Home made wine

Up until recently I sent off for country fruit wines, which offered a wonderful unusual choice ('A nice Banana or Pineapple wine anybody'?!). This year I've decided to go back to brewing my own kitchen hedgerow wine. There's a shortage of sloes here too, so trying Rowanberry, Elderberry and Apple Mead. Easy and satisfying to make with the aid of a good book, and a lot cheaper than buying from specialists. I've heard W*lko's sell wine making equipment?

We used to make a lot of fruit wines, the nicest was a lovely dark red elderberry.

Now I just make flavoured gin. Sloe or blackberry, depending what is available. No sloes this year, so blackberry it is.

Before it was ready, not I. I was always ready.

We used to make our own in the '70s. There used to be shopa that sold all the equipment. I don't know if they still exist. In those days we often us d to drink it before I was ready!

My mother's wines and brandies would have blown your hat off ! It's a miracle that the potting shed didn't explode.

My brother went to a party at the host's house where he was offered home-made wine. He asked the host where it was made. "In the kitchen" was the answer, to which my dear brother replied "It doesn't travel well, does it."

Our next door neighbour, notoriously stingy, used to make his own wine and coded the labels. At parties, we learned by experience to avoid like the plague any bottle labelled GA when we'd worked out that it meant "Give Away"!

Hi, nansypansy, I used to make a fair bit of wine. I found these two books very useful. Since I don't use them any more I'm happy to send them to you if you would like them.