the pulp into a double layer of cheesecloth using a small plastic cup or spoon, without stirring up the sediment that is collecting on the bottom of the fermentation container. Squeeze the pulp through the cheesecloth into a glass bottle. If some of the pulp or seeds get through into the bottle, strain the liquid from the first bottle into a second bottle through a cheesecloth lined funnel. You will just have to repeat the straining process as many times as it takes to remove the seeds and pulp. Once the liquid is clear in the bottle, then it can be corked and racked.

Once the wine has been transferred into the chosen bottles, the bottles should be capped with fermentation locks that are filled with water. If you have not been able to find fermentation locks, then plastic wrap around the top and held in place with rubber bands is a doable substitute. The wine is continuing to ferment at this stage and bubbles will be seen in the water inside the locks or at the surface of the plastic wrap. When the bubbles cease to appear, take another saccharometer reading. You should get a gravity reading of 1000 or a alcohol level reading near 0. At this point, you are ready for the second racking.




Move the wine into new bottles that have been sterilized and are very clean. Use a siphon to move the wine from one bottle to the other, making an effort to "splash" it along the sides of the bottle as it's poured in, so as to stimulate aeration. Cap the bottles with fermentation locks. There will be less fermentation at this point so the bubbles will come slower. Leave for a month. After the month has passed, redo the saccharometer test and look for a gravity reading of .990 or .995. Keep testing every 4 days until this reading is acheived. Once it has reached this level, the wine is ready for final bottling.

Dissolve the box of gelatin in warm water and then add it to the wine. This will force all the remaining sediment, seeds, pulp and other debris to sink to the bottom of each bottle and remain behind as the wine is tranferred to the final bottle. If you wish, now is the time to test to acidity level of your wine. Wine that is too acid is unpleasant to the taste. Use a standard pH kit, putting the strip into the bottle and then setting it aside to dry. If the pH is less than 3.5 then the wine is way too acid. This can be fixed by simply placing the bottle into a refrigerator for a week. Test it to be sure it is at 3.5 and no higher than 4.0. If in the initial test you have the opposite problem and the test reads a pH of 4.5, the wine is not acid enough. For this, you need to add small amounts of tartaric acid to the wine until the test shows a pH of 3.5- 4.5. Also, to prevent oxidation of the wine while it's aging, you will want to add Vitamin C to the bottle, at a rate of 50 mg per gallon of wine.



Now, at last, the wine is ready to be bottled. The final bottles should be sterilized before use. This can be done by boiling the bottles in hot water and then pouring the hot water into a sink or large container along with the bottles and adding a small amount of bleach. Let sit until the water cools. Then place the bottles in a dishwasher with no soap and run them through a hot cycle to remove the last of the bleach. This is as clean and sterile as it gets. You should also sterilize the corks you plan to use by boiling them in hot water as well.

Once the bottles are clean and dry the wine can be racked directly into these bottles. While filling each bottle, allow for a small amount of air between the level of the wine and the cork. Drive the corks in as far as you can but don't get too rough or you can crack the bottle. Store the bottles by laying on their sides so that the corks remain wet with wine at all times. Wine racks are ideal for storing wine this way. This wine, made this way, should be aged for up to a year but no longer. In fact, it should be ready to drink within 8 - 10 months.

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