# Heather wine?



## BernardSmith (Feb 4, 2015)

Has anyone here ever made a wine from heather tips? I am thinking of blending heather and elderflowers to make such a wine. Is there anything I should be aware of with the heather? I have used heather to make a fra'och beer (A Scottish version of a gruit) and a tea I made with the heather (to see how well a must made from heather might taste) is quite pleasant when balanced with some sugar)...Are there any special concerns to which I should pay attention? Thanks


----------



## jensmith (Feb 6, 2015)

Just the number of bugs! 

It sounds like you have sampled a varity of heather drinks already. Just turn your tea into wine. Of corse, I know knothing about heather other then its pretty and the bees love it. 


Sent from my iPod touch using Wine Making


----------



## Winorick (Feb 7, 2015)

*Heather & Hibiscus*

I just bottled my 2013 Heather and Hibiscus, AKA Bulgarian Red. The idea came from this site: http://wineworldfdw.com/wine_recipes.html

I've made a fair amount of Hibiscus over the years and added dill to it once. That turned out very nice. This is the site that gave me the idea for the Heather Hibiscus. I kept it on the dryer side - bottling SG = 1.01, @ oz dried Hibiscus & 1.5 oz dried Heather


----------



## Runningwolf (Feb 7, 2015)

I didn't know you could do that with Heather's. I have a two huge beds with probably 40 different varieties of them.


----------



## Winorick (Feb 7, 2015)

Runningwolf said:


> I didn't know you could do that with Heather's. I have a two huge beds with probably 40 different varieties of them.



What do you use all of that Heather for?


----------



## Runningwolf (Feb 8, 2015)

Winorick said:


> What do you use all of that Heather for?



They are part of our dwarf conifer gardens. We get a few botanists that come each year to take cuttings from them to start new plants.


----------



## BernardSmith (Feb 8, 2015)

Winorick said:


> I just bottled my 2013 Heather and Hibiscus, AKA Bulgarian Red. The idea came from this site: http://wineworldfdw.com/wine_recipes.html
> 
> I've made a fair amount of Hibiscus over the years and added dill to it once. That turned out very nice. This is the site that gave me the idea for the Heather Hibiscus. I kept it on the dryer side - bottling SG = 1.01, @ oz dried Hibiscus & 1.5 oz dried Heather



Interesting idea... I was planning on making a heather/elderflower wine using 2 oz of dried elderflowers and 2 of the dried heather tips if the heather wine itself showed any promise. 
But you say that you bottled your heather and hibiscus on the "drier side", 1.01. Is that perhaps a typo? 1.010 is sweet. Did you mean 1.001? 

And Runningwolf, heather tips are used by brewers to make a gruit beer (beers , nominally, with no hops but with bittering agents made from other herbs - such as heather or mugwort and yarrow.


----------



## Winorick (Feb 10, 2015)

BernardSmith said:


> Interesting idea... I was planning on making a heather/elderflower wine using 2 oz of dried elderflowers and 2 of the dried heather tips if the heather wine itself showed any promise.
> But you say that you bottled your heather and hibiscus on the "drier side", 1.01. Is that perhaps a typo? 1.010 is sweet. Did you mean 1.001?
> 
> And Runningwolf, heather tips are used by brewers to make a gruit beer (beers , nominally, with no hops but with bittering agents made from other herbs - such as heather or mugwort and yarrow.



I guess that "Drier" is a rather relative word. Yes, I meant 1.010, 1.030 is sweet! IMO, while I prefer a dry Zin, I definitely prefer fruit wines on the sweeter side. I have never had a "dry" (under 1.00) that was any good. But, I'm open to trying one!!


----------

