Elderflower cordial

My mother used to make elderflower champagne, and I remember helping her with it as a child: first we went out flower picking (ones away from the road), then we mixed them with sliced citrus and sugar to make the most beautiful mixture in a big earthenware bowl. Then it was strained and bottled and left to ferment. There is a story about once finding holes in a corrugated iron roof after the lids burst off bottles of elderflower champagne left in a shed.

I've made elderflower champagne myself several times, but ultimately decided that cordial is easier and more efficient: it is ready to drink sooner, it is more concentrated so less voluminous and easier to store, and there is less chance of lids blowing off bottles (although it doesn't keep as long without freezing).

I have rarely found elder in New England. But we came across a bush while biking around in Belmont at the weekend. The heads were huge: wider across than my own head. So I think it was perhaps a different species from the wild, British one, but it smelled good, so I thought it was worth turning into cordial anyway.

~20 heads of elderflower
1 lb sugar
1 1/2 litres of water (500ml boiling, 1000ml cold)
2 lemons (one large, one small), thinly sliced
1 lime, thinly sliced
1 1/2 tbsp citric acid

Wash the elderflowers gently and remove any bugs. Put the sugar in a large, heatproof bowl and pour the boiling water over. Stir until the sugar is dissolved, then add the cold water. Test the temperature with your finger (it should feel colder than body temperature), and if it feels OK add the lemons, lime and citric acid. Stir to dissolve the citric acid, then add the elderflowers and stir again. Cover with a clean cloth and leave for 24-48 hours, stirring occasionally. When ready, strain through a fine sieve or a piece of muslin, then bottle (using a funnel or a jug). It will keep for approx a couple of weeks in the fridge. To keep for longer, put in plastic bottles (or a tub, or ice cube trays) and freeze. With a tub, you can scoop enough for a glassful out at a time: it doesn't freeze very hard as it has so much sugar in it.


Yes!!! Last time I made elderflower cordial in the US it didn't really work - the elderflower taste didn't come through and I wondered if there might be something in the environment that was different and scuppered the taste. But this one is good. I left it for 48 hours instead of the 24 I usually do, although with it being so hot I wondered if I should have left it in the fridge. Anyways, we had some last night, at our picnic, diluted with fizzy water, and it was good.

Notes: I saved the lemons, limes and elderflowers left after straining the cordial and used them to make this marmalade. I also dried out the flowers that fell off the flowerheads and didn't make it into the cordial mix and used them to make biscuits.