As promised, here is the nettle beer recipe for you to try. Maybe using your wild starters! 🙂

This is my adaptation from Pascal Baudar’s recipe in his book – The Wildcrafting Brewer.

A traditional wild ferment that transforms humble nettles into a refreshing, lightly sparkling drink. Infused with ginger, lemon and optional bitter herbs, this Nettle Beer (or Mead when made with raw honey) captures the flavours of the hedgerow while introducing the magic of home fermentation.

A wonderful recipe for anyone looking to explore wild brewing. 🌿🍺✨

INGREDIENTS

4 litres spring or filtered water

450-680g fresh nettles or a mix of nettles, dock and dandelion leaves.

340-560g organic sugar or raw honey

14g ginger root (cut finely or grated)

3 lemons (juice first, then throw them into the wort whole)

50-60g wild bitter greens such as dandelion leaves

1 handful of mugwort/yarrow/heather buds/flowers (optional)

Yeast (ale yeast or wild yeast starter)

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Make the wort. Bring the water to a boil and add in the cleaned nettles. Boil for 10 to 30 minutes, then add in the sugar (if using honey only add in at the end by whisking, once the wort is cooler and feeling luke warm), ginger, lemons, dandelion leaves and other herbs (if using), and cream of tartar.
2. Remove from the heat, with the lid on, place into a sink filled with cold water. Refresh with more cold water two or three times, until the wort is luke warm (around 70F/21c). Whisk in raw honey at this point, if using.
3. Strain into your fermenter/jar/bottle/pot or whatever you will be using, add your yeast, and place either the airlock or a clean towel over the top, so that the fermentation gases can escape.
4. Ferment for 3 to 4 days if using 340g sugar or 7 to 8 days if using 560g sugar (more sugar means a higher alcohol percentage). Count fermentation from the day the wort becomes active (visible bubbles), usually 8 to 12 hours after adding yeast.
5. On last day of fermentation, bottle and place in the fridge to cool. As the fermentation will still be quite active after bottling, you will need to check the pressure by releasing the lid slowly with a hand on top, to release the build up of gas. This will stop it from exploding. Once pressure reduces, you are safe to stop releasing the pressure.
6. Nettle beer should be drunk within a week or two, as flavours can develop into less favourable ones.