Dandelion Wine

Dandelion heads were popping all over the place over the last 10 days, and I was able to harvest a bunch of them on a prime sunny morning. Laborious petal plucking ensued shortly after (you need to de-petal within a quick amount of time because the flower heads start to close up); with the company of friends, it was a splendid spring activity, though I neglected to take any photos. *I did have to freeze the first round and go pick the rest on day 2. Next was soaking the petals in water, straining them out, then adding sugar, raisins, fruit and yeast. The concoction bubbled away in my kitchen all last week, sometimes sounding like a gentle rain storm. It was very active.

One week later and upon the quietening of the fermentation, I strained the mixture into a glass 1 gallon carboy with airlock. There it will sit for 2-3 months before I rack it off into some wine bottles for the final 6-9 month stretch. I am looking forward to trying this wine, and am planning to make a rhubarb one in the coming weeks so that I can have a bit of a "local" wine tasting. Local being my yard, plus some extra dandelions from a neighbor in the buy nothing group and some from the Oromo church down the street. I'd like to find some elderberries to try a wine from those too, despite that getting a little farther away!

You do need some wine making supplies for this recipe, namely wine yeast, a 1 gallon carboy and an airlock, and brewing sanitizer. Some people skip the carboy/airlock and sanitizer, and just pour into clean wine bottles with balloons on top, which means really you just need yeast. Ideally I'd love to make wine with natural yeasts, but to start, I'm adding it in.

I mainly followed this primary recipe, and relied on this secondary one as well. I wanted to make just one gallon for my novice try, though it ended up being about 3 quarts only, in the end. We'll see how that fares. 

Dandelion petals!

My main notes to myself:

• It was a pain to strain the wine a 2nd time (also more sediment b/c I could not rack it), so I think next time I will follow the secondary instructions, modifying the amounts to = 1 gallon. (Unless mine turns out totally amazing, in which case I will just stick with it!)
• I will start with more water next time, too much boiled off or got strained out (this may also be a result of double straining and boiling, again I'll go for the secondary instructions next time). When I researched what to do with all the extra space, it seems that it is okay for the early fermentation process as long as there is an airlock. But if it were in a corked bottle, that much surface area would not be good. I am guessing this will get me 3 full bottles, but likely not 4.
  
• I did sanitize my carboy and will sanitize bottles/the tubing for racking the wine. I just don't want to risk it, but people do.
• Other recipes recommend a ratio of 1 gallon dandelion petals for 1 gallon of wine. This is a little less and depending on how it turns out, I want to add more next time.

Fruit peel and dandelion petals simmering in water

Bubbling wine concoction!

Roasted Dandelion Root tea

This post comes from a culmination of two things: 1) I've been drinking roasted dandelion root tea that I got at the co-op daily during Ramadan - I love it, it's like a sweet, darker tea similar to chicory root; and 2) I cleared some beds in my community garden plot the past several days, including many dandelions, some with decent sized roots. I brought them home and did a little internet perusing, and voila! I have my own roots for tea. I also nibbled a few - and omg! The roots are delicious. Plus they have lots of inulin, good for gut health, and are good for your liver.

Some internet research revealed that dandelion roots are best in the fall, and early spring before they flower. I will be curious to try roasting some roots this summer to do a taste comparison, and will definitely dig some up this fall since now they are all flowering. I initially roasted some roots just for 30 minutes or so, which left a chewy, edible and sweet root. I could eat those all day. But, for tea, you do a longer roast until the roots become brittle and quite brown. Some people dehydrate the roots, then roast them in a cast iron skillet until brown (similar to coffee bean roasting). I have not tried that yet, but it seems either method works. I used even quite small roots, because that is what I had, but larger ones obviously will produce more with less labor involved.

My roasted roots resulted in a bit milder flavor than the kind I get at the store, but they smell stronger - like vanilla and chocolate. (It was as if I was baking cookies when I was roasting them!) I wonder if fall roots would result in a stronger flavor? I will update then. 

Also, speaking of dandelions, this weekend also included my picking many, many dandelion heads, and then removing all of the yellow petals from the green part in order to make dandelion wine. It is decidedly labor intensive. But a lovely task with some friends. I'll make a post once I'm into some later stages, but won't know how it will all turn out until winter sometime. People speak of dandelion wine like a taste of sunshine in the winter, which is just what all those bright big fat flowers looked like on Saturday!

Roasted Dandelion Roots

1. Pick the largest dandelions that you can find. Dig them out using a special dandelion tool, or lever them up  (if in the garden) with a spading fork. You want to pull them out with the least amount of breaking of the roots, keeping them as intact as possible. 

2. Rinse the roots as best you can to get off the clinging dirt. I did this by first submerging all of my dandelions in a bucket and swishing them around. I then brought them inside and cut the greens from the roots, and then scrubbed the roots with a vegetable scrub brush. 

3. All the websites instruct you to let the roots dry before you roast them. I left mine out for a couple of hours so they were not wet, though not technically dry either. I then roasted them in a 200 degree oven for a couple of hours, until crispy (the snap) and browned. They will smell like vanilla!

4. Crush or break up the roots. I put mine in a jar and then used the end of my rolling pin to crush them up more finely, a la a mortar and pestle, without needing to transfer the contents! 

Tea

Put a heaping spoonful of roots in a tea strainer and pour hot water (no longer boiling) over the top. Steep for 10 minutes. Serve as is, or with cream.

Onion Dandelion Pakora

I was out walking in the late afternoon sun yesterday when I spied some bright yellow dandelion heads. Remembering a recipe for dandelion fritters, I picked as many flowers as I could cradle in my cupped hand for the walk home. And, I resolved to carry some kind of vessel for future walks now that spring is here and edible things are popping up everywhere. The flowers fared well enough, though they lost a bit of their buoyancy from the cramped quarters.

The fritter recipe I'd saved included flour and beer, and when I was sorting through my GF flours to figure out what I might substitute, I came upon garbanzo flour. At which point I realized I wanted to make pakora with the dandelions, which are GF to begin with. That, food makers, was a very good call. I have never made pakora, but these were easy and delicious. The recipe I used was for onion pakora (with cilantro and jalapeno), and I opted to add the dandelion flowers rather than use them alone because I wasn't sure how the latter would go. Now that I've made them, I would do it - but the combo was great in this iteration.

The pakora recipe also included a "ketchup chutney" that was really good, despite seeming kind of weird. While not a tamarind sauce from Gorkha Palace, it was definitely tamarind-chutney-like, and in what turned out to be a fun "what-can-I-substitute" experiment, I made it with things I had. I did not have chaat masala spice mix, so made my own with heavy substitutions. I'll list them below in case you, like me, want to try this. I was rather impressed with my ingenuity to substitute sumac for mango powder, the most key ingredient in the mix. A substitution search told me to use tamarind powder (didn't have), or lemon or lime juice, because mango powder is tangy. At first I was going to use kefir lime leaves, but the ones I had were 10 years old (I am now rid of said lime leaves) and had no taste. But then I thought of sumac, which is tangy, and brings a middle eastern-Nepalese mash-up to this chaat masala.

I made half of this recipe, and it made 7 pakora clumps. If you are going to make the ketchup chutney, make that first so you can eat these as soon as they are done frying. Chaat Masala spice mix recipe and substitutions are at the bottom.

Ketchup Chutney
1/4 cup ketchup
1/2 Tablespoon water
1 teaspoon chaat masala
1/8 teaspoon sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
squeeze of lemon or lime 

Pakora Batter (serves 2-4)
1 cup Chickpea/Garbanzo Bean Flour
1/2 Tablespoon crushed red pepper flakes
1/2 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
1/8 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 green chili pepper, sliced
1/4 cup Cilantro leaves, chopped (I only had parsley)
1/2 yellow onion, sliced into 1/8-inch half moons
1/3 cup dandelion flowers
1/2+ cup luke-warm water
 Coconut oil for deep frying

Make the Chutney (Mix all ingredients together in a bowl.) 
Make the Pakoras.
1. Fill an 8-inch cast-iron skillet half-way up with oil. Heat the oil to 360-375ºF.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, red chili flakes, salt, baking powder, sliced chili pepper, cilantro, sliced onion and dandelion flowers.
3. Slowly add in the water, while mixing with a wooden spoon or your hands. Vigorously mix for a couple of seconds. The batter should be thick, almost like heavy (double) cream and there should be air bubbles throughout.
4. Once the oil is heated, carefully place in heaping tablespoonfuls of batter into the hot oil. Try not to overcrowd the oil because it will result in greasy pakoras. Fry until the pakoras are a pecan-brown.
5. Drain on a cooling rack placed over a cookie sheet.
6. Repeat with the remainder of the batter. Serve the warm pakoras right away with the Ketchup Chutney, and enjoy.

Chaat Masala spice mix, with substitutions:

3 tablespoons cumin seeds* sub powder
1 tablespoon coriander seeds

1 1/2 teaspoons fennel seeds
4 tablespoons raw mango/amchur powder* sub sumac
3 tablespoons powdered black salt* sub sea salt & decrease by half
1 1/2 teaspoons black pepper (freshly ground)
1/4 teaspoon asafetida powder* sub garlic or onion powder
1 1/2 teaspoons ginger powder
1 teaspoon dried, powdered mint* sub insides of a mint tea bag!
1 1/2 teaspoons ajwain/carom seeds* sub thyme

1. Heat cumin, coriander, and fennel seeds on a hot skillet. Dry roast until the seeds begin to turn a little darker and start to give off their aromas. Stir often while roasting, to prevent the seeds from burning.

2. When the seeds have roasted, remove them from the pan and spread on a plate to cool.

3. When cool, mix the seeds with all the other ingredients in a clean, dry, coffee grinder until you get a fine, smooth powder.