Today I'm making a loaf of farm fresh zucchini bread with the intention of it's being full of gratitude, abundance, and the movement towards fruition of all that's positive.

How are you celebrating?

Wishing a bountiful Lammas for you all.

Veda.....thank you for reminding us of the first harvest festival of the year. Sounds like you are celebrating by using fresh produce of the season. Baking something that incorporates the local harvest is customary. I don't have the time to bake today but I will celebrate in spirit.

Debbie, the intention is all that's ever needed the rest just helps us be present. I feel so blessed to be a member of a CSA (community supported agriculture) this year, and to, as a result, have an abundance of local produce already on hand. It's certainly supporting my desire to celebrate the harvest. That combined with the gift of a day off, is allowing me to bake and share bread with my nearby family. I am so thankful...

That's wonderful, Veda. Thanks again for sharing with us.

Happy Lammas To all. I'll cook and make something delicious for my dinner. And I'll definitely include blackberries.

Hoping to find a jar, and time, to make some Blackberry Port

A very bountiful and happy Lammas to all of you -- spiritually or in the physical, may you all enjoy this wonderful time of year.

Mmmm.... blackberries are on my shopping list for this weekend. I have been making breads this week and just the act of doing so fills me spiritually with abundance and goodness of the harvest.

If you could share the Blackberry Port recipe, Ian, I would be ever so grateful.....

Yes, that sounds wonderful Ian! I'd love to be able to create a homemade version of blackberry port.

Blackberries are a wonderful fruit. I love eating them as they are, on cereal or ice cream, and as a jam. I bet there are some baked goods recipes that incorporate blackberries. I'm sure I would love a pastry with blackberries baked in.

The basic Blackberry Port recipe is:

1 Gallon of Blackberries (about eight pounds)
1 pint (pound) of sloes
1 pint damson plums
1 gallon boiling water
1/2 oz yeast
1 large slice of bread - toasted

In a clean (plastic) bucket pour the boiling water over the fruit. leave for eight days, tightly covered with a muslin cloth. M ash the mixture each day with your fingers or a wooden spoon

Strain and squeeze every drop of moisture from the fruit before throwing it away. This is best done first through a fine sieve and then putting the remaining damp pulp in a old clean cloth such as an old tea towel and using that like an icing bag but with no nozzle or holes.

Strain the liquid collected so far through three thicknesses of muslin

Add the sugar and stir until it is dissolved. Spread the yeast over the toast, and float it on the liquid yeast side down. cover the bucket tightly with a clean cloth and leave in a warm area for a week to ferment.

Then skim and put into loosely corked bottles, or bottles corked with cotton wool and put in an area with a steady temperature. NOT THE ATTIC OR AN OUTBUILDING - for at least seven months.

Drinkable after this time, but best kept in firmly corked bottles for at least a year. Reaches its' best in 3-5 years, still good after this. Ten years longest kept

As you can tell from the above this is a very old Craft recipe from 100+ years ago. What I do is use a plastic bucket, rinse all the equipment with boiling water to sterilise it and make sure I tie a cord tight around the bucket to keep the vinegar fly out.

I also put the fermenting liquor into gallon jugs, having first sterilised them buy filling them with water and adding two baby bottle sterilising tablets. Then rinsing them out and adding the
liquor as described. Then I cork them tightly with cork pierced for an airlock, add that, and leave it to 'work', usually in a quiet corner of the kitchen. When fermentation stops I pour the new wine into bottles, cork them tightly, and leave them to mature. Usually for 18 months plus

Remember, the measures are all imperial and will need to be converted to their US equivalents.

What is a sloe? And which type of yeast?

I worry about spoilage. How can you tell if a batch is ruined?

Annnnd the fun begins!

This is the Wikipedia explanation of a Sloe. Basically the plums and sloes provide a source of sugar, flavour, and 'depth' to the wine. You may well be able to compensate by substituting nectarines for the sloes - this sort of experimentation is part of traditional home winemaking.
{Also some people have told me that the best wine is made with fruit that is bruised or going soft as the natural winemaking process is underway}

After I logged out I had another look through my Craft notes and came across this recipe for Blackberry Mead

"Boil one pound of barley in 5 quarts water for 12 mins (timed). Stand for one minute, then pour all the water off the barley.
Add to this water 6 pounds ripe blackberries, 1 pound black plums, and boil for 15 mins.
Strain and add 1 pound of honey to each quart and stir it away [stir until it dissolves]

All timings to be exact"

Add to fermentation demijohn, and proceed as usual winemaking.

The key to keeping the brew from spoiling is keeping all the equipment clean in the first place. I tend to rinse everything I can in boiling water before use, make sure I sterilise the jar or glassware used in the secondary fermentation. Then keep the fermentation in the bucket tightly covered with one layer of thick cloth, or several layers of thin ones. This keeps the vinegar fly out which is the main spoiler of home-made wine.

Sometimes there is a little bit of mould on the pulp in the bucket- just carefully remove it with a large spoon.

Also I used rainwater where possible filtered through cloth and well boiled.

You can get all sorts of yeast these days. In the time these recipes were written there was only bakers yeast, or relying on the natural yeast on the fruit itself. I'd start with the stuff in the bread aisle made up as like the suggestions on the packet. If you can get yeast paste and use it on toast so much the better.

As to tell when a batch is ruined- when it won't ferment, goes an interesting colour, or smells 'odd' are about the best indications.
Once the yeast starts 'working' it usually out-breeds any noxious bacteria and the positive pressure and pooling of the resultant CO2 acts as good protection too.

Wonderful. Thank you Ian!

Sounds quite interesting but it is a bit labor intensive for me. I don't have the time, but if anyone here makes it please let me know how it turns out.

My pleasure Veda. Even more fun if you can spare a cauldron to start the must (ingredients) in. You'd have a self-seething cauldron without need of a fire!

A cauldron......very neat, Ian!

That's a beautiful image you've conjured up Ian