So last night we continued a bit of elderflower harvesting from the local hedges. We love our elder cordial in this wee hoose. We take only enough flowers to leave the tree and other folks happy and take them carefully. If in doubt of identification, don't collect flowers, that's just silly, LOTS of things look like elder. Be careful! Happy to ID via a photograph (If I can) on the Wellybook Facebook page if you need! But there's a great 'How to ID an Elderflower' link here thanks to Gemma Garner for such an informative post.
Elderflower Cordial
Syrup
2lb sugar
1 pint water to a handful of lemon (in my case frozen sliced lemons unused at xmas and bagged up for a later use).
Heat up and make a syrup, then cool.
35g of citric acid (add when mix is cold)
10-20 elder flower heads (shake to remove bugs!). To each lot of syrup (cold syrup or they're rank and go brown)
You just need to steep for 24-48 hours and then sieve, put into a sterilised vessel.
If you don't have citric acid you can increase lemons, but it can be added afterwards (up to a year)
Multiple batches or large batches seem to work well. Old lemonade bottles can be used to store and you can strain after storage into a nice glass bottle if you've a mind.
Its so easy and we're still using last years (2013 batch) up, so we must be doing something right. We also had this as the toast in our forest wedding and as a non-alcoholic option for our party. Its fabulous. Yes we COULD make wine, but we prefer the cordial, I think its much nicer and such a 'summer' fix in the cold months.
Enjoy.
Various supermarkets have sugar at 68p/kilo, so given the price of the cordial in the shops, this recipe WILL endeavour to save you a fortune. But be prepared for it to be one of the only cordials the family favours.
A more haiversome version of this recipe and on collecting flowers is here.
You've been warned, its haivertastic with bells on. Happy cordial making people!
