The healing properties of elderflowers and berries have been known since the Middle Ages. Elderberry has a sweat-inducing effect, it relieves fever and colds. To use it as a medicine, the flowers must first be dried or the berries pressed.
Elderberry juice is very rich in vitamins and healthy
Obtain elderberry juice by cold pressing
In September and October, the black elderberries are ripe and can be harvested. You should make sure that the berries are completely black and therefore ripe. Wash the berry clusters under running water and pluck the small berries from the stalks. Now you can squeeze them out in two different ways:
- with a juice centrifuge or
- with a juicer
Juice extraction with a centrifuge
First put a particularly fine grater in the centrifuge so that you get a decent juice yield. Put the cleaned elderberries in the feed chute and start the machine. The berries are crushed and spun so fast that the juice and pomace are separated into two separate containers. You can then let the juice flow through a cheesecloth and filter out the small berry seeds.
Extraction of juice with a fruit press
Fruit presses come in different sizes. For occasional household use, a small to medium-sized press is sufficient.
All presses work the same way. The fruits are in a sieve or perforated container. This in turn is in a collection container. Using a threaded spindle, you move a pressure plate down into the perforated container and squeeze out the berries inside. The juice flows through the holes into the collection container and can be conveniently drained. Here, too, it is advisable to pour the juice through a cheesecloth so that the small berry seeds are removed.
The use of cold-pressed elderberry juice
The healing properties of elderberry are well known, but it is also known that the seeds in the berries in particular contain a toxin called sambunigrin. Eating unripe berries and drinking the cold-pressed juice can cause nausea, vomiting, cramps and diarrhea.
You can avoid such complaints by always heating the cold-pressed juice before consumption.
The heat completely destroys the toxin and the juice can be drunk without regret.
The garden journal freshness ABC
How can fruit and vegetables be stored correctly so that they stay fresh for as long as possible?
The garden journal freshness ABC as a poster:
- as a free PDF file to print out yourself