Recipe for elderberry juice
When winter approaches, it’s a great idea to gather the black elderberries and make juice. They are packed with vitamin C, which helps keep colds at bay during the chilly season ahead. I sweeten the juice with seasonal apples, but if you can’t find any, you can easily leave them out. I promise it will be just as delicious without them.
If you have a juicer, of course, just use that, but for those who aren’t so lucky, here is a recipe that makes juice the old-fashioned way.
This recipe yields 1 ½ liters of elderberry juice.
Equipment
- Scissors
- Cutting Board
- Knife
- Pot
- Sieve
Ingredients
Elderberry Juice
- 1 kg Elderberry
- 0.5 liters Water
- 3 pcs. Apples
- 375 gram Sugar
- 0.5 pcs. Lemon the juice
Instructions
- Wash the berries thoroughly and clip the coarse stems off the clusters. Cut the apples into large cubes and place them in a pot with elderberries and water. Turn on the heat and let the mixture come to a boil until the berries burst and the apples cook down. Now hang the elderberries and apples to drain in a juice bag or place a thin piece of cloth in a strainer, so the juice separates from the fruit. A tea towel works fine, but let the expensive ones stay in the drawer, as elderberries stain terribly! Once the last precious drops have dripped out, pour the juice into a pot and add sugar and lemon juice. Bring to a boil and skim off the pink foam that collects along the edges of the pot. Adjust the taste with sugar and lemon before pouring the finished juice into sterilized bottles. Elderberry juice stays fresh in the bottle for several months, but you can also freeze it without any problems. Opened bottles should be stored in the refrigerator and consumed within a couple of weeks.
Notes
Serving Suggestions
Admittedly, my elderberry juice is not the sweetest you'll ever be served, so you can easily add more sugar when you cook it. The reason I don't do this is that I prefer to sweeten it just before serving. Here I season with honey and adjust with extra lemon juice to add a tangy twist.I also always drink my elderberry juice warm, and if it's meant to ward off a cold and soothe a sore throat, it should be consumed piping hot! However, when I serve it to guests, it's often in a deep bowl, as the black juice is delightful as a soup. That's how I often had it as a child – always with a crispy zwieback on top. Thus, you can certainly serve it as a warm dessert in the wintertime, and I know it tastes wonderful if you place a cold dollop of rice pudding in the middle of the bowl.