Making Country Wine, Cider and Vinegar with Philip Richards

In this workshop you will learn general principles so that you can make any wine, as well as following particular recipes as examples.  You will see all the equipment and materials necessary (bottle, closures, locks fermentation vessels and more) and where possible inexpensive alternatives and I will detail sugar use and its measurement. We will also consider cider, ginger beer and more.  If you are currently using expensive cider vinegars, learn a simple method for making these products at home, along with fruit vinegars for preserving or for salad.

In this workshop Phillip will get you ready for making Summer drinks for quaffing.  Phillip’s advice is that Lemon Beer is tops, along with Parsley wine, so get planting now ready for a summer splash, and take advantage of Phillip’s free recipe for Hibiscus Delight, (a Yandina invention), a Turkish Delight rose tasting drink.  Great for summer sundowners, but make now for some winter cheer.

HIBISCUS DELIGHT          

12-18 (more if you’ve got them) Good size flowers with stamens. Make sure you knock out all the little black beetles inside.

Put in bucket with 2 lemons grated and juiced or just roughly chopped. 1 kg sugar, 2 tbsp of white vinegar and 4.5 L water. Mix, cover, and leave 48 hours.

Bottle (recycle PET bottles), leave 1 month, check for excess gas by pressing the bottle’s shoulder or letting the cap off a little. It is necessary to check and relieve the pressure every couple of days.

Leave for another month. Taste. If too sweet leave another month.

Tickets are $35 for Non members and $25 for Members of Yandina Community Gardens, they are limited in number so please book here to avoid disappointment

About the Presenter:

Leaving his job as Headmaster of a boys boarding school in NSW, Phillip Richards took his family to carve out a farm on a 40 ha bush block of regrowth on sandy degraded granite outside Childers. Gaining organic certification (BFA) they sold vegetables through an organic produce agent in Brisbane as well as into the Sydney and Melbourne markets. Cows, pigs, goats all sorts of poultry helped increase the fertility and caused constant mayhem. They have been on the Sunshine Coast for many years and have 1.7 ha along the South Maroochy river and are self-sufficient in fruit and vegetables and have recently begun growing grains (maize, millet & sorghum) for both chook food and for our consumption.

Phillip writes for Grass Roots (in the past for Earth Garden) as well as G magazine, Owner Builder, and lately in PIP Journal (article on coffee) and Australasian Poultry (grains and sprouts for chooks). He was formally the organic editor for suite 101 a now defunct ezine.

Phillip Richards makes country wines, beers and ciders from fruit, vegetables and flowers. He says: I have some guiding principles and that is as far as possible to use what we grow and have in excess or to use cheap alternatives.