Rowan & Apple Wine

Experienced

In season September · makes 4.5 L · target OG 1.092

Teaches two things at once: why a bitter fruit must be cooked (safety and palatability) and how blending rescues a fruit too harsh to stand alone.

Before you start. Rowan must be cooked — raw berries contain parasorbic acid that causes stomach upset. Do not use it raw.

You will need

Rowan berry
Ready when the whole cluster is a strong orange-red and the berries have softened; better still after a frost.
Apple
Ripe when the fruit parts from the tree with a gentle upward twist rather than a pull, and the pips inside have turned brown.

1
Sanitise. Strip the rowan berries from their stalks; use them after a frost or freeze them overnight.
2
Two lessons here. First, rowan is bitter and holds parasorbic acid that upsets the stomach RAW, so it must be COOKED: simmer the berries 15-20 minutes, which both makes them safe and tames the bitterness. Second, rowan alone makes a harsh, medicinal wine, so you BLEND it — the chopped sharp apples soften and round it into something you would actually pour.
3
Simmer the rowan; meanwhile crush the apples and add pectic enzyme. Combine the cooled rowan liquor with the apple pulp.
4
Add the sugar dissolved warm; top to 4.5 L (reading ~1.092); pitch yeast and nutrient.
5
Ferment on the pulp three days, strain, and finish under airlock.
6
Rack and age well over a year — the bitterness that survives cooking mellows only with time. An unusual, faintly bittersweet, amber-red wine.

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An original MakeWine recipe.