Silver Birch Sap Wine

So now you have your Silver Birch Sap you may think what could you possibly do with such a sugar rich liquid. The answer is of course, make wine! Unfortunately we do not have any pictures of the batch we made this year but I can tell you it ended up being an off-white coloured wine and one of our more enjoyable brews. We will definitely be making this one again next spring.

Minimum Equipment Requirement

1 Gal Demijohn or Drum/Tub
1 Airlock
1 Siphon Tube

Ingredients for 1 Gallon Silver Birch Wine

1 Gallon Silver Birch Sap Unprocessed (not boiled down or anything).
1133g Sugar
2 Lemons
277g Raisins

Method

Sterilise your equipment
Boil the Sap and Lemon together for 20 minutes
Add the sugar and raisins and stir in while still warm
Strain the flowers – keep the liquid but not the flowers themselves
Place into the primary fermentation bucket/Demijohn
Allow the mixture to cool until it reaches around 21C
Add yeast and yeast nutrient
Cover and place airlock
Keep in a warm dry place
After 8 weeks, test the mixture with a hydrometer. Add sugar according to taste if it’s ready to bottle.
Add a crushed Campden tablet to clear according to the tablet instructions and allow to settle
Rack Off and bottle.

Dandelion Flower Wine

Dandelion Flower wine is best made when the dandelion flowers are in full bloom in the spring and fully open on a sunny day. The wine requires acidifying for the yeast so it tends to become a very citrus flavoured wine. For this reason we called this batch the Citrus Bang. We aren’t usually very fond of overly citrus flavours so we may change or ignore this recipe next year or use it as “Filler” wine only (wine we make only when we have made everything else available and have spare drums/demijohns).

Minimum Equipment Requirement

1 Gal Demijohn or Drum/Tub
1 Airlock
1 Siphon Tube

Ingredients for 1 Gallon Dandelion Wine

1.136 Litres of pressed dandelion petals (follow the instructions for how to prepare the petals in our post on dandelion cordial if you are unsure)
340g Raisins
907g Sugar
3 Lemons
3 Oranges
Water as required

Method

Sterilise your equipment
Boil the Petals
Allow petals to steep for a minimum of 2 hours (we did overnight to increase flavour)
Strain the flowers – keep the liquid but not the flowers themselves
Add raisins, Lemon Juice, Orange Juice, sugar and orange/lemon zest to the liquid and place on a low boil for 30 minutes.
Allow to cool.
Mix thoroughly and add to the Primary Fermentation Bucket/Demijohn and top up with water.
Allow the mixture to cool until it reaches around 21C
Add yeast and yeast nutrient
Cover and place airlock
Keep in a warm dry place
After 8 weeks, test the mixture with a hydrometer. Add sugar according to taste if it’s ready to bottle.
Add a crushed Campden tablet to clear according to the tablet instructions and allow to settle
Rack Off up to three times, or less if you don’t mind it cloudy. Top up with water and bottle when finished.

Mahonia – Oregon Grape

Name: Oregon Grape

Location: The berry of the Mahonia, typically American but often found across the UK in posh gardens particularly in new build areas.

Months: June, July, August

Edible Parts: Berries

Non-Edible Parts: Anything else

The Mahonia Bush as pictured above is filled with sharp holly like leaves. As such people tend to stay away from the berries mistaking them for poisonous holly berries. The bushes typically look around this size in the UK with the same twisty wood at the base and a fluffy head of not so fluffy leaves. The berries look powdery blue like Sloes but are grouped together in long string bunches similar to grapes. The berries themselves are often said to be a bit too tart for raw eating but having now tried them myself I would say they are only slightly tart and quite sweet and full flavoured. In fact I was licking my red fingers all the way home enjoying the taste. Mahonia berries can be used to make jams and wine as with most berries. You will not be dissapointed with flavour.

One last tip to leave you with as we learned this the hard way: BRING GLOVES when harvesting. The leaves HURT and the juice STAINS. Ouch!

How I Created my First Home Aquaponics System

After struggling for a long time with how to keep my fish tank as clean as possible (with as little effort as possible) and failing miserably I finally discovered aquaponics – and I wanted it. This system is so special it covers looking after fish, upcycling materials and growing your own food! The problem was most aquaponics systems costs hundreds of pounds and I had about a tenner to spare, if that.

I was not to be deterred however, I wanted one, so I was going to figure out how to build my own. I already had a small fish tank with a terrible water filter that dribbled out water at best and needed changing every week. I wanted to convert this into a self cleaning system that also provided food.

How Aquaponics Works

Aquaponics is amazingly simple really. All you need is a pump to pump the water from the fish tank to a tray with various sized filtering rocks in it. Here you plant a bunch of cress seeds (or even lettuce) on top of the rocks. The idea is the plants use the fish poo and turn it into nutrients to grow. Then, the water needs to be directed back down either into a second tray or into the fish tank again. The falling water being a bit cleaner than before and oxidizing the tank.

Cost to DO:

If you already have fish and a fish pump: £0
If you do not have a pump : £10 +costs of tank and fish according to your requirements.

Our zebra fish are around £7 each, snails to eat algae are 75p each (because our zebra fish are in cold water) and the tank was free from friends (you can also scour freecycle and supermarket adverts). While we did also get a free pump it broke within a few days and we had to purchase a new one – we got the cheapest one around which was £10 from our local pet store. Since we are improving the flow capability of this pump anyway a cheap one will be sufficient.

Equipment:

Glue/Glue Gun/Super Glue
Knife/Scissors
Plastic tray – such as those from supermarket bread/pastry products
Plastic tubes (we used kids toy tubes from a pirate bed – they were the perfect fit for the pump attachment!)
Gravel of different sizes (taken from the original filter and replacement filters and the fish tank gravel)
A couple of small bottles (those little innocent smoothie bottles work great)
A water pump (taken from the original filter). You can purchase a pump on its own but it’s actually cheaper to just buy the cheapest tank filter instead and get the extra gravel this way as a bonus.

Method:

First of all before we begin, I would like to let you know that the aquaponics system isn’t the one I first built. The one I will be teaching you to make today is our Aquaponics Mark II system.

The first one looked like this:

There were however several problems with this design that only emerged afterwards including:

Not enough space for cress – it grows hard and fast and we want more!
Roots clogged up holes
Holes were leaky
Fish filter pump was not enclosed enough

So we decided to create Aquaponics Mark II and significantly improved upon it’s design with some rather intuitive solutions if I do say so myself.

Step One

Gather together your materials including plastic tray (I prefer see through to maximise light access), plastic tubing, scissors, and glue (i used a glue gun before but ran out of sticks so used super glue this time).

Cut the tube into two sections: 1 long one to fit from the pump to the fish tank lid, and one short one to fit from the fish tank lid to just above the water level of the tank. The long tube will be your water out section and the short one will direct the water back in.

Step Two

Line up the plastic tray against your fish tank lid. Later on it will be glued into place but not now (just in case something goes wrong). Mark out where you want your tubes to go so that they go through the existing holes in the fish tank lid. I placed my output tube on the right hand side (so that the pump will be at the side of the tank and the power cable is closest to the wall socket). The shorter input tube I placed at the back middle of the lid/tray.

Put a hole through the marks and ease the tubes in, glue in place inside the plastic tray so that water can’t leak out (you can use bath sealant I guess if you have some spare). Allow to dry thoroughly before exposing to water.

Step Three

Take your small plastic bottle and check the water pump you have will fit inside it. The pump should be easy to remove from the fish filter and won’t require any tomfoolery. For my filter I found it fit easily with plenty of room into an innocent smoothie bottle.

Get your knife/scissors and score thin line holes at 90 degree points at the base of the bottle like in the picture above. You don’t need to widen these holes this will be plenty for the water to get into without endangering small fish.

Step Four

Remove the lid of the bottle and make a hole in the middle. Thread the long tube attached to the tray through this hole. Do not glue it in place (we want to minimise the use of glue where possible both for the fish and for the sake of easy removal and replacement of parts).

Cut the Bottle in half above the pump and slot the pump inside. There should be plenty of breathing room in there.

Cut a line hole in the top of the bottle and thread the wire through it (since it is attached to a pump at one end and a plug at the other, you need to cut a line to thread it through not just a hole for the wire). Do not seal the top of the bottle into the base yet – attach the long output tube to the pump first threaded through the open bottle top. Then screw the bottle top to the lid on the tube and finally slot the top half of the bottle inside the bottom half of the bottle so that the pump is covered and cannot trap fish.

Step Five

Secure the plastic tray to the fish tank lid with glue in the corners. If using super glue you will need to sit around for a long time. A glue gun is much faster to dry. When it is dry, place the system into the fish tank and close the lid in place. Check that the short tube is suspended inside the fish tank above the water level and that the pump bottle fills with water and is weighed down sufficiently.

Now is the time to check your system works before progressing further. It should all work fine but if your holes are too small, or too big you may have water flow problems or leaks and now is the time to fix those before finishing the system. Thankfully ours did not have leaks and had excellent water flow, yay! Remember we had a piddly slow water pump? Not anymore! Thanks to the vastly superior filter system the water flow was much better, some pre-built fish water filters are just designed very badly. Time to move on…

Step Six

In this design we also created a removable tube protection system that acted as an additional filter. This device will use the bio sponge found in your old fish filter providing a third method of cleaning the water. This sponge needs regular cleaning, so its important it’s not fixed into place – which means a tricky problem to solve for our aquaponics system. We found in our Aquaponics Mark I system, placing the sponge into the tube meant daily cleaning required and a vastly reduced water flow so this time we went for something a bit more daring.

Take your second small bottle and cut the top off. Then cut a small rectangle (smaller than the bio sponge you have) into the bottom side of the bottle.

Then with the bottom half of the bottle cut a thin strip off the top so it makes a circle like this.

Slot the strip of plastic into the base of the top half of the bottle so that it covers the rectangular hole you created. You should find the plastic bends inwards a bit creating a gap as the plastic ring is slightly bigger than the bottle top half. This is great and just what we need to get water through the sponge so align this inward bend so that it is behind the rectangular hole you created.

Then place the sponge between the plastic like above. It will be clamped in to place by the plastic strip but still allow water to pass through the sponge. Your tube protection device can now be sat on the plastic tray around the shorter tube hole. This will help stop roots clogging up the tube and provide an extra filter for the water exiting the system. Not all of the water will go through the sponge but it will capture a lot. It does not need anything to weigh it down – it will be heavy enough and the water flow won’t disturb it.

When the sponge gets brown – rinse it under a tap and then replace it. Turn the bottle top periodically to sever ambitious roots heading for your tube hole.

Step Seven

Fill the tray with your smallest gravel from the filter, then the second smallest, then the biggest and finally with the gravel from the bottom of your fish tank (after you have cleaned it all). This creates several layers of filtration. Make sure the level of the gravel is higher than the stable water level when the pump is on to help prevent seed movement.

Finally, scatter some cress seeds on the gravel, put your fish tank by a window and turn on the pump. Check the water flow is still good to ensure sufficient oxidisation of the water for the fish. Wait 3-6 days and eat the resulting cress – plant more on top and repeat the process!

If you do not have a spare window you can get a special growing LED bulb plate to fix above your fish tank but this will cost around £20.

Congratulations, you are finished!

Great job on getting this far, you now have your own aquaponics system that will/is:

Oxidise your water
Provide a multi-filtration system by: Plants, Gravel layers and Bio Sponge
Provide quick and easy to grow healthy food to snack on and use in salads (the kids will LOVE this!)
Make happier healthier fish
Reduced cleaning for your fish tank required (deep clean once a month if the water starts going green and consider adding one or two water snails).
An amazing self sufficient system you didn’t pay £400 for.

In a few days your tray will look something like this one did (picture from Aquaponics Mark I):

Silver Birch Sap

Collecting silver birch sap in the beginning of spring is a great way to get some extra sugar and clean water into your foraging diet. It does require some minor equipment and some thought and care though.

Equipment

Knife – sharp!
5L Bottle
Siphon Tube
Tape
Leaf and Twig or similar devices

Step One

Cut a “V” shape into a silver birch tree near the base but not at the bottom. If the sap begins to drip out rapidly, you are doing this at the right time.

Step Two

Insert the leaf into the base of the V shape and attach it in with a small twig. The sap should collect on the leaf and drip down at the point giving you a great way to direct the sap to where you want it. CAUTION: THIS WILL BE TRICKY!

Step Three

Attach the siphon tube to the tree underneath using non-permanent tape. Ensure the sap drips into the tube. Place the other end of the tube into the 5L bottle and tape securely in place. Use tape or other shade tools if you think it might rain to prevent rain water getting inside.

Step Four

Wait a couple of days for the bottle to fill up. This sap is clean, refreshing and a great emergency supply. You can also boil it down for syrup or make it into wine (which we will post about later on).

Remember:

Do this at the beginning of spring when the sap rises.
Try to look after the tree – seal the wound afterwards if possible and keep it clean.
Don’t keep doing this to the same tree, let it recover (some years).
The sap should be clear, sometimes with a tint. If it is brown it may be that the tree has a fungal infection and should be avoided.
Always seek permission form the tree owner of course.

How to Produce your Own Salt

Salt is one of our most important minerals for the human body but in the wild, it’s pretty hard to find in every day foraging. The coastal region is a massive resource for fresh salt whether it’s from the various food stuffs found from the coast or from harvesting the sea itself. Best of all, creating your own salt from the sea can be done all year round!

Salt isn’t as complicated and scary as you might first think. The way I will teach you how to produce your own salt from the sea today is pretty much exactly how large companies do it, there is no special secret you don’t know about.

Ingredients

Sea Water – Try to find a certified clean water area for the best and cleanest results!

Method

Collect around 5 Litres of sea water if possible. I used a large water bottle for this to get as much as I could.

Sift the Sea Water through several layers of Muslin. Repeat several times.

Allow the water to stand for a week and you may see a bit of excess dirt form on the bottom still. Siphon off the clean water from the top (as much as possible without disturbing the dirt at the bottom) using plastic tube (see homebrewing for help). Sieve through several layers of muslin again.

Boil off as much water as possible so that you are left with around 1 litre of water left at the most. Now your water beyond this point will begin to make salt so to avoid the salt burning on the bottom of the pan you should set up a gentle cooking system like this:

This is a large pan with around 30-50% water in it on the lowest heat setting on the hob. A metal bowl has placed on the top with the sea water in it. As you can see, after a few hours your water will disappear and you will be left with super strong salt! You may find your salt colour can vary from white to brown, it all depends on where you got the sea water from and the water quality. This salt has been produced from Morecambe and produced finer salt than I expected!

Next, loosen the salt form the edge of the bowl and leave it to air dry in a warm dry location like a windowsill. This will take a very long time but it prevents burning and allows the salt to dry properly for safe storage.

Make your Own Sourdough Bread

If you know about bread making, you may think it takes a lot of different ingrediants to make bread that wouldn’t necessarily be cheaper than just buying yourself a loaf of bread. With sourdough however, the only thing you need to buy is flour (unless you have foraged it yourself of course).

Sourdough does take some looking after however, I tend to fit it in alongside other daily chores such as feeding the animals so it doesn’t get forgotten about. To make sourdough bread, you first need to make a sourdough starter:

How to Make Sourdough Starter

Ingredients

Plain Flour (I prefer “Strong Bread Flour”)
Water

Equipment

Large lidless Jar
Piece of cloth big enough to fit over the jar top
Elastic band or hair bobble

Method

Add 2-3 heaped tablespoons of flour to the jar and enough water to create a thick liquid that is easy to stir. Cover with the cloth and keep it in place with the elastic band.

You do not need to buy yeast for sourdough. The sourdough will activate with the natural yeast already there.

After a day or two, the mixture will begin to form bubbles of the surface and a separate liquid will form at the top. It will smell yeasty/alcoholic. This means it’s working! If you see or smell mould (distinctive and hard to miss), the mixture has not activated or the yeast has died, if this happens you will need to throw it away and start again.

Once the mixture has activated, “feed” every other day with 1-2 tablespoons of flour and a bit of extra water to mix in well.

How to Make Sourdough Bread

Ingredients

Sourdough Starter
Water
Plain Flour

Method

There are a few different methods of creating the perfect sourdough bread. I found I had to undergo a lot of research and experimentation until I found a method that worked for me. This is the method I use currently and has been reliably providing better bread but you may wish to adapt it slightly or improve it if you can!

Step One

When your sourdough starter has filled the jar it’s time to separate off some of the liquid. Pour half of it into a bowl to be made into bread. Always feed the starter after removing some of it to make sure it stays strong and healthy.

You can make the sough as big as you want, so I do not tend to measure out the flour. Mix in as much flour as required to make a rough dough at this stage though, you can add more later if you want it bigger.

Cover with cling film and place in the fridge overnight. This prevents the yeast from exhausting itself too quickly.

Step Two

The next day take out the bowl and flour a work surface to knead the dough. Add more flour and water at this stage before kneading to get the size and consistency you want. The dough should be stretchy and elastic. Knead the dough so that you push and stretch it out without breaking it. Try to do this for at least 10 minutes, I normally watch a program while I’m doing it so I can zone out and not feel like it’s taking forever.

Make a rough loaf shape and place into a loaf tin. It does not have to touch the sides it will spread out as it rises. Leave the dough for a day in a warm location – I keep it on the kitchen counter near to the oven top so it’s nice and warm.

Step Three

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C when the dough has risen well. If in doubt leave the dough longer, it need to have risen enough so that the inside is fluffy and airy. If it spills over the side of your tin do not worry, trim off the excess and chuck it in separately as nibbles. Do not squash or touch the dough when it has risen – you want to keep it intact as it is.

Place the loaf tin in the oven on a tray in the middle of the oven. When the loaf looks ready – it’s not. Place a skewer in it and you will see the middle is still slightly doughy. You should have a good crust at this point though, if you do now is the time to turn it down to 140 degrees to make sure it cooks well throughout. Most sourdough books recommend keeping it on high throughout but every single time I did this the middle did not cook and the outside over cooked, and a low heat also fails to cook it properly. This is just the way I found it works well for me, your oven may be different. When the bread smell starts to leak into the next room it’s ready to come out.

Wrap the bread in greaseproof paper to keep it fresh.

Bladder Wrack or Popweed Seaweed

If you get a chance to visit the coastal region at all then do not let the opportunity to harvest some coastal delights pass you by. The coast is an abundant source of food rich in nutrients and should not be passed over. Seaweeds are all year round but are at their best in April, May and June.

Name: Bladder Wrack, Popweed

Location: Seaside rocks and in the sea

Months: April, May, June

Edible Parts: Leaves

Non-Edible Parts: Stipe (to avoid damaging plant)

Bladder Wrack is easy to identify because it grows with small to large sacks of gas, it’s name comes from the inflated bladders they possess. You may recall stepping on this seaweed as a child and having hours of entertainment from the popping sounds – much like bubble wrap. Bladder Wrack (or popweed) is also abundant in the UK and if you find nothing else, you will find this.

Remember to only cut seaweed that is attached and living on rocks, avoid seaweed that is floating free. Cut at the stipe (the hard stem like part) giving a good distance away from the section that holds the seaweed to the rock, this will allow the seaweed to regrow without too much trouble.

Wash the seaweed thoroughly before use to clean it of contaminants and excess salt. Avoid seaweed that grows near Red Tide (the red algae) and other high pollutant areas.

Experimental Avocado

I am going to try to grow my own avocado tree in the UK. This will be grueling, unrewarding and lengthy so it’s not for the faint of heart!

You can germinate your avocado pip in a few different ways apparently. However, if you can get a seedling this is meant to be easier and more reliable for a tasty crop. I’m just going to turn the Hass Avocado I bought from Sainsbury’s into a tree and see what happens.

Things to note:

You may not get fruit
If you do get fruit it may not be tasty, even if the original avocado was
It WILL be big, easily up to 6 foot if not kept pruned and contained/stunted.
It WILL need to be kept warm and safe from frost
It WILL take at least 3 years before you see any returns at all

Avocados like soil of PH around 6 and a sandy texture soil works best. Make sure it also has great drainage or it will not be happy!

Your Avocado seed will look something like this:

How to Germinate Your Seed

You can do this in two main ways, first of all you can plant it in a large pot of well drained soil with the pointy end upwards. I have also put a plastic bag around the pot to keep it warm and moist while it germinates, remember to remove this bag as soon as germination occurs.

This method works particularly well with most seeds that thrive in warmer climates such as Squash, Tomato and Cucumber.

Or alternatively you can place three toothpicks into the seed around the middle and suspend the pip over a beaker of water using the toothpicks to balance it. This ensure the base of the seed is submerged in fresh water and the point end is again upwards. You will need to change the water every 2-3 days.

Germination takes 3-6 weeks, the larger the seed is the longer germination usually takes so be prepared for it do to a whole lot of nothing for a very long time.

Dandelion and Ginger Cordial

After running out of Dandelion Flower Cordial I decided to adapt the recipe a little to add some extra oomph for my next batch. As such the recipe is very similar.

Due to no preservatives or additional ingredients, this cordial has a high sugar content to prevent it from going bad.
Dandelion flowers can be collected around March to April when the sun is in full swing to ensure the flowers are out and full of goodness.
Can also double as a great hot tea drink to combat colds, enjoy with hot water and a slice of lemon.

Ingredients

100 Dandelion Flower Heads at least – the more the better
1kg Demerara brown sugar estimate
half a lemon
Knob of fresh Ginger Root

Method

Collect at least 100 dandelion flower heads fully opened and trim off the green bases. It’s okay to get a few green bits in with the petals and they usually get in the way.

Give the petals a quick wash/rinse but be careful not to loose all the flavour!

Grate the ginger with a fine tooth grater and squeeze out the ginger juice into a saucepan.

Boil the petals and ginger juice with roughly 1 pint of water and allow to cool and steep overnight in a covered bowl.

Add the juice from a half a lemon and strain out the petals thoroughly.

Weigh the liquid (a bit tricky I know) and for every 1g of liquid you have created add 0.95g of sugar. You can use different sugar types if you prefer but they will affect the flavour, this time I used Demerara Brown sugar for a more caramel flavour.

Stir in the sugar and gently heat until dissolved (do not boil).

Pour contents into bottles and seal.