I've got quite a few trees on the edge of our sheep field but the birds get most of them, as I can only reach the lower ones.
I got the recipes off t'internet - the balsamic vinegar is nice, but I'm not quite sure how to use the syrup as I'm not one for sweet drinks. Might be nice with icecream...
When we were kids my brother and I got dosed with elderberry wine if we got a cold. Definitely made you feel better. Luckily we were both pretty healthy or we might have grown up alcoholics from a young age!
Yeah Iv read it’s good for colds. Sounds like a good tree/bush 🤷♂️ to have in the garden. Hopefully the birds don’t take them all. Thanks for the info 👍
I have made an elderberry cordial a few years and it works well. Syrup is good for ice cream etc.
Also it works very well for making paints and dyes.You can use dried berries or fresh. You basically boil them up, sieve them and add some kind of fixitive/ mordant. Some ideas here. (It's a good reminder for me - I will do that this year with berries from my tree). It's a very strong colour - purple/blue. Fixitive will make it stay stronger for longer.
As a side note, I also dye using dahlia petals. There are many other plants make for super-strong colour, including berries like strawberries and also pelargonium petals. The key is really figuring out how to fix it well. It's easy to dye natural fibres like wool, silk and cotton. Human made fibres, like rayons, not so much.
When I was a child, my mum always made elder syrup. It was given as a hot drink when you had a bad cold, mainly. I still have a bottle with a label 1994 and it is still usable. I might have the recipe for it if anyone wants it. One of the ingredients is cloves!
My neighbor does a syrup with garlic and clover flowers added to the elderberry. For medicinal purposes. He actually just gave me a rooted cutting from his bush, which I am currently hardening off as it's been in his poly tunnel.
I used to eat the berries by the flower head.. convenient dispenser for a child wandering around the yard. No ill effects.
I have a big bush out here by my door and they are green still. They mix well with blackberries in jam, but as the lanes here are flooded with blackberries I tend to leave the smaller berries for the birds.
Posts
even if they do sometimes have the addition of a pollen beetle or two.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.