Two more Nettle beer recipes including a Stronger Nettle Beer

Many thanks to stonehead (see left) for posing these recipes on the forum and allowing me to use them here. Stonehead is self sufficient with the ish. He lives up in Scotland where he lives with his family on a croft you can read more about him in his blog.

Stonhead states that when you collect the nettles you should only take the tops as there are many insects who benefit from the plant and you will be taking away their habitat if you take the whole nettle.

We do already have a nettle beer recipe that has been featured at The National Nettle Day held at the natural history museum in London. We were delighted to help out, Dave's recipe for nettle haggis was also featured.

Stronger Nettle Beer Recipe

Ingredients

10lb young nettles (the top six leaves or so, easy way to measure is 10 carrier bags full)
40 pints water
10 lemons, (juice them and then cut off the rind)
5lb demerara sugar
1lb white sugar
5oz cream of tartar
1.5 oz yeast (baking yeast is fine)

Method

Rinse the nettles (if you can be bothered!), drain and boil in the water for 15 minutes. Either do this in a six-gallon brewing boiler or do it in batches if you only have smaller pots.

Strain the liquor into a fermentation vat, containing the lemon juice, lemon rind (no pith), sugars and cream of tartar. Stir vigorously and allow to cool to blood temperature.

Sprinkle the yeast over the top, cover the vat loosely with a cloth and leave for 24 hours. Replace the cloth with an airlock and leave to ferment for a further 3-4 days.

Strain and either bottle or keg. If using a keg, it's worth adding another half pound of white sugar to help get the pressure up.

Leave for at least seven days before drinking. Serve chilled.

This is much stronger in flavour and alcohol than my other recipe. If you want to add finings, do it at day three, leave for 24 hours and then bottle or keg.

Stoneheads Nettle beer recipe

Ingredients

5 gallons of water
3 bags of nettle tips
2 lemons, juiced
2 oranges, juiced
3kg sugar
100g cream of tartar
Yeast (Girvan 5 is good, but if I haven't any I just use bread yeast, beer yeast or even my rye leaven!)
Large dandelion root, chopped (optional)
Large ginger root, chopped (optional)

Don't use both the dandelion and the ginger, use either or none!

Method

Boil the water - either in batches or get a brewing boiler (a 6-gallon one is good for doing 5 gallons as you get less splashing).

Put the nettle tips in a large tub (at least 6 gallons), and pour the boiling water over them. Leave to infuse until cooled to around 35-36C (usually takes a couple of hours).

Strain back into your boiler (or a multitude of pots!). Add the lemon and orange juice, the sugar and the cream of tartar. Heat gently and stir until the sugar has dissolved - do not boil - and then transfer into a brewing vat.

Leave to cool to about 20C (overnight is usually best), then pitch the yeast. If using leaven, I spread it on a piece of toast and then float the toast on the liquid.

Cover the vat loosely with muslin and leave to stand in a warm place for about three days. (Or use a brewing heater set to 20C.)

Carefully skim any scum off the surface, then rack the beer into beer bottles, taking care not to disturb the sediment. Leave to condition for a week or so, then serve cold.