Elderberry Vinegar

I think this year was the year of the fruit-infused vinegar for me. Partly because of my laziness. Every time I had something starting to molder, I would toss it in some vinegar and that would be it. One of my favorites of the season was elderberry vinegar. Usually, I save all the precious elderberries for syrup. But there was an errant pint of them sitting in my fridge a little too long, so I poured some cider vinegar on top of them. They sat in the vinegar for a while. I forgot about them. Then I drained the vinegar off when I got around to it. It sits in a jar in my cupboard with no further ado. And now a splash of the vinegar (drained of the berries) in a cold glass of cider is my tonic for the day. Especially since I'm fighting off this horrible bug. Wish me luck that I can get outside and enjoy this brisk fall weather soon!

In the Garden: Transplanting an Elderberry Bush

Going for a ride in the wagon!

 Right now we are waiting on yet another snow storm that should last tonight and tomorrow, which is pretty depressing, so I'm going to stick my fingers in my ears and sing a little until it's over. While I do that, I'm going to think about last week when I planted some Red Giant mustard greens, radishes, and two kinds of peas. It felt so good to be back in the dirt.

While I had the chance, I also transplanted my elderberry bushes. I had gotten them as a present from my mother a few years ago, and promptly planted them in the worst possible spot in my yard. That would be a hot, dry spot. The bad part is the dry part. Elderberries want to have their feet in the water and their faces in the sun. I happen to have a pond and a stream on my land, so I moved them down there. Right next to the wild elderberries I found last summer, growing on the edge of the pond. I hope to have a big family of them down there one day. They reproduce quickly, if given the right conditions. And they don't need much upkeep, if any at all.

You can use elderberries to make many a wonderful jelly or wine, but I mostly like the syrup. I might be dreaming, but during this epic winter, we didn't get sick once. And I think it was the elderberry syrup.

Can you see them in all this dreary brown??

Elderberry Syrup

Happy 2011! I don't want to jinx myself by writing this post, but it's been in the hopper since the summer, and I thought January of the new year would be a great time to talk about the health benefits of your own totally local elderberry syrup. I haven't been sick yet, and I'd like to think that it's due to a few tricks to staying healthy. One of them being taking a spoonful of elderberry syrup every now and then when I think I'm running low, or when people around me start to get sick.

This summer I had a bit of an elderberry obsession. I found scraps of time to bike around my neighborhood sussing out where the elderberry bush grows. My own two little sambucus canadensis plants have miserable, and now I know that where I planted them was not optimal. Elderberries like swampy lands, their feet well in the water, face in the sun. Once I started looking, of course, I found them everywhere. Even on my property, on the edge of the pond, being choked out by alder bushes. I've since trimmed the alders back, and come spring I will transplant my two unfortunate troopers to a prime spot all cleared out: nice and wet, super sunny. I hope one day to encourage a whole passel of elderberry bushes down there, but in the meantime they are all over my immediate neighborhood for the picking.

Elderberries are not entirely edible!

The thing you want to be careful with is this: elderberries shouldn't really be eaten raw, and don't eat any of the leaves. And as with all foraging, you want to be sure they are elderberries! Now, what was I going to do with all those elderberries? I did not make wine. But I did make elderflower liqueur. I made elderberry jelly with some wild apples I found; delicious on duck. Elderberries are an acquired taste. They are slightly winey, musty and funky. They are also incredibly healthy. You can find elderberry syrup in health food stores, good for immunity and high in vitamin C. That's what gave me the idea of elderberry syrup. I was sending my friend a bottle of this great elderberry syrup made in Vermont that she swears by (she bought it while we were vacationing, and I sent it to her to lighten her load). I thought, gosh, I must be able to make that. So I did.

Elderberry production line.

 On the porch, I would pull the berries off the stems into a white bowl so I could see the little stems and pull them out. I used a recipe from my trusty Linda Ziedrich Joy of Jams, Jellies and Other Sweet Preserves (the recipe is called Elderberry Rob). It's basically just elderberries and honey. And of course, you know how good for you honey is. Nice and local, too. I also froze some elderberry juice, should I need to replenish my stock. And, of course, this syrup is great on yogurt or in a glass of champagne, like cassis in a kir royale. Or in a cup of hot water like tea. There was also a recipe for raw elderberry syrup, and I'm sure some may say that cooking it depletes it's store of vitamins but being that I intended it for my two-year old as well, I didn't want to chance it.

Fair warning: they will dye your fingers.

You basically want to juice the elderberries, which you do in a heavy-bottomed pot. One stemmed and washed, put them in a pot and mash them. I chose to add water because mine seemed so un-juicy. Probably due to our very dry and hot summer. Simmer for about fifteen minutes and strain. Because you are making syrup, you can squeeze the jelly bag you strain it in (go ahead, I know you want to do it!) because who cares about the cloudiness? (I saved the pulp and added it to some apple pulp to make some elderberry-applesauce which I then used for fruit bars, but that's me. I can't throw anything out.)

Then take the juice, measure it and add an equal amount of honey. Simmer it until the honey and juice are combined and look syrupy. And that's it. Seal it in a jar, keep it in the fridge. No canning required.

Fave kitchen tool. Potato masher. Or berry masher, depending on the season.

Some other good elderberry posts:

Picking Berries in California, Hunter Angler Gardener Cook
Elderberry Jelly, Simply Recipes
Respect Your Elderberries, David Lebovitz

Just a little something to keep under your hat until summer! It's really not that far away.