The Elder Scrolls

Apparently the first day of the British summer is that on which the elder first blooms! So it’s official – this is the summer. Ha. Anyway, I started to make elderflower champagne a couple of weeks ago and am pleased with the results – frothy, floral and lemony, with an unexpected creaminess. Unfortunately it doesn’t look as though I’m going to fulfil my fantasy of drinking it out in the garden on a hot summer’s evening. Maybe in front of the radiator. Yes, our heating is on. In June.

Yes, I took this picture at 8.45 in the morning. It's the first sun I've seen all week. Also, it's so frothy and delicious! And you can't possibly put it back in the bottle after pouring it out, can you?

Strictly speaking, of course, elderflower ‘champagne’ is not champagne at all – various books are rather bossy about this misnomer, as though anyone might actually be deceived into drinking it under false pretences. But who cares. Snotty books are not the boss of me.

Elderflower champagne

2 unwaxed lemons, sliced fairly thinly

6 heads of elderflower, if possible picked early in the morning on a hot day

4 litres water

700 g sugar

30 ml vinegar (cider or white wine)

Take a lidded bucket and put the lemons, water and elderflower heads in it. Cover with the lid and leave for 36 hours.

I love my new steeping bucket. Yes, I bought it specially for making booze. No one is ever allowed to throw up in it or use it to wash paintbrushes in.

            Now uncover and strain through muslin or a sieve (if you don’t mind the odd bug or petal) into a large bowl. Add the sugar and vinegar, and stir until all the sugar is dissolved. At this stage the liquid is very sweet but floral and lemony – the sweetness will diminish as the sugar is turned into alcohol by the wild yeasts that live on the flowers. Now decant it into two two-litre plastic fizzy drinks bottles that have been sterilized. Don’t screw the lids on too tightly at this stage. 

I'm not too bothered about the weird lumps of yeastiness that have formed. I think they mean it's working.

            Leave for around a week. After a day or two you’ll see small bubbles forming; this is a good sign, it means that the yeasts are doing their job. After a week tighten the lids up fully and leave for another few days to a week for the drink to become fizzy. You’ll be able to tell when it’s fizzy enough because the plastic bottles will swell up when the gas build-up is too high. If you use glass bottles you have no such clues, and you may find that the bottles explode or that you lose your precious champagne when you open them. In plastic bottles you can let the gas out when the bottle's about to fall over and keep letting it out at intervals (I had to do it around every 4 hours, guess my wild yeasts were pretty powerful) until you're ready to drink it, at which point you should leave the bottle tightly screwed up for a few hours first to make the champagne super fizzy. The fermentation will slow down if you put the bottle in the fridge, so take this into account if you're trying to fizz it up and get it cold at the same time.

The elder tree has other uses besides culinary ones: Dr Johnson in his Dictionary (1775) mentioned that ‘dwarf elder is near London propagated for medicinal use’; he isn’t any more specific about what it was used for, but elderflower or elderberry tea was a traditional folk remedy for coughs and colds, and when the plant is made into a poultice it was used to ease grazes and skin problems such as eczema. The smell of its leaves is said to repel flies and wasps, so it was traditionally planted near larder windows, or next to privies. The modern gardener may find that pigeons and other birds will go for elderberries rather than their carefully tended fruit and veg – there’s a chubby woodpigeon that doesn’t stir from the elder tree in my garden from June to September – so it might be worth planting one near the veg patch. In British folklore it’s believed to repel witches if you plant it near the house or carry its twigs or leaves in your pocket, although it’s not all good: although you can be confident that it is immune to being struck by lightning, you should never burn it in the fireplace, as this is taken to be an invitation to Death, or to the Devil himself.

Witches, demons and critters aside, the elder’s flowers can flavour jam and cordials or be made into fritters, and its berries can be made into wine or added to fruit pies. Elderflower is a popular flavouring in Scandinavian countries as well as the UK and US. Don’t eat the branches or bark, though; they can cause stomach upsets.

‘Sambocade’ (from the tree’s Latin name, Sambucus nigra) from The Forme of Cury, a fourteenth-century cookbook written for the chefs of Richard II, is a sort of medieval elderflower cheesecake: a pastry case filled with sweetened curd cheese, mixed with egg white and fresh elderflowers, and then baked. Yum! Here is a modern version that you don’t have to bake (or pick soggy brown elderflowers out of):

Elderflower cheesecake

10 digestive biscuits

75 g melted butter

1 tbsp golden syrup

700g mascarpone (or Philadelphia if you want something a bit tangier)

1 unwaxed lemon

6 tbsp elderflower cordial, either your own or shop-bought

175 g icing sugar

Put the biscuits in a plastic sandwich bag, seal it and smash them with a rolling pin (this is the fun part). Mix in the butter and syrup and squish into a 20-cm tin.

            Zest and juice the lemon. Put the zest in a separate bowl with 2 tbsp of the elderflower cordial. Beat the cheese together with the sugar, lemon juice and elderflower cordial. Smooth it on top of the base and leave in the fridge for at least 12 hours. Before serving, decorate with strips of the soaked lemon zest.