dandelion wine..

[waggoner]

Seeing all the masses of dandelions about everywhere,, i want to have ago at dandelion wine.
Reading my books, they all seem to suggest boiling the flowers, then leaving them a couple of days before adding the yeast??
I've also read the posts here too..which seem a bit mixed..

Would anyone have a recipe for a nice dandelion wine,, if it is possible to make a nice wine from them???

Thanks.
Mark.

[lockwood1956]

I have made Dandelion wine several times now, with mixed results....

I think adding the flowers later and without boiling gives better results.

Prepare a base white wine (wine No 1 works well) ferment it till it reaches around S.G. 1.020 to 1.010 (to allow the vigorous part of ferment to subside) then add the flower petals....no green bits.

doing it this way requires a lot less flowers, and all I do is pick them and then holding the base of the petals between thumb and forefinger snip the yellow bits off using scissors. you "should" only need about a cup or two of petals, as we are allowing the alcohol to extract the aroma compounds.

The wine will not taste anything like nice (or even drinkable) till it is at least 6 months old, before that it will tastes horrid!!!! it is at its best after 1 year of ageing, but it has proven to be worth the wait.

I won the flower class at Telford show with a dandelion wine.

1 litre white grape concentrate
acid to 7 g/l (measured as tartaric)
500ml Dandilion petals (no green bits)
1 tsp bentonite
1 tsp pectolase
1 tsp good quality nutrient
Lalvin D47 yeast

Fermented to 1.010 then added flower petals (chopped earlier and frozen) fermented to dry, racked, degassed, stabilised, then sweetened to 1.008 for a nice refreshing medium wine.

hope that helps
regards
Bob

[lockwood1956]

Forgot to add...

Dandilions are "allegedly" at their best if picked at noon on St Georges day, so you may want to pick them then and freeze them
Try to harvest from an area where dogs dont pee on them, this is, of course, why [people have always boiled them, but I think it overdoes the colour extraction, and never tastes as "dandilion'y" afterwards)

[Cellar_Rat]

That'll be why they grow grapes on wires to keep them out of the way of the dog pee

[waggoner]

Thats brilliant, thanks Bob.

I'll shall throw tradition out the window i think and go and pick some tomorrow,,seeing as its nice weather and freeze them, because knowing my luck if i waited till St Georges day it would be blowing a gale or snowing or the rabbits would have eaten them all!!

I'll try one of each recipe, i got a can of grape concentrate here, so thats good,,looking forward to trying this now.

Thanks for the warning on Dog pee..

Thanks again.

[SiSandrine]

Try adding some dried apricots, chopped into the must early on. This gives a slight caramel and apricot edge. A recent tasting note I made had something like greek yogurt with honey and warmed fruit (or some such tosh). I used the non-sulphured ones from Morrisons. If interested I can give the exact recipe I used but this made an excellent wine. Mine is still bulk ageing from last year but my patience is running thin now. Apricot and Dandelion is a fantastic combination IMO.

[robwrx]

Try adding some dried apricots, chopped into the must early on. This gives a slight caramel and apricot edge. A recent tasting note I made had something like greek yogurt with honey and warmed fruit (or some such tosh). I used the non-sulphured ones from Morrisons. If interested I can give the exact recipe I used but this made an excellent wine. Mine is still bulk ageing from last year but my patience is running thin now. Apricot and Dandelion is a fantastic combination IMO.

Sisandrine
I would like to see the recipe you used as I'm keen to have a go at a couple of different dandelion wines.

Regards
Rob

[waggoner]

Hi Simon.

That sounds interesting,,yes if its ok for the recipe that would be great.
I'm going to do the two from Bob first,Hopefully will start on them later today,,But your recipe will be good to try in the future too..

Thanks.
Mark.

[SiSandrine]

Makes 2 gallons

400g Dandelion heads, stripped from green bits
300g muscavado sugar
1.4kg granulated sugar
3 oranges, 1 lemon
250g sultanas
125g organic dried apricots
1.5 litre apple juice
2tsp pectolase
1 tsp yest nutrient
1 tbsp acid.
Gervin No5

(With apologies to Bob for all the boiling)
Added boiling water onto Dandelion heads
Added juice of 3 oranges and zest of 1.5 oranges and 1 lemon
Added sultanas and apricots
Reboiled must for 10 minutes.
Allowed to cool for 1 day then filtered through muslin into fermentation bucket.
Added sugar to 1088
Added acid to taste (I probably measured too but don't have the record)
Added pectolase and 5ml 10% sulphite.
Created yeast starter
Following morning - pitched yeast.
Once major foaming had stopped (at about SG of 1070), I transferred to 2 demi johns and topped with 1 litre Apple Juice across DJs (SG still 1070 afterwards)
After 1 month at SG 990, racked to clean DJs. Topped with further 250mls apple juice to each DJ SG raised then to 1.000.
After 2 more months SG 990, racked to 2 clean DJs. Taste by this point was starting to refine. Degassed.
After another 2 months need to clear (it just wasn't moving - probably on account of all the boiling). I added Bentonite at this stage which cleared it like billy-o.
After 2 weeks, racked off sediment. Added 5ml 10% sulphite.
Filtered into clean DJs and topped with a little WWN1.
Has been bulk ageing ever since (5 months).
Occasional tasting and it really is good. Lovely depth.

[kampervan]

was quite shocked at the taste of this as did one 2 years ago and is very nice now. give it time

[waggoner]

Been and collected the dandelions this afternoon,, ok picking them, but sooo boring pulling the yellow petals off,,,still got enought to do the two wines.
I washed them in a 1 pint of water to 1 camden tablet solution to clean them and then rinsed them off afterwards in clean water.
I got them in the freezer now until they are ready to add to the base wines..

One question,, when added at an SG of 1020 to 1010,, do they get left in till the end of the fermentation?? or do they need to be strained out after a few days/week ??

Thanks.

[David]

Fermented to 1.010 then added flower petals (chopped earlier and frozen)

Did you sulphite the petals prior to freezing?

[lockwood1956]

I didn't David no.....

did think about it, but figured they should be safe whilst frozen

seemed to work ok

regards
Bob

[lockwood1956]

Been and collected the dandelions this afternoon,, ok picking them, but sooo boring pulling the yellow petals off,,,still got enought to do the two wines.

don't pull the petals off....nip the bit beneath the yellow petals between thumb and forefinger and squeeze, the petals will go flat and protrude a little, you can then snip them off with scissors

regards
Bob

[lockwood1956]

One question,, when added at an SG of 1020 to 1010,, do they get left in till the end of the fermentation?? or do they need to be strained out after a few days/week ??

From 1.010 to end of ferment isnt very long, so i leave them in till the end