Marrow Wine

[Elmo]

There must e a lot of people brewing round me I have been scouring the carboot sales for more demijons to no avail I am having to resort to ebay.

[Snadger]

There must e a lot of people brewing round me I have been scouring the carboot sales for more demijons to no avail I am having to resort to ebay.

Oh dear! Sorry about that elmo! Must admit it was 5 or 6 years ago when I got mine!

Maybe demijohns are becoming an endangered species?

[Snadger]

Please be careful

My daughter decided to make marrow rum in the airing cupboard of a shared house. Unfortunately she forgot she'd left the marrow packed with sugar in there and the whole thing collapsed, fell out of the bowl she'd stood it in and she had to spend ages scrubbing the carpet to try and get rid of the smell.

TOTALLY TRUE, but seriously I've made quite a few home wines. Car boot sales are a good source of equipment (demijohns etc). Boots used to do a good range, but I think they've decided home made wine is not PC any more.

Try an internet search for wine making equipment.

My favourite bit was always the siphoning off - somehow you always managed to swallow quite a bit of the wine even though you were supposed to be transferring it into either a clean jar or bottles.

I've had some very good results (blackberry and elderberry especially) but I think it's the challenge of trying something new that makes it special. Yeah you can buy plonk from the supermarket (as you can veggies) but it's not the same as doing it yourself, is it?

De-ja-vou! My marrow stuffed with sugar finished up on the floor without any warning! Scraped it up though!

[NEWTO THE PLOT]

There must e a lot of people brewing round me I have been scouring the carboot sales for more demijons to no avail I am having to resort to ebay.

Have you tried asking on freecycle in your area mightbe worth a try.

[Elmo]

I've tried there to I think homebrewing might be having a come back!

I started bidding on 6 on ebay and winning those when 12 came up so I bid on those to at this rate I'll have more than I know what to do with (well not really more than I know what do do with but may end up needing a liver transplant hic!!

[Don Vincenzo]

6 plus 12 = 18 to me, in order to have a liver traspant you need 352 demijohns ready or maturing ( one a day ) and that if that it is only you drinking but also you should think of friends. If that is the case you could progress to 50 litres demijohns then 250 litres wooden barrels etc.
Don Vincenzo

[Elmo]

Very good point I did win both sets of demijons so I have a grand total of 29 to play with now hummm what else have I got that can be brewed

[Elmo]

Marrow wine update

I promised I'd give you an update and here it is: I bottled the marrow wine this weekend and it is truly gorgeous its cleared to a beautiful light white and has a lovely crisp flavour with a warming aftertaste of ginger. This has got to be the best use of marrows yet!!

I strongly suggest you all give it a go this year I am going to be growing a bumper crop and making a barrel of it hic!

[madderbat]

Great encouragement Elmo, I've got enough marrow in the freezer to make some wine - next brew.

Am decanting my blackberry into demijohns today and looking forward to that as I've ony got one bottle left now. Have saved some parsnip, plum, apple and pear, but it's not the same as blackberry

Have you tried freecycle for demijohns? We get them advertised quite often in this area.
http://freecycle.org/display.php?reg...ited%20Kingdom

[Headfry]

marrow wine

How many bottles of wine would you get from a demijon filled to the neck'ish?
I started wine making last year with our own grapes, got hooked, then made some marrow wine! should be bottling the grape and racking the marrow this weekend! is it ok to taste it before it's ready? ie as we rack it....I cant wait to see what it tastes like.
Next will be elderflower.. I am told there are two types of flower, one good one bad- how do I tell them appart....help please

[Birdie Wife]

Hi Headfry,
You should get six bottles from a full demijohn. You can taste it before it's ready, it may taste sweet, or 'green' as in young, or totally brilliant! Can't help much with the elderflower, didn't know there were two types... I'm sure someone else will be able to come up with an answer for you though.

[Brewer-again]

elderflowers

Hi! headfry!
I have brewed with elderflowers and have many books on brewing and none of them mention a bad elderflower. Perhaps it is another white flower that can be picked by mistake. But I am still not aware of any that you should not use, has any one else heard of ones not to use???Glad to see that marrow wine has been put under air lock, it has to be the only way .

[madderbat]

Hi Headfry and welcome.
The only elderflower I know not to use are the older ones, that are going a bit brownish - end up tasting like cat-pee I'm told. You should pick for best results on a sunny morning, early, and if you do it after a new moon you should get the energy running up the stems instead of down, therefore more flavour.

Enjoy.

[shirlthegirl43]

When I was collecting elderflowers for wine last summer I actually experienced the different flowers. Not sure if it is an age thing but some deffo smell like cat wee - don't use them!

[Headfry]

Hi, Yes - I am sure that I read once that some of the flowers smell like cats wee! This is where my confusion was born!
But I dont know if it's an age of flower thing or a type of plant thing?

Guess I will just give it a go and try NOT to think of cats!

ps - putting the grape into bottles this weekend, last night I put in 1 crushed campden tablet!

Please wish me luck, never done this before and its been a long time in the making....we have bonded!