The first of a number of Shrubs for the Food in Jar Challenge..
Elderberry Shrub
8 0z of Elderberry Syrup (made with cooked elderberry juice and sugar at 1 to 1 ratio)
2 oz of Apple Cider Vinager
2 oz of plain water (but I would like to try different fruit flavoured left over canned juice)
Measure, mix, pour, chill and serve.. it was delightful and I do not know why I have not made it before. it truly surprised me at how rich and depth of flavour this mix gave me, it was like a good wine in regards to top and bottom notes.
I have grown and harvested Elderberries on the farm for 12 years, most year, I harvest at least 30 to 50 plus pounds of them, I made juice, jelly, syrup and Cold-Honey blends.
We use it as a hot fruit tea, we blend it and homemade jello with it.. Its one of favorite wild fruits of the farm.. I even have a little video that shows my way of quickly destemming them
So if you put up some elderberry juice or elderberry syrup, consider making a pint into this awesome drink, and if not.. and you want to try it, there are many places that sell dried elderberries to be made into syrups.
Just another Day on the Farm 
That’s a lot of work to process all those berries! Do you have a trick for removing the poisonous stems quickly?
I do in fact.. you will see in the video that the stems are leftover, after I do that, I do look though the berries to see if any little ones broke off but it takes very little time as its few that do. https://livingmydreamlifeonthefarm.com/2016/08/28/destemming-elderberry-video-for-juice-making
That colour on the spoon/plate is magnificent. 😀
Thanks, I love the amazing color that elderberries give you.. and how it will turn the most amazing blue when mixed in certain things..
D > I wonder if Elderberry was taken to N America from Britain or other N European countries? It’s very much a hedgerow/smallholders small tree. If we have enough, we make Elderberry Wine, which – if it turns out at its very finest – we refer to as Elderberry Port.
I think we have had it for a long time as well, there is records here in Canada that it was a wild fruit that the natives used as well as the amazing history of this plant in Europe.. I was born in alberta, Canada and we do not have elderberry, it can be bought and used as a garden plant but it is not found in the wild, instead the Saskatoon, the pin-cherry and the choke-cherry as well as high bush blueberry is the most common fruits.. When I lived in the artic, Iqaluit Nunavut (across from Greenland) a tiny plant the cloud berry was the local fruit, and I had to relearn when I got to the farm here in the Ottawa valley, Ontario, as my most common wild fruits are Elderberries, High Bush Cranberries and Chokeberry.. and despite me trying, I can’t get a Saskatoon bush to produce here and I have never found a single wild pin-cherry baby to transplant..
Do you use the flowers to make a drink as well or just the berries and o yes, so very fine indeed
D > Berries for wine/port. Flowers for ‘champagne’- a sparkling white wine (drunk whilst still active). Cautious with the latter, as no fruit without flowers!
My bushes are so heavy on the production that I need to remove a third of the flowers so that the fruit does not snap the branches. I find that if you feed them well, they can and will out produce what they can hold.. but I must either cover them to keep the birds off but I also grow a number of them in the front yard, that the farm cats keep clear of the birds for me.
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