Absoloute impeccable timing - I've realised I've got a great big Elder growing just inches from the backside of my garden, and I was considering giving this a try. No excuse not to do it now! Can't wait to see how it turns out, thank you!
Elderflower used to be considered sacred in earlier days because of it´s medical properties. The flowers are a good remedy for fevers, and the berries are not only tasty, but are also the best support for the immune systeme and a popular home remedy to ward off colds. Caution: You do have to heat elderberries first, because they contain a harmful chemical called sambuccin. But once the berries have been heated, the sambuccin is destroyed. The berries a full of nutrition, antioxidants, iron and vitamins. They can be eaten as a jam (very nice combined with apples). Or you can drink elderberry juice as a hot toddy (seasoned with ginger, cinnamon, cloves and honey). On hot days, Elderberry juice mixed with apple juice and cold water makes a most refreshing drink. As a special dish: pick elderberries by the stem, dunk them into a batter, and fry them in oil. Sprinkle it with powdered sugar, honey or syrup.
If you leave some, the fruit makes a really tasty juice. But it also makes quite a mess when pulling them off the heads, so do that outside and with clothes you don't wear any more. The colour doesn't come out ever again.
I've been on a sort of Atomic Shrimp binge today, I even ended up reading a few posts on your blog. I am truly fascinated with everything you do, and I'm immensely inspired by your creativity, calm nature and overall comforting feel. I try to apply a little bit of the way you see things to my own life, as I love learning, and I've been learning a lot just by watching your UA-cam channel. It's incredible how much you can learn and understand from the most mundane and simplest of practices. So funny that you uploaded a new video on this exact day. You've become my favorite person to watch on here, and to be quite honest, you serve a huge comfort on days that are harder to go through. Love your channel, cannot wait to see what else you show us.
Quite a few of the recipes on this channel are pretty common in Romania. My grandma used to make elderflower cordial every summer, although looking at your recipe it is quite different (she would throw them all in a big, 10l jug and let it infuse and ferment for a while, so it would come out slightly fizzy). And a while back you did nettles, which is another very traditional Romanian dish.
Yeah, Atomic Shrimp does seem to be using a lot of recipes that are, in the very least, similar to the ones in our country. I have to say, though, that it really depends on which part of Romania you're from. As it turns out, depending on how far you live from me you might also have quite a few different words (let alone recipes😅) or meanings that I have never heard of before. I came to know this when I went to the UK. I met romanians from all parts of the country (mainly north and north west for some reason, seems like I'm the only southerner here lol) and I was very surprised and a bit bewildered to find out that they were using slightly different words or sometimes theirs would have different meanings. Hell, sometimes I thought to myself that I know way more english than my own home language 🤣, though that is to be disputed.
@@thakyou5005 Thats true for other countries as well. Northern German (a dialect called "plattdeutsch" or "pladdütsch" is totally different from Bavarian, they have even trouble understanding each other unless they speak the official "hochdeutsch".
This is exactly what I wanted to say. I was excited to see a video about this, since I grew up drinking and making socată, which I actually made last week to enjoy it throughout the month. Some people use lemons and even yeast in some recipes, to make it more flavourful and fizzy. I am so happy that food and drinks manage to bring so many different people from all around the world, each with our unique sense of taste, preferences and similarities between cuisines.
In Thailand, we don't have elderflowers. The flowers we use for drinks, at the top of my head, are dried butterfly peas, dried roselles, and dried chrysanthemums. Butterfly peas give a really deep blue drink which turns purple if you add lemon/lime juice. Roselles give a deep red drink, which is acidic enough without the need of lemon. Chrysanthemums yield yellow drink which need to be diluted or else it will be too bitter. I wonder what the result would be if dried elderflowers were used instead of freshly picked.
It is OK made with dried elderflowers but not great. Litchis have the same flavour chemical, as do muscat grapes. Is ดอกขจร ( _Telosma cordata_ ) only used in food?
@@pattheplanter _Telosma cordata_ (khachon) in my country is usually used as vegetable, so are _Sesbania grandiflora_ (khae) and _Sesbania javanica_ (sano).
this is so interesting, I had never seen butterfly peas before but I googled it and they're such a beautiful deep shade of blue! Would love to try it sometime!
Not gonna tell you what to do, but if she is still with you make her a bottle in return or otherwise keep the tradition alive. If you are not a fan of sweetening your water, sparkling wine goes well with a dash of elderflower
Oh, i do like elderflower flavoured drinks. It never occured to me to make a cordial. Thank you very much for this. I will definitely give it a go. PS: We normally freeze some cordials in silicone molds and use them as "flavoured" ice. Maybe you can try freezing some of yours so you don't have the ice diluting your drink problem!
I love elderflower cordial. As well as a drink I add it to my cake batter, then top with an elderflower drizzle or elderflower icing. I have Marsh Mallow in my garden, it would be interesting to see what you can make with the plant.
Ah I love elderflower cordial! A store near me gets a commercial version. It's very nice. Flower flavourings are great and I see a lot of people who haven't tried them before
elder flower syrup is really prominent in austria... my granny used to make a big pot of 10+L and make 10000 bottles 🤣 man i really get so good vibes from your channel...love it
"Elderflower Cordial Gin and tonic" We'll call it an Atomic Shrimp, and respond with righteous indignation when any bartender says they can't serve that.
Always remember as a child the farmer next door used to bring us the most delicious fizzy elderflower drink. Will never forget the taste of it with ice on a summers day.
Love making elderflower cordial, made 5 litre last weekend. I use the BBC Mary Berry Recipe. Dont usually boil or zest the lemons (but pore the hot sugar syrup over them and the heads) and also don’t pick the heads of the stalks. My mum has made some with pink elderflower, which is also edible, turned out very pink.
When I've made it in the past with the stalks still on, the result is a lot greener in appearance, and sometimes has a sort of pea pod vegetal flavour note to it. I suppose that might be something else I dis
One of my favourite summer flavours, albeit a branded version. I once mistakenly added tonic to it instead of fizzy water and after the sensory confusion, decided it was rather good!
I just drank the last bottle of last year's batch of spakling elderflower mead the other night. Similar recipe, the end result was like honey, grape and lychee. Beautiful stuff.
I used to make this and Elderflower wine 40/50 years ago from a book called Wild Food The older version by Roger Phillips. I loved his recipes. I made wine from different things found in the wild. You can still get his books on World of Books. He just died in November 2021.
I'm not really into either foraging, cooking, or making my own beverages, but I found this video extremely pleasant to watch. And your narration is quite relaxing as well. I found your channel in my feed due to the scam bait content (which I am very much into), but now I'm preparing to take a journey through the backlog of the rest of your videos. Thanks in advance for the entertainment!! Cheers!
The sloe gin is a lovely touch. Sorely tempted to make that. I also have some sloe gin I made several years ago. I have some 2011 vintage that I'm saving, some 2013 and some 2015.
I make it every few years, I reuse small plastic water bottles when I make it, and put them in the freezer, once out of the freezer it lasts a month in the fridge by which time it is all gone.
40 years ago I got drunk on my father's (awful) elderberry wine. Maybe this would cure my aversion for elderberry I've had ever since. I might try it because your drinks looks soooo delicious.
Another thing that's really nice: simmer the elderflowers in (filtered) apple juice, add gelling sugar to taste (might need to add extra pectin or gelatin if you're doing 1:3) - et voila, elderflower jelly. You can leave the flowers in, that have come loose, or pour it through a sieve. However you like. My mum just stands the full heads upright (flowers down) in the pan, so you can pull them out in one piece again and don't _have_ to pour it through a sieve.
That's something that's very common here in Austria (my mum still makes this every year), and it's really lovely stuff, it's just called Hollersaft here (Holler is short for Holunder, German for elderflower/elderberry, and Saft is juice), and yes it can be mixed with almost anything and makes it taste great, though I usually just drink it plain with sparkling water. And if you're too lazy to make it on your own (though it's really not that hard to make) you can even readily buy it in every supermarket from various big and small producers...
Hi! Does your mom forage Holunder or buys it somewhere? Can you recommend any places near Vienna where it’s allowed to do? (I’m a foreigner residing in Austria, and Holundersoda is one of the things I learned about only when I moved here, and I absolutely love it)
@@faritkamalov6567 Yes she forages it herself, the stuff grows everywhere where there are fields or on the borders of woods... Can't tell you any spots near Vienna as I live in western Austria, but it's ubiquitous all over central Europe. There are not really any rules for foraging it, but as the bushes usually grow wild as long as you don't take the flowers from obvious private properties you should be fine. However I fear this season you're too late sadly all the flowers are gone already... So I guess your best bet is just go into a supermarket and buy some, not as tasty as the homemade stuff but still adequate IMHO.
@@faritkamalov6567 Elderflowers may be gone, but you still have the chance to gather the elderberries. They make the juice, not the flowers that you use for the elderflower cordial. Don´t pick the lower ones, they could have been peed on, but the higher ones. Don´t collect near an Autobahn or busy road. Avoid parks, because they might grow a different variety of elderflower for ornamental purposes. Elderflower likes to grow in ditches and hedges. Look for wild roses and hazelnuts or sloes as well, these plants like each others company. So often if you find one, you find the other. And go to the library and borrow a "Bestimmungsbuch", so you can be sure you pick the right thing.
We used to make this and elderflower "champagne" growing up so it's very evocative. I made some elderflower cordial about a month ago but haven't got round to making another batch yet. Might try the "champagne" recipe again.
This is great, here in Germany we have a drink called Hugo. Cited from wikipedia: "The Hugo is a slightly alcoholic aperitif, originating in South Tyrol, but widespread in Triveneto, Austria, Switzerland and Germany, based of prosecco, elderflower syrup (or lemon balm syrup), seltzer (or sparkling water) and mint leaves." Because things with names sell better, they invented the "Inge" which is basically the same thing but with ginger syrup instead of elderflower syrup. Very refreshing. I prefer the non-alcoholic versions with a little bit of lemonade.
I usually freeze this, only downside to that is that you'll need to refreeze them from time to time since it tends to separate. And as a plus, you dont need to add ice to it. Just mix it with water when you want to use it! Mix it with some gin and it will be a really summery drink. Perfect.
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Usually I just put the elderflowers and sliced lemons (and oranges sometimes) to soak in water for a day and a half, then I filter it, bring it to boil and add sugar/citrid acid. I slowly pour boiling liquid into glass bottles, that way they don’t break and can properly pasteurize. I wrap the bottles in a blanket to let them cool down slowly. I do use 1kg of sugar for every 1,5l of water but I guess it only affects the final ratio of syrup to water mixture. The syrup can be preserved this way for more than a year without refrigeration. Some people prepare it without boiling, the flavour is even better but it has much shorter shelf life.
I like making all kinds of plant-based extracts from stuff I've grown or found walking around the greener areas of the city I live in. I'm used to using insane amounts of alcohols and sugar because basically everything I make is a concentrate you're meant to use small amounts of diluted in water or other thing. Never tried this one, but now I have to!
Great timing with this video. Literally yesterday I was picking elderflower while walking with a friend and he wanted a recipe for how to make cordial. I'm one of those people who can't do recipes so I couldn't give him one. He should like this Can confirm in the north the flowers are still in full bloom,
elderflower syrup and sparkling water is my favorite spring drink! It's really THE flavor of springtime for me :D Elderflower lemonade is also wonderful!
Yay thank you! I have these elders which grow over into my garden and there is a huge amount of flowers on them this year. I am making your tea for sure tomorrow .
Top work as ever, sir! As a resident of the North Pennines, the elderflowers here are only just ready. Needlessly to say, I've had a couple of batches steeping overnight ready to bottle up for champagne!
We've got a giant bush of those small white roses back in our garden. They're incredibly fragrant after warm sunny afternoons... big treat in the evening to water the veggies that grow right next to them.
Splendid video as always. Our elderflowers are just opening up now in central Scotland. I make elderflower "champagne" and elderflower cordial most years. With the latter, I tend simply to add soda water but occasionally have made a fruity gin by adding about 20% cordial to 80% gin and going from there. I shall definitely try the tea and sloe gin this year. Your videos are always interesting as you have so many interests and there is inevitably a great overlap of activities. I am, for example, renewing my fight against the invasion into this rural area of common hemlock and also hemlock water dropwort along the riverbanks. Two years ago I had to speak to the primary school headmistress about the hemlock growing around and in the playground. Give them their due, they acted on that information immediately. But memories fade quickly and a renewal of this is necessary as twelve plants have reappeared and they are getting quite big. I think the problem in our area is that in the past, farmers knew what hemlock and water dropwort looked like and they eradicated them both on sight. Certainly it was dealt with quickly during all of my childhood. My father farmed in Perthshire (though I do not) and he was VERY clued up on all the flowers and fungi meaning that we were always out to collect herbs (mullein, valerian, lambs lettuce, ramsons, blaeberry, bearberry, cloudberry and crowberry, few flowered leeks, triangular leeks, lovage and hundreds of others that escape my memory at this moment) not to mention the fungi (regularly we picked chanterelles, ceps, hedgehogs, red and brown birch boletes, Jews' ears, and shaggy inkcap mushrooms). I can say "Jews' ears" with ease because I am from German Jewish stock so I'm not bothered about appellations which are not intended to be anti-semitic but merely descriptive in a slightly clumsy vernacular kind of way - in this day and age you have to choose the targets that REALLY matter). But in the last decade things have changed as far as dangerous weeds are concerned. I don't think the farmers have much of a clue nowadays (with the exception of one of the local farmers who is completely clued up). I think that dangerous weeds no longer form part of the curriculum in Ag. Colleges around here. The others don't seem to recognise the danger at all. They don't eradicate ragwort either which I remember was a major problem in some fields when horses, sheep and cattle roamed freely - though my area is now almost entirely arable. Times change!! You, of course, are down in Hampshire near to where I was born in Hythe cottage hospital (though I think on the other side of the Solent). So it is very interesting to see how life could have been had we stayed in the deep south.
We have several elders in hedges on our land. It's nice because they all face different aspects and flower over a period of time, extending the season. We make elderflower wine every year, we want to make elder currant wine too, but we will have to branch out and make cordial - it sounds great. We have sloe trees too, and make sloe gin, so will have to try that combo. Thanks shrimp!
I recently had a delicious cocktail at a restaurant made with vodka, elderflower, soda water, blackberry simple syrup, fresh sage, and a tiny pinch of black pepper. I would love to use this recipe to try to recreate it at home!
These foraged cooking videos are really interesting. I have very little chance of ever foraging myself, I both live in an area that's not conducive to it and suffer from pretty severe pollen allergies, but seeing food and drink being made from things that I would have never really considered ingredients is fascinating to watch, and it certainly makes me want to at least try cooking up something similar.
love the variety of content Atomic Shrimp! nearly watched all your old stuff, but when I see a new video I just drop everything, make a cuppa and enjoy
my aunt usually makes this for the entire family during the summer here in sweden, lots of nostalgic memories come flowing in while drinking it nowadays!
Thanks again for this video and i like you throw the Lemon complete in with all the bitterness from the white under the yellow skin We Make a sirup out of them all the time or waiting for the fruits to make Jams
Just made some of this the other day because we have loads of elder growing in the hedgerows in our area. it's fantastically refreshing. The citric acid really makes a difference, lemon is good for flavour but it doesn't give the bite that citric acid gives it.
Wow this is so interesting! I'm from the US and Cordial is something I've read about in books but i've never actually seen in real life- it looks REALLY cool, and the idea of a versatile drink flavoring type of thing is super interesting. I'm definitely going to see if I can make cordial myself using ingredients I can find around me. Thanks for the video!
As an Aussie which is a weird cultural conglomerate, cordial is a staple here and you can make it out of pretty much any fruit or edible flower! Popular ones here include lime, raspberry and fruit mixes with passion fruit! Clear fruit juice fruit is probably the easiest ones like a lime :) mix that with lemonade and angostura bitters and you’ve got a lemon lime and bitters!
We've been doing this for the last 5-6 years after a massive elder grew behind the house - I've finally got the balance right but make the recipe slightly differently: Makes about 2.75L of 10:1 concentrate - 50 heads (if possible with stalks removed as best as you can) - 2kg sugar - 2 or 3 lemons (juice and all), - 1 small orange (juice and all) - 2 tbsp citric acid - 1.7L boiling water Lob it in a fermenting vessel (or bug pan) and add the boiling water. Stir to dissolve the sugar and leave to steep - I always thought 24-48 hours but things get in the way so it ends up being a week! I have also usually added a campden tablet to prevent bad stuff and alcohol happening but this is only if we bottle it to keep (it will easily last a year by doing this though it's an artificial preservative). Strain it all through a muslin and bottle it up! :)
My grandma used to make Elderflower and sometimes even Plantago lanceolata syrup basically the same way as you do here. It was supposedly used to treat sore throat but I loved it for the flavour as a kid
Coincidentally, I was out walking in a lovely spot in Lichfield recently, and there was an abundance of Elderflowers, and you sprung into my mind as I always watch all the foraging videos. I thought to myself they would make a lovely drink/cordial, and just like that here we are 😄
Lovely. I make a very simple rose water. I take rum or brandy or vodka, put rose petals from my garden into it and let it steep until all the color leaves the petals and the liquid darkens. I then store this in the cupboard and use it to flavor cakes, drinks, frappes, ice creams, icings etc. I was wondering if elderflowers would infuse similarly (no elder trees here in Oaxaca where I live, so I can't do it myself). I always learn new things from you, appreciate it. JIM
Looks so refreshing in all 3 beverages. I'd like to try it with a bit of a weaker tea since you mentioned the somewhat muted flavor. Another great video Sir.
Love your content Mr shrimp, you have given me yet another thing to try out! the G&T cordial looked great :) time to try my hand at cordial making, can't wait 😁
Hey Mike have you thought about making Dandelion & Burdock ? I feel like that is such a you type of project and as you haven't done it maybe you hate it ? haha. Awesome vid thanks as always
😂😂 I had a feeling you’d enjoy the last drink the most! 💡idea - you could dilute some of the cordial and make ice cubes with it so your drink doesn’t get too watered down. Really enjoyed this and I have seen elderflower on my walks so I think I’m going to try it! 😀Thanks 👍👍
This seems a very particular way to make cordial. Mine's way simpler and a bit less scientific but i'm not dead yet and it has been 3 years since i made my first batch, so i think i'll stick to what i know. I guess this is good for anyone who's worried about the safety of consuming wild stuff.
The Swedish recipes I've seen all use around 40 flower heads for 2 liters of water, and boil up water and sugar, and then you pour it together with the flowers and lemons and let steep for 3 to 4 days.
As much as I like Elderflower cordial, I broke and used our elderflowers to make wine. Unfortunately there aren't many hedge row elderflowers in my town. It's a bit built up, so finding them in the wild is a little hard. Our elder is not the biggest though and we wanted to keep enough blossom to get berries for some elder berry and apple crumbles I also turned our rose bush into 5 gallons of wine.... Much to a certain some ones disdain for deflowering their bush..... Ahem.
Chanced upon this video, watched it and didn't think about it whatsoever until sunset tonight. Chanced upon some trees and picked enough elderflower to fill two tall jars when I got home. Let's see how this goes!
Looking forward to seeing what you can do with Common Mallow.. .It grows like a weed in my garden -- but I think it's pretty, so i let it do its thing.
Ahh you've just reminded me that elderflowers are in season now! Thank you! I'll be sure to make elderflower syrup again as I forgot to do it last year ;-;
You should try Elderflower Sparkling Wine (aka Elderflower Champagne). Using PET-bottles for the fermentation is a good method Just don't close the lid completely, so that the CO² can still escape.
Have you ever made elderflower wine, it's fantastic stuff, also made rose extract for the first time this year, thinking of making some rose petal wine and or rose petal liquor, as a child I grew up drinking this cordial please do a follow up with elderberry cordial when the berries are out
This Canadian from southern Ontario just liked and subscribed! I love the scambaiting videos, but this one is a really nice change of pace that I didn't see coming. Keep up the good work, and mixture of videos!
Absoloute impeccable timing - I've realised I've got a great big Elder growing just inches from the backside of my garden, and I was considering giving this a try. No excuse not to do it now! Can't wait to see how it turns out, thank you!
heck yeah good luck!
good luck :)
Elderflower used to be considered sacred in earlier days because of it´s medical properties. The flowers are a good remedy for fevers, and the berries are not only tasty, but are also the best support for the immune systeme and a popular home remedy to ward off colds.
Caution: You do have to heat elderberries first, because they contain a harmful chemical called sambuccin. But once the berries have been heated, the sambuccin is destroyed.
The berries a full of nutrition, antioxidants, iron and vitamins. They can be eaten as a jam (very nice combined with apples). Or you can drink elderberry juice as a hot toddy (seasoned with ginger, cinnamon, cloves and honey). On hot days, Elderberry juice mixed with apple juice and cold water makes a most refreshing drink.
As a special dish: pick elderberries by the stem, dunk them into a batter, and fry them in oil. Sprinkle it with powdered sugar, honey or syrup.
If you leave some, the fruit makes a really tasty juice. But it also makes quite a mess when pulling them off the heads, so do that outside and with clothes you don't wear any more. The colour doesn't come out ever again.
@rolfs2165 you can't drink the juice/eat the berry raw, it contains cyanide so therefore it must be boiled
I've been on a sort of Atomic Shrimp binge today, I even ended up reading a few posts on your blog. I am truly fascinated with everything you do, and I'm immensely inspired by your creativity, calm nature and overall comforting feel. I try to apply a little bit of the way you see things to my own life, as I love learning, and I've been learning a lot just by watching your UA-cam channel. It's incredible how much you can learn and understand from the most mundane and simplest of practices. So funny that you uploaded a new video on this exact day. You've become my favorite person to watch on here, and to be quite honest, you serve a huge comfort on days that are harder to go through. Love your channel, cannot wait to see what else you show us.
@@mercster even the most angelic of saints have limited patience lol
Quite a few of the recipes on this channel are pretty common in Romania. My grandma used to make elderflower cordial every summer, although looking at your recipe it is quite different (she would throw them all in a big, 10l jug and let it infuse and ferment for a while, so it would come out slightly fizzy). And a while back you did nettles, which is another very traditional Romanian dish.
Yeah, that sounds like elderflower 'champagne' - make it at the same dilution as it will be consumed, then ferment it for a while in pop top bottles
Yeah, Atomic Shrimp does seem to be using a lot of recipes that are, in the very least, similar to the ones in our country. I have to say, though, that it really depends on which part of Romania you're from.
As it turns out, depending on how far you live from me you might also have quite a few different words (let alone recipes😅) or meanings that I have never heard of before.
I came to know this when I went to the UK. I met romanians from all parts of the country (mainly north and north west for some reason, seems like I'm the only southerner here lol) and I was very surprised and a bit bewildered to find out that they were using slightly different words or sometimes theirs would have different meanings. Hell, sometimes I thought to myself that I know way more english than my own home language 🤣, though that is to be disputed.
@@thakyou5005 I know what you mean.
@@thakyou5005 Thats true for other countries as well. Northern German (a dialect called "plattdeutsch" or "pladdütsch" is totally different from Bavarian, they have even trouble understanding each other unless they speak the official "hochdeutsch".
This is exactly what I wanted to say. I was excited to see a video about this, since I grew up drinking and making socată, which I actually made last week to enjoy it throughout the month. Some people use lemons and even yeast in some recipes, to make it more flavourful and fizzy. I am so happy that food and drinks manage to bring so many different people from all around the world, each with our unique sense of taste, preferences and similarities between cuisines.
In Thailand, we don't have elderflowers. The flowers we use for drinks, at the top of my head, are dried butterfly peas, dried roselles, and dried chrysanthemums. Butterfly peas give a really deep blue drink which turns purple if you add lemon/lime juice. Roselles give a deep red drink, which is acidic enough without the need of lemon. Chrysanthemums yield yellow drink which need to be diluted or else it will be too bitter.
I wonder what the result would be if dried elderflowers were used instead of freshly picked.
It is OK made with dried elderflowers but not great. Litchis have the same flavour chemical, as do muscat grapes. Is ดอกขจร ( _Telosma cordata_ ) only used in food?
@@pattheplanter _Telosma cordata_ (khachon) in my country is usually used as vegetable, so are _Sesbania grandiflora_ (khae) and _Sesbania javanica_ (sano).
this is so interesting, I had never seen butterfly peas before but I googled it and they're such a beautiful deep shade of blue! Would love to try it sometime!
This is something my grandmother always used to make in the summers. She always gave away bottles to the kids, grandkids, guest and colleagues.
Not gonna tell you what to do, but if she is still with you make her a bottle in return or otherwise keep the tradition alive. If you are not a fan of sweetening your water, sparkling wine goes well with a dash of elderflower
I made a lovely cordial from lilacs last year. Lilac simple syrup is so great, and elderflower/rose are great options, as well .
Oh, i do like elderflower flavoured drinks. It never occured to me to make a cordial. Thank you very much for this. I will definitely give it a go.
PS: We normally freeze some cordials in silicone molds and use them as "flavoured" ice. Maybe you can try freezing some of yours so you don't have the ice diluting your drink problem!
My GF buys elder flower cordial concrete
@@unnamedchannel1237 what is elder flower cordial concrete? i have googled it and cannot find what it is.
@@Adrienneten I think they meant to type concentrate.
I love elderflower cordial. As well as a drink I add it to my cake batter, then top with an elderflower drizzle or elderflower icing. I have Marsh Mallow in my garden, it would be interesting to see what you can make with the plant.
As a person who uses rose as a flavoring alot, I have found that lemon is perfect for cutting that soap flavor out.
Ah I love elderflower cordial! A store near me gets a commercial version. It's very nice. Flower flavourings are great and I see a lot of people who haven't tried them before
elder flower syrup is really prominent in austria... my granny used to make a big pot of 10+L and make 10000 bottles 🤣
man i really get so good vibes from your channel...love it
Elderflower Sorbet and Elderflower and Gooseberry crumble are two of our favourites!
I love these foraging videos. They make me want to move back to the farm I grew up on and be more self-sufficient.
I always forget that we get foodstuffs from nature tbh, this was a really fun refreshing video.
I adore elderflower, the smell the taste the bees that Bob around it, but I love the wine and the fizzy wine most 😉
"Elderflower Cordial Gin and tonic"
We'll call it an Atomic Shrimp, and respond with righteous indignation when any bartender says they can't serve that.
Always remember as a child the farmer next door used to bring us the most delicious fizzy elderflower drink. Will never forget the taste of it with ice on a summers day.
Love making elderflower cordial, made 5 litre last weekend. I use the BBC Mary Berry Recipe. Dont usually boil or zest the lemons (but pore the hot sugar syrup over them and the heads) and also don’t pick the heads of the stalks. My mum has made some with pink elderflower, which is also edible, turned out very pink.
When I've made it in the past with the stalks still on, the result is a lot greener in appearance, and sometimes has a sort of pea pod vegetal flavour note to it. I suppose that might be something else I dis
One of my favourite summer flavours, albeit a branded version. I once mistakenly added tonic to it instead of fizzy water and after the sensory confusion, decided it was rather good!
I just drank the last bottle of last year's batch of spakling elderflower mead the other night. Similar recipe, the end result was like honey, grape and lychee. Beautiful stuff.
I used to make this and Elderflower wine 40/50 years ago from a book called Wild Food The older version by Roger Phillips. I loved his recipes. I made wine from different things found in the wild.
You can still get his books on World of Books. He just died in November 2021.
I'm not really into either foraging, cooking, or making my own beverages, but I found this video extremely pleasant to watch. And your narration is quite relaxing as well.
I found your channel in my feed due to the scam bait content (which I am very much into), but now I'm preparing to take a journey through the backlog of the rest of your videos.
Thanks in advance for the entertainment!!
Cheers!
I used to make this years ago and left a few to "go-over" into elderflower wine. Delicious.
That looks so refreshing - especially today 🌞❤️
The sloe gin is a lovely touch. Sorely tempted to make that. I also have some sloe gin I made several years ago. I have some 2011 vintage that I'm saving, some 2013 and some 2015.
Yeah, it was a bit on the sweet side with both the cordial and the sloe gin. It could maybe stand a dash of bitters
I make it every few years, I reuse small plastic water bottles when I make it, and put them in the freezer, once out of the freezer it lasts a month in the fridge by which time it is all gone.
40 years ago I got drunk on my father's (awful) elderberry wine. Maybe this would cure my aversion for elderberry I've had ever since. I might try it because your drinks looks soooo delicious.
Another thing that's really nice: simmer the elderflowers in (filtered) apple juice, add gelling sugar to taste (might need to add extra pectin or gelatin if you're doing 1:3) - et voila, elderflower jelly. You can leave the flowers in, that have come loose, or pour it through a sieve. However you like.
My mum just stands the full heads upright (flowers down) in the pan, so you can pull them out in one piece again and don't _have_ to pour it through a sieve.
Love the serving suggestions and taste testing at the end of the vid! Thanks for all your fab videos ✨
atomic shrimp brings me everytime to a holistic appreciation of the world, thank you for not getting scammers any part of it
That's such a perfect summer drink, even with just sparkling water.
That's something that's very common here in Austria (my mum still makes this every year), and it's really lovely stuff, it's just called Hollersaft here (Holler is short for Holunder, German for elderflower/elderberry, and Saft is juice), and yes it can be mixed with almost anything and makes it taste great, though I usually just drink it plain with sparkling water. And if you're too lazy to make it on your own (though it's really not that hard to make) you can even readily buy it in every supermarket from various big and small producers...
Hi! Does your mom forage Holunder or buys it somewhere? Can you recommend any places near Vienna where it’s allowed to do? (I’m a foreigner residing in Austria, and Holundersoda is one of the things I learned about only when I moved here, and I absolutely love it)
@@faritkamalov6567 Yes she forages it herself, the stuff grows everywhere where there are fields or on the borders of woods... Can't tell you any spots near Vienna as I live in western Austria, but it's ubiquitous all over central Europe. There are not really any rules for foraging it, but as the bushes usually grow wild as long as you don't take the flowers from obvious private properties you should be fine.
However I fear this season you're too late sadly all the flowers are gone already... So I guess your best bet is just go into a supermarket and buy some, not as tasty as the homemade stuff but still adequate IMHO.
@@faritkamalov6567 Elderflowers may be gone, but you still have the chance to gather the elderberries. They make the juice, not the flowers that you use for the elderflower cordial. Don´t pick the lower ones, they could have been peed on, but the higher ones. Don´t collect near an Autobahn or busy road. Avoid parks, because they might grow a different variety of elderflower for ornamental purposes. Elderflower likes to grow in ditches and hedges. Look for wild roses and hazelnuts or sloes as well, these plants like each others company. So often if you find one, you find the other. And go to the library and borrow a "Bestimmungsbuch", so you can be sure you pick the right thing.
We used to make this and elderflower "champagne" growing up so it's very evocative. I made some elderflower cordial about a month ago but haven't got round to making another batch yet. Might try the "champagne" recipe again.
Elderflower is one of the soft drinks I definitely miss once I left the UK.
This is great, here in Germany we have a drink called Hugo. Cited from wikipedia: "The Hugo is a slightly alcoholic aperitif, originating in South Tyrol, but widespread in Triveneto, Austria, Switzerland and Germany, based of prosecco, elderflower syrup (or lemon balm syrup), seltzer (or sparkling water) and mint leaves."
Because things with names sell better, they invented the "Inge" which is basically the same thing but with ginger syrup instead of elderflower syrup. Very refreshing. I prefer the non-alcoholic versions with a little bit of lemonade.
I usually freeze this, only downside to that is that you'll need to refreeze them from time to time since it tends to separate. And as a plus, you dont need to add ice to it. Just mix it with water when you want to use it!
Mix it with some gin and it will be a really summery drink. Perfect.
Usually I just put the elderflowers and sliced lemons (and oranges sometimes) to soak in water for a day and a half, then I filter it, bring it to boil and add sugar/citrid acid. I slowly pour boiling liquid into glass bottles, that way they don’t break and can properly pasteurize. I wrap the bottles in a blanket to let them cool down slowly. I do use 1kg of sugar for every 1,5l of water but I guess it only affects the final ratio of syrup to water mixture. The syrup can be preserved this way for more than a year without refrigeration.
Some people prepare it without boiling, the flavour is even better but it has much shorter shelf life.
I like making all kinds of plant-based extracts from stuff I've grown or found walking around the greener areas of the city I live in. I'm used to using insane amounts of alcohols and sugar because basically everything I make is a concentrate you're meant to use small amounts of diluted in water or other thing. Never tried this one, but now I have to!
Wow!! I’ll be trying that when I get back home this summer!!
i love these types of videos, i learn so much from them, please keep doing these.
Great timing with this video. Literally yesterday I was picking elderflower while walking with a friend and he wanted a recipe for how to make cordial. I'm one of those people who can't do recipes so I couldn't give him one. He should like this
Can confirm in the north the flowers are still in full bloom,
elderflower syrup and sparkling water is my favorite spring drink! It's really THE flavor of springtime for me :D Elderflower lemonade is also wonderful!
Yay thank you! I have these elders which grow over into my garden and there is a huge amount of flowers on them this year. I am making your tea for sure tomorrow .
Used to make this with my grandmother every summer. Lovely video, and some lovely memories.
Top work as ever, sir! As a resident of the North Pennines, the elderflowers here are only just ready. Needlessly to say, I've had a couple of batches steeping overnight ready to bottle up for champagne!
And for anyone who's interested, the recipe comes from the John Seymour book on self-sufficiency
We've got a giant bush of those small white roses back in our garden. They're incredibly fragrant after warm sunny afternoons... big treat in the evening to water the veggies that grow right next to them.
Splendid video as always. Our elderflowers are just opening up now in central Scotland. I make elderflower "champagne" and elderflower cordial most years. With the latter, I tend simply to add soda water but occasionally have made a fruity gin by adding about 20% cordial to 80% gin and going from there. I shall definitely try the tea and sloe gin this year. Your videos are always interesting as you have so many interests and there is inevitably a great overlap of activities. I am, for example, renewing my fight against the invasion into this rural area of common hemlock and also hemlock water dropwort along the riverbanks. Two years ago I had to speak to the primary school headmistress about the hemlock growing around and in the playground. Give them their due, they acted on that information immediately. But memories fade quickly and a renewal of this is necessary as twelve plants have reappeared and they are getting quite big. I think the problem in our area is that in the past, farmers knew what hemlock and water dropwort looked like and they eradicated them both on sight. Certainly it was dealt with quickly during all of my childhood. My father farmed in Perthshire (though I do not) and he was VERY clued up on all the flowers and fungi meaning that we were always out to collect herbs (mullein, valerian, lambs lettuce, ramsons, blaeberry, bearberry, cloudberry and crowberry, few flowered leeks, triangular leeks, lovage and hundreds of others that escape my memory at this moment) not to mention the fungi (regularly we picked chanterelles, ceps, hedgehogs, red and brown birch boletes, Jews' ears, and shaggy inkcap mushrooms). I can say "Jews' ears" with ease because I am from German Jewish stock so I'm not bothered about appellations which are not intended to be anti-semitic but merely descriptive in a slightly clumsy vernacular kind of way - in this day and age you have to choose the targets that REALLY matter). But in the last decade things have changed as far as dangerous weeds are concerned. I don't think the farmers have much of a clue nowadays (with the exception of one of the local farmers who is completely clued up). I think that dangerous weeds no longer form part of the curriculum in Ag. Colleges around here. The others don't seem to recognise the danger at all. They don't eradicate ragwort either which I remember was a major problem in some fields when horses, sheep and cattle roamed freely - though my area is now almost entirely arable. Times change!! You, of course, are down in Hampshire near to where I was born in Hythe cottage hospital (though I think on the other side of the Solent). So it is very interesting to see how life could have been had we stayed in the deep south.
This looks like a delightful refreshing summer treat!
Good Job Mr Shrimp. I will never attempt to forage in the wild however I tend to forage in the supermarket and in my dad's veggie plot.
Damn, this brings back childhood memories
We have several elders in hedges on our land. It's nice because they all face different aspects and flower over a period of time, extending the season. We make elderflower wine every year, we want to make elder currant wine too, but we will have to branch out and make cordial - it sounds great. We have sloe trees too, and make sloe gin, so will have to try that combo. Thanks shrimp!
I recently had a delicious cocktail at a restaurant made with vodka, elderflower, soda water, blackberry simple syrup, fresh sage, and a tiny pinch of black pepper. I would love to use this recipe to try to recreate it at home!
Am so pleased it’s a recipe again!
These foraged cooking videos are really interesting. I have very little chance of ever foraging myself, I both live in an area that's not conducive to it and suffer from pretty severe pollen allergies, but seeing food and drink being made from things that I would have never really considered ingredients is fascinating to watch, and it certainly makes me want to at least try cooking up something similar.
Oh man, I miss elder flower cordial, it's so good
love the variety of content Atomic Shrimp! nearly watched all your old stuff, but when I see a new video I just drop everything, make a cuppa and enjoy
my aunt usually makes this for the entire family during the summer here in sweden, lots of nostalgic memories come flowing in while drinking it nowadays!
Thanks again for this video and i like you throw the Lemon complete in with all the bitterness from the white under the yellow skin We Make a sirup out of them all the time or waiting for the fruits to make Jams
It looks absolutely lovely.
Just made some of this the other day because we have loads of elder growing in the hedgerows in our area. it's fantastically refreshing. The citric acid really makes a difference, lemon is good for flavour but it doesn't give the bite that citric acid gives it.
Wow this is so interesting! I'm from the US and Cordial is something I've read about in books but i've never actually seen in real life- it looks REALLY cool, and the idea of a versatile drink flavoring type of thing is super interesting. I'm definitely going to see if I can make cordial myself using ingredients I can find around me. Thanks for the video!
As an Aussie which is a weird cultural conglomerate, cordial is a staple here and you can make it out of pretty much any fruit or edible flower! Popular ones here include lime, raspberry and fruit mixes with passion fruit! Clear fruit juice fruit is probably the easiest ones like a lime :) mix that with lemonade and angostura bitters and you’ve got a lemon lime and bitters!
Same, I feel robbed of having a good cordial. All we get is soda 😰
Nice to see someone being kind to one of our insect friends !
This recipe is so timely...Gonna make some cordial too.
We've been doing this for the last 5-6 years after a massive elder grew behind the house - I've finally got the balance right but make the recipe slightly differently:
Makes about 2.75L of 10:1 concentrate
- 50 heads (if possible with stalks removed as best as you can)
- 2kg sugar
- 2 or 3 lemons (juice and all),
- 1 small orange (juice and all)
- 2 tbsp citric acid
- 1.7L boiling water
Lob it in a fermenting vessel (or bug pan) and add the boiling water. Stir to dissolve the sugar and leave to steep - I always thought 24-48 hours but things get in the way so it ends up being a week! I have also usually added a campden tablet to prevent bad stuff and alcohol happening but this is only if we bottle it to keep (it will easily last a year by doing this though it's an artificial preservative). Strain it all through a muslin and bottle it up! :)
I like elderflower cordial in my Gin and Tonic ... it's so earthy and yummy
really refreshing on a hot summer day
I love the kind you can get in IKEA, but a freshly made one for sure is much better!
My grandma used to make Elderflower and sometimes even Plantago lanceolata syrup basically the same way as you do here. It was supposedly used to treat sore throat but I loved it for the flavour as a kid
Coincidentally, I was out walking in a lovely spot in Lichfield recently, and there was an abundance of Elderflowers, and you sprung into my mind as I always watch all the foraging videos. I thought to myself they would make a lovely drink/cordial, and just like that here we are 😄
Oh, that’s lovely. That’s first class. That is superb. Ooh, there you go, it’s all happening...
I've never so immediately gone out and done something from a video before! Immediately gone out and gotten the stuff to make this!
3:54 that is actually very beautiful, both flowers in the bowl like that!
Lovely. I make a very simple rose water. I take rum or brandy or vodka, put rose petals from my garden into it and let it steep until all the color leaves the petals and the liquid darkens. I then store this in the cupboard and use it to flavor cakes, drinks, frappes, ice creams, icings etc. I was wondering if elderflowers would infuse similarly (no elder trees here in Oaxaca where I live, so I can't do it myself). I always learn new things from you, appreciate it. JIM
I love anything Elderflower, so thank you! 👍💕
Looks really refreshing 🤗
Looks so refreshing in all 3 beverages. I'd like to try it with a bit of a weaker tea since you mentioned the somewhat muted flavor. Another great video Sir.
Just planted two elderberry plants this year, excited to get lots of flowers and berries soon
Living in France and all of these flowers are gone by now. It was the taste of my childhood. I'll try to make your recipe next year. Thank you Mike!
used to live near a farm that sold stuff like this, made the summer that much more bearable
Love your content Mr shrimp, you have given me yet another thing to try out! the G&T cordial looked great :) time to try my hand at cordial making, can't wait 😁
Hey Mike have you thought about making Dandelion & Burdock ? I feel like that is such a you type of project and as you haven't done it maybe you hate it ? haha. Awesome vid thanks as always
We made Elderflower cordial just last week. Quick tip : Freeze your excess cordial into refreshing Ice popsicles
Your content is among my favorite on UA-cam. thanks Shrimp!
😂😂 I had a feeling you’d enjoy the last drink the most!
💡idea - you could dilute some of the cordial and make ice cubes with it so your drink doesn’t get too watered down.
Really enjoyed this and I have seen elderflower on my walks so I think I’m going to try it! 😀Thanks 👍👍
Commercial elderflower or elderflower & pomegranate cordial is enormously refreshing on hot days when mixed with cold water or tea over ice.
My watermelon radishes bolted, so I've been enjoying the seed pods the past few days.
This seems a very particular way to make cordial. Mine's way simpler and a bit less scientific but i'm not dead yet and it has been 3 years since i made my first batch, so i think i'll stick to what i know. I guess this is good for anyone who's worried about the safety of consuming wild stuff.
My Mum's and Stepfather's elderflower wine is legendary. 😂
The Swedish recipes I've seen all use around 40 flower heads for 2 liters of water, and boil up water and sugar, and then you pour it together with the flowers and lemons and let steep for 3 to 4 days.
As much as I like Elderflower cordial, I broke and used our elderflowers to make wine. Unfortunately there aren't many hedge row elderflowers in my town. It's a bit built up, so finding them in the wild is a little hard.
Our elder is not the biggest though and we wanted to keep enough blossom to get berries for some elder berry and apple crumbles
I also turned our rose bush into 5 gallons of wine.... Much to a certain some ones disdain for deflowering their bush..... Ahem.
This is sure to make a good gift too!
Chanced upon this video, watched it and didn't think about it whatsoever until sunset tonight. Chanced upon some trees and picked enough elderflower to fill two tall jars when I got home. Let's see how this goes!
Remembering Mrs "Bookay" and the Dowager Lady's homemade wine.XD.
Favourite of the three. Not surprised 😉
Looking forward to seeing what you can do with Common Mallow.. .It grows like a weed in my garden -- but I think it's pretty, so i let it do its thing.
Hey Mike awesome video and at the perfect time it's really sunny here in the Midlands 33-34c and that would go down a treat
Ahh you've just reminded me that elderflowers are in season now! Thank you! I'll be sure to make elderflower syrup again as I forgot to do it last year ;-;
You should try Elderflower Sparkling Wine (aka Elderflower Champagne).
Using PET-bottles for the fermentation is a good method Just don't close the lid completely, so that the CO² can still escape.
Have you ever made elderflower wine, it's fantastic stuff, also made rose extract for the first time this year, thinking of making some rose petal wine and or rose petal liquor, as a child I grew up drinking this cordial please do a follow up with elderberry cordial when the berries are out
This Canadian from southern Ontario just liked and subscribed! I love the scambaiting videos, but this one is a really nice change of pace that I didn't see coming. Keep up the good work, and mixture of videos!