Heartbreak and Dandelion Wine

 

Wine making has been a hobby of mine for many years. It doesn't always go as planned.   The results of my efforts have been both rewarding and heartbreaking.   I remember my father making wine using a large Redwing crock as a primary fermenter and covering it with a plastic bag.  He had concord grape plants growing all along the old stone wall (picked from the field after plowing) and they were quite prolific.  They are long gone now, but back then, he made wine every single fall that I can remember.  He never added yeast and just allowed the grapes to ferment with the natural yeast that occurred on the skins.  I don't remember him ever having a batch turn to vinegar although I am sure that it happened.

One year he had a particularly large batch going in the crock and my Aunt and her family came to visit us during that time.  He had the large crock covered with a black plastic garbage bag and the batch was ready to rack into the secondary.  He was only waiting to do it until after company was gone.  My mother had fixed a large meal.  If I remember correctly it was turkey.  My Aunt and Uncle volunteered to do dishes after the meal and began to do so.  My dad went into the kitchen while they were doing this and nearly had a coronary because they had been scraping all the bones and food scraps off the plate and into his nearly ready to rack wine thinking it was a garbage can.  His face was almost as purple as the grapes.  Even though the grape husks and pulp had mostly floated to the top forming a thick mat on top of the still bubbling wine, most of the food scraps and bones had fallen through and were comfortabley marinating in the now never to be racked wine.  He was heartbroken!  All that effort ended up being poured out into the woods.

I have made wine almost every year for the last 20+ years.  I have made mullberry, grape, strawberry, cherry, rhubarb, blackberry, raspberry, thimbleberry, apple, pear, peach, blueberry, beet, onion (yes onion - the best marinading wine you ever had) and many combinations.  I have good wine, poor wine, excellent wine and vinegar!  I lost a batch of wild blueberry wine just prior to bottling because the carboy cracked...the garage sure smelled good though...and I am betting that the floor is still purple and blue where the wine soaked in.  We have been gone from that house for many years now.  The best wine I have ever made (the second best is wild blueberry) and quite frankly, ever tasted, is dandelion wine.

Essentially, dandelion wine is made using either a white grape juice base, a golden raisin base or some other fruit that is light and will allow the flavor of the flower to shine through.  The wine itself is made in the traditional way with the exception that you need about 2-3 quarts of loosely packed dandelion flower petals for each gallon of wine.  Yes, petals.  Yes, 2-3 quarts per gallon.  There can be no "green" from the plant mixed in with the petals because it can impart a bitter flavor.  The dandelions should be picked and cleaned mid day when they are just about fully open.  This is the very tedious part...picking and cleaning enough dandelions to provide 15 quarts of petals for a 5 gallon batch of wine (one gallon batches don't last long enough!).  The petals are then steeped in boiling water, allowed to stand for a couple days and mixed with the must.

I always make dandelion wine in a 5 gallon clear glass carboy, including during the primary fermentation stage.  You strain the must through cheese cloth as you put it in the carboy.  After about 60 days, you rack the wine.  It should be relatively clear at this point.  I usually rack the wine at least two more times before bottling.  After a year total, it is an excellent wine chilled from the fridge.

I remember about 10 years ago thinking I would make a huge batch of dandelion wine.  Maybe 20 gallons.   This was going to require A LOT of dandelions.  I took both kids out to a couple of spots and lawns that were absolutely blanketed in dandelions and we began to pick.  We picked for a couple hours and had a pretty good batch, but not nearly enough to do 20 gallons.  I thought to myself, I will put them in baggies and put them on ice and we will pick more tomorrow and I will start the steeping process tomorrow night.  The kids were glad to be done and were not looking forward to picking again the next day.

The next morning I went to get the dandelions out of the cooler and...Heartbreak!  Horror!  They were black and greasy looking.  Oh man!  Talk about disappointment.  The kids were mad and so was I.  My plans for a big batch were pretty well shot.  I went out, by myself, that afternoon and picked enough dandelions to make a 5 gallon batch.  Every time I drank the wine over the next couple years I saw those black, unuseable dandelions that had gone to waste.

I have not made dandelion wine in I think three years.  We still have probably 6 bottles in the cupboard.  I didn't make any wine this year at all.  I have probably 20 pounds of Montmorency Cherries in the freezer and I may yet make a batch of Cherry this year.  Next year, I will have to get busy.  Late Spring is dandelion season....dandelion wine is always worth the potential heartbreak of a failed batch.