Elderflower Cordial 1

There’s some. …. Look, there’s some more!

We’re driving to the allotment, Tea Stew is in the driving seat. He keeps slowing down and excitedly pointing at things out of the window while on route. I privately wonder whether he should be keeping his eyes on the road. Wow look there’s loads there! I politely enquire what he is talking about. Elderflowers.

Oh, those are elderflowers?? Hitherto to my eyes indistinguishable from the cow parsley, it turns out the roads around our house are littered with elderflowers. Elderflower cordial happens to be one of my favourite drinks. An idea takes hold while allotmenting, and a few hours later, on the way home, we stop and go foraging.

A quick google search revealed hunred of recipes for homemade elderflower cordial. We selected this one from BBC Good Food (http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/531660/homemade-elderflower-cordial). We adjusted the quantities up slightly as once counted we found we had picked 31 elderflowers instead of the required 20.

It’s very easy – boil loads of sugar (and I really do mean loads) with water to make a syrup. At the last moment this will suddenly go clear.

Add 2 lemons cut into rounds with the zest first pared off with a lemon peeler. Then swish the elderflowers in some cold water to remove any bugs, tip them in with the lemons and citric acid and leave it to steep for 24 hours.

The hardest part is definitely managing not to drink it before 24 hours are up. As I’m writing this I have 3 more hours to go before straining and bottling, and most importantly – drinking!!!