Thanks for taking the time to reply with such a thoughtful comment. I'll definitely try the dandelion wine and let you know how it goes! In the interim, I feel a post about vine leaves coming on! Have a great day!
Wow, I love it. That makes things so simple. I get all stressed out about how to prune. At my last place I never pruned but the grapes got really small. Thanks Ashley! I'm on the fence! 💓
We actually don't prune our grapes at all. They're completely ignored, but we have a lot of fence line, and at this point we harvest about a 5 gallon bucket full from every 10-15 feet of fence. (8ft tall)
Yes! Thank you! Not going to make any grape wine in the near future but thank you for making this available! Also, and this is off-topic, but as you had said earlier you have no plans for a book.. Does there exist an option to have blogs printed off as books? Just cheap and plain? I would pay for a paper copy of that! This is not urgent or necessary, just was thinking about it and thought I would throw it out there to consider for future.
I have a tutorial on how to print the blog posts coming up shortly, I just need a bit of tech support from my computer savvy husband to finish it. Soon!
Absolutely brilliant Ashley....You are totally awesome...and so practical...Your information was very thorough....and I do thank you so much for all your sharing...and caring...again, you're the best! Hugs and love, Barbara from Sydney xoxoxo
Thank you SO much for this! It took me a while to get around to reading, but it's exactly what I wanted! I'm going to pick up my order of grapes today, so will be trying out some wine-making (actually mead) recipes in the near future. I do have a refractometer to measure sugar since we make our own maple syrup. I've been reading a lot into making wine, so I'm ready for a challenge. Thanks again!!
As a complete novice, I think I may pass on this project and start with something simpler. As an herbalist I think that dandelion wine might be a nice project. In regards to your vines - do you use the leaves? I've tinctured them in the past and made quite a good remedy for piles. You've encouraged me to revisit this project - the only issue is where to source the leaves! My last batch came from a friend who brought them back from a holiday in France. Perhaps a Substack collab may be in order! Thanks for so generously sharing all your hard work Ashley. I'm really enjoying reading through the archive and will update you on my efforts with the dandelion project should it come to fruition. Have a great weekend!
I actually haven't really used the leaves, other than as a tannin source for winemaking with low tannin fruits, and to help keep pickles crunchy. But not for herbal medicine at all.
As to a source, there are wild grape vines around every corner here. Literally you can't walk in the country for more than 100 feet without seeing one, but I guess it is incredibly rural here. I haven't been "to the city" in a decade, and of course not everywhere is as covered with wild grapes as it is here. Just funny, it never occurred to me that anyone would have trouble sourcing grape leaves...but of course that'd happen =)
Our grapes are at the very end of life, as frosts come early up here. I'd imagine they'd be better for remedies earlier in the season? (But I honestly don't know?)
Enjoy the dandelion wine. It comes out rather thin as a sugar wine, but truly spectacular as a mead. I'd strongly recommend using honey in place of sugar (3 lbs per gallon) if you're going to go through all the trouble of cleaning dandelion petals for the project. Honey is more expensive for sure, but so worth it.
Thanks for taking the time to reply with such a thoughtful comment. I'll definitely try the dandelion wine and let you know how it goes! In the interim, I feel a post about vine leaves coming on! Have a great day!
Wow, I love it. That makes things so simple. I get all stressed out about how to prune. At my last place I never pruned but the grapes got really small. Thanks Ashley! I'm on the fence! 💓
How do you prune your grapes?
We actually don't prune our grapes at all. They're completely ignored, but we have a lot of fence line, and at this point we harvest about a 5 gallon bucket full from every 10-15 feet of fence. (8ft tall)
Yes! Thank you! Not going to make any grape wine in the near future but thank you for making this available! Also, and this is off-topic, but as you had said earlier you have no plans for a book.. Does there exist an option to have blogs printed off as books? Just cheap and plain? I would pay for a paper copy of that! This is not urgent or necessary, just was thinking about it and thought I would throw it out there to consider for future.
I have a tutorial on how to print the blog posts coming up shortly, I just need a bit of tech support from my computer savvy husband to finish it. Soon!
Absolutely brilliant Ashley....You are totally awesome...and so practical...Your information was very thorough....and I do thank you so much for all your sharing...and caring...again, you're the best! Hugs and love, Barbara from Sydney xoxoxo
Thank you!
Thank you SO much for this! It took me a while to get around to reading, but it's exactly what I wanted! I'm going to pick up my order of grapes today, so will be trying out some wine-making (actually mead) recipes in the near future. I do have a refractometer to measure sugar since we make our own maple syrup. I've been reading a lot into making wine, so I'm ready for a challenge. Thanks again!!
As a complete novice, I think I may pass on this project and start with something simpler. As an herbalist I think that dandelion wine might be a nice project. In regards to your vines - do you use the leaves? I've tinctured them in the past and made quite a good remedy for piles. You've encouraged me to revisit this project - the only issue is where to source the leaves! My last batch came from a friend who brought them back from a holiday in France. Perhaps a Substack collab may be in order! Thanks for so generously sharing all your hard work Ashley. I'm really enjoying reading through the archive and will update you on my efforts with the dandelion project should it come to fruition. Have a great weekend!
Yeah, it can be a tricky place to start for sure.
I actually haven't really used the leaves, other than as a tannin source for winemaking with low tannin fruits, and to help keep pickles crunchy. But not for herbal medicine at all.
As to a source, there are wild grape vines around every corner here. Literally you can't walk in the country for more than 100 feet without seeing one, but I guess it is incredibly rural here. I haven't been "to the city" in a decade, and of course not everywhere is as covered with wild grapes as it is here. Just funny, it never occurred to me that anyone would have trouble sourcing grape leaves...but of course that'd happen =)
Our grapes are at the very end of life, as frosts come early up here. I'd imagine they'd be better for remedies earlier in the season? (But I honestly don't know?)
Enjoy the dandelion wine. It comes out rather thin as a sugar wine, but truly spectacular as a mead. I'd strongly recommend using honey in place of sugar (3 lbs per gallon) if you're going to go through all the trouble of cleaning dandelion petals for the project. Honey is more expensive for sure, but so worth it.