I had a flashback this morning walking my dogs in the park.

We passed a spot with a large crop of dandelions and I recalled from my early youth that an old man used to come by our neighborhood in the summer and pick our dandelions for free. My mother told me that he used the flowers to make dandelion wine.

I never thought about it again until my flashback this morning. I checked the internet and found that there really is such a thing. It is apparently of Celtic origin, and here is a recipe for it: https://www.allrecipes.com/rec...2202/dandelion-wine/

Has anyone ever been crazy enough to try this stuff? What does it taste like?

I've never tried it, but as a home brewer the key to making it drinkable would be yeast selection and controlling the fermentation temperature to be at the ideal range for the yeast.

Otherwise, you are just fermenting sugar with some dandelion flowers and citrus to add an herbal-citrus flavor component.

Out of curiosity I looked up the temp ranges of a few wine yeasts and they are pretty broad (as compared to Ale yeast). I would ignore the recipe saying to pitch the yeast at 90 deg and let it come down to room temp instead. Room temp will be in the range of all the wine yeast I Looked at. Hotter temps can cause the yeast to throw off-flavors. Belgian yeasts are brewed warmer on purpose, that is where their funky flavor profile comes from.

If you want a good headache, ferment yeast hot, in the 90's, w/ lots of nutrient deficient fermentables like cane or beet sugar.

I would sub honey (max of 3-4 lbs/gal.), ferment at the low end temp for the yeast, and use staggered nutrient additions.
That recipe looks like it was written for the prison yard.
"Age the wine at least a week for best flavor" Lol.

My dad use to make my brother and I pick bushel baskets of dandylines to make wine. It was the nastiest tasting brew he ever made. What a waste of good yellow flowers.

The thought of drinking wine made out of flowers makes me want to spew.

Circa 1973-78 I was a fan of a little rural winery on the banks of the Clackamas River, "Bonded Winery #17" that had been licensed for a couple generations. They had periodic eclectic selection of wines that at the time I enjoyed considerably.

The Dandelion Wine was one I considered either a failure or basically so foreign to my tastes I only shared part of one bottle with a friend. While memory may be in error, I thought they used a different part of the plant there, than the flower.

Others such as Rhubarb Wine were spectacular. Various berry versions all had their fan base.

Their ELDERBERRY wine was a pure psychedelic masterpiece.

I learned of the passing of the gent running the business and eventual closure about 1980 or so.

It was a true historic loss to a large circle of their customer base.

Thought this thread would be about the Ray Bradbury novel.

Do you want dirty hippies? Because that's how you get dirty hippies.

No dirty hippies, kill the weeds

Interesting, id love to try some.

A buddy of mine used to make it in the late 60s. It was bitter nasty tasting stuff but we didn’t care because it was cheap. We drank this stuff and cheap beer, and Boonsfarm or Bali Hai wine from the store was about $1.00 a bottle. (We mixed this with dandelion wine to make it taste better). We would crank up our guitar amps, drink wine and smoke cigarettes till morning. Good times back in them days. Thanks for the reminder.

I live near the Amana Colonies in Iowa and they have in the German traditions made dandelion, rhubarb (piestengel) and many berry wines. Some of them are quite good, the rhubarb and elderberry come to mind, but they are very sweet. Ladies tend to like them and they certainly are not on my keto diet. I know my grandparents used to drink some homebrewed versions as an after-dinner drink. These were heavy sweet wines similar to a port.

It was quite common decades ago. There have even been several songs written about it. It is an acquired taste, or should I say, a taste I never acquired.

quote:

We drank this stuff and cheap beer, and Boonsfarm or Bali Hai wine from the store was about $1.00 a bottle.

Ah yes, the 60s & "Chateau Boones Farm".....

don't forget the 'Vino Fino'.....at 76 cents/gallon it was overpriced.

I've tried it and discovered that I'm partial to the grape kind.

My dad who turned 96 this year used to make 5 gallon batches of wine when he was younger. He would take me with him to pick blackberries and raspberries for both wine and to put some in the freezer. But it seems to me everyones favorite was the dandelion wine he made from those yellow flowers. I still have his recipe books but I haven't made any in probably 20 or 25 years.

My grandfather used to make it. His entire family were alcoholics, unfortunately. My mother told me she was transporting it once to a relative's house (~1965 time frame) and some spilled on her seat. She said it partially melted the vinyl! When I was in my teens my grandfather gave me the recipe. I tired to make it once but failed. I do remember it had oranges in it, in addition to dandelions.

People used to make salads with the young, tender dandelion leaves believe it or not.

Saw something about how they were so prized for this that people (1600's-1800's I think) used to tear out grass to plant the dammed things! Now we go crazy doing the opposite.

Recall that it had a purgative effect.

quote:

Originally posted by P220 Smudge:
Thought this thread would be about the Ray Bradbury novel.

As did I.