Racking the Elderberry Wine

We always try to eat as "close to the land" as possible. Two years ago I found out I could drink "close to the land" also :-). We rarely drink alcohol, but a couple glasses of wine on Sun. night when all the kids are here, goes really good with supper. When we are talking medicinal herbs, elderberry is right up there on the top of the list.  I made 3 gallons of elderberry wine this year, a really fun way to preserve your harvest. Freezing elderberry juice takes up too much space in the freezer, though I do make the grandkids some elderberry syrup that they take home and freeze in their own freezer. The grandkids call it their "black ice cream vitamins". It does look black because of the deep, deep, purple color. :-) (think of all the antioxidants!) I did can some elderberry juice this year too. I will be doing more of that again next year.
     Three gallons of wine is 15 bottles of wine. When it is finished, this is what we will bring out if there are a lot of colds/flu bothering the adults. What a fun way to take your medicine :-). More on the medicinal value of elderberry, and the elderberry wine recipe, next time.

See all the "gunk" at the bottom?

     So, for now let's rack the wine. This wine has already been in the primary fermentor (a 5 gal. pail) for about a week, and in this 3 gallon jar called the secondary fermentor for a couple of months. All that racking is, is siphoning off the wine into a new container and leaving all the gunk (dead yeast -- I'm pretty sure "gunk" is not a real wine term
:-) .  You may have to rack your wine 3 or 4 times, with a couple of months in between each one, before you bottle it. This will make sure it's nice and clear in the bottle. Learned that the hard way with my dandelion and rhubarb wine this year. I bottled it too soon. It will still taste great, just not that pretty in the bottle. Tomorrow more on elderberry.