EmsE
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Spring leaf wine- which leaves?I was looking at Gil's recepie for spring leaf wine and was wondering if leaves from a silver birch can be used (don't want to give anyone a poorly tummy)? What do leaf wines taste like?
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gil
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Never tried birch leaf wine - there's a recipe for Beech Leaf Noyau somewhere on the site, and the topic was raised in a recent thread in Recipes Preserving Homebrew, but you have to buy spirits to make it.
I tried making ground elder leaf wine one year (using three pints of very young , glossy and crinkly leaves per gallon). It went a fetching shade of pale pink in the DJ, and was perfectly drinkable if a bit opalescent. But it tasted bland.
Sorrel (cultivated) leaf wine tasted better - think I used a couple of pints of leaves per gallon. Also pale pink to start, losing the pink later. But it didn;t taste lemony like sorrel. Quite good though.
I got fed up of the permanent sorrel patch in the rotation plot and took it all out shortly after that, so never made it again.
IMHO, the very best spring leaf wine is Nettle. There's a recipe for it in the 'Wines to make....' article, possibly March or April.
BTW, welcome to Downsizer, EmsE. Whereabouts in Scotland are you ? I'm in the south-west, near the border.
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cab
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I suspect that sweet cicely would make a superb wine.
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EmsE
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Thank you, I'm always looking for new ideas on what to add to my vegi garden so I think sorrell will have a good chance (just tell the hubbie its for wine and it'll be in there  ). I went picking nettles about a month ago for beer but saw the recepie on here for wine so hopefully I made the right choice.
I'm in a village in the west of Scotland though originally from Yorkshire (left there 15 years ago).
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ksia
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ia made a very good wine from young oak and walnut leaves.
The beech leaf noyau is underway.
silver birch I don't know and I couldn't see any reference to it in his book but I did see you can make wine from hawthorn blossom - I'll have to remind ia of that!
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gil
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Ah, I;d forgotten oak leaf, though I associate making it with midsummer [up in these northern parts]. Supposed to be creamy / vanilla-ish, though the one I made wasn't and I never tried making it again.
But thinking about leaf wines, how about bramble tip wine ? Should be almost ready to pick...
Anyone know whether you could use raspberry leaf tips the same way ?
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EmsE
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Raspberry leaf wine is really nice however I can't remember how I made it (this was before I learnt to keep a note of what I was doing  )I think it was the bramble tip recipie I used with raspberry leaves instead.
There's a few Oak trees on the cycle path so I think I'll be going for a wonder tomorrow night to see if any have begun to leaf yet.
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goosey
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Don't know about siver birch leaves, but once, I saw a recipe for a drink based on siver birch sap. (wine I think) so probably the leaves would be safe.
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EmsE
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If you can use the sap, then I thought there'd be a good chance of using the leaves, so I googled it and apparently you can make tea from birch leaves (good for kidney problems apparently). I think I'll try making some wine and see how it turns out.
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gil
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| EmsE wrote: | | If you can use the sap, then I thought there'd be a good chance of using the leaves, so I googled it and apparently you can make tea from birch leaves (good for kidney problems apparently). I think I'll try making some wine and see how it turns out. |
Let us know how it turns out - I'd be really interested to know [but got no spare capacity to try it myself].
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EmsE
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I will do. Was trying to collect the leaves this evening but the problem is that the tree is in the chickens pen and I needed to borrow their stepladder to reach the leaves. However they decided to sit there on the ladder watching me try and balance on a upside down plant pot to reach up to get the leaves. By the time they decided to fly into their house I'd only collected a pint of leaves and had a bad kink in my neck and it was beginning to get dark so I gave up. Will try again tomorrow.
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ksia
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Many thanks for the beech leaf noyau suggestion above - we've just drained and sugared ours and it's delicious. Will be making loads next year.
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