Gooseberry & Elderflower Wine

You will need

• Gooseberries1.2 kg
• Elderflower florets, cream-white0.3 L loosely packed
• Sugar1.1 kg
• Pectic enzymeper dose
• Campden tablet1
• Wine yeast + nutrient1 sachet
• Waterto 4.5 L

Picking it at the right moment

• Gooseberry

  For a dry or sparkling wine, pick them hard and green (under-ripe); for a fuller wine let them soften, colour and give slightly.

• Elderflower

  Pick when the heads are fully open and cream-white with a sweet, faintly muscat scent — before any of the tiny flowers brown or start to drop.

Method

1. 1

   Sanitise. Top and tail the gooseberries; strip the elderflower florets from every piece of green stalk (the stalks and leaves are toxic).

2. 2

   The two are in season together in June and made for each other: gooseberry's crisp acidity carries elderflower's muscat scent beautifully.

3. 3

   Crush the gooseberries under 2.5 L cooled boiled water, add a campden tablet, wait 24 hours, then add the florets and pectic enzyme.

4. 4

   Add the sugar dissolved warm; top to 4.5 L (reading ~1.086); pitch the yeast and nutrient; ferment cool to hold the aroma.

5. 5

   Ferment on the pulp two days, strain, rack and clear.

6. 6

   A fragrant, crisp early-summer white — one of the loveliest in the collection.