Elderberry Wine Recipe

The short answer: to make one gallon of elderberry wine, strip 3 pounds of fully ripe elderberries off every stem, mash them in a straining bag and cover them with about 3½ quarts of boiling water in which 2 pounds of sugar have been dissolved. Once it is lukewarm, add acid blend, yeast nutrient and a Campden tablet, then pectic enzyme and wine yeast a day later. Ferment on the berries for two weeks, drain without squeezing, and age the wine in the dark for about a year. Never crush stems or leaves into the must.

Elderberry wine is a classic country wine, prized for its deep color. It is also the one fruit wine on this site where the preparation is a safety issue, not just a quality one, so start with the section below before you pick anything.

How Many Elderberries per Gallon?

Jack Keller, the wine judge and author whose work is gathered in his Requested Recipes Collection (2020), gives two fresh elderberry recipes that sit at opposite ends of the range: one uses 3 pounds of berries per gallon and the other 10 pounds. He says the difference is huge and shows in the wine, but that both are very good. The 3 pound version is the practical starting point if you are picking wild berries by hand.

The 10 pound version

Keller’s second recipe, adapted from Julius Fessler’s Guidelines to Practical Winemaking, uses 10 pounds of berries, 2¼ pounds of sugar, 6 pints of water, 1 teaspoon of acid blend, 1 of nutrient and ½ of pectic enzyme. The berries are brought slowly to a boil with ¾ pound of the sugar and half the water, cooled, and drip drained for two hours before the rest of the sugar and water go in. If you want the berries properly cooked, this is the method to follow, at any quantity.

Fresh or dried berries

Keller mentions using dried, imported elderberries because fresh ones are hard to find where he lived. Dried berries are a different recipe with far less fruit by weight, so do not swap them pound for pound into the card above.

Sugar, Acid and Yeast

Starting gravity

The 2 pounds of sugar on the card is a starting point; fruit varies, so measure. The Virginia Tech guide Wine Making for the Home Gardener (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2024) notes that a starting gravity of about 1.090 gives roughly 12% alcohol. NDSU Extension’s Getting Started With Home Winemaking (FN1638, reviewed August 2026) says 11 grams of sugar per liter raises gravity by about 0.004. Use a hydrometer and our sugar calculator to land on target.

Acid

The recipe adds 2 teaspoons of acid blend. Virginia Tech notes that most fruit musts benefit from added acid, and explains that too little acid leaves a wine tasting flat or bland, and too much makes it sharp, so add the blend and taste again later rather than doubling up.

Yeast

Keller uses Montrachet yeast. For a dark red like this one, Lalvin RC212 is a strong alternative: Lallemand rates it at 16% alcohol tolerance and 18 to 30 °C (64 to 86 °F), and selected it for red wines and color stability. Keep the primary near the warm end of that range; NDSU recommends 65 to 80 °F for fermenting fruit wines. More options are on our best wine yeasts page.

How to Make Elderberry Wine, Step by Step

Step 1: Pick and destem

Pick only clusters where the berries are dark and fully ripe. At home, pull the berries off with a fork or your fingers over a bowl and discard every stem. This is slow, and it is the step that matters most.

Step 2: Heat the berries

Put the berries in a nylon straining bag in the sanitized primary and mash them with gloved hands. Pour the boiling sugar water over them, or follow the boil method from the 10 pound version. Cover and let it cool.

Step 3: Additives, then wait

When the must is lukewarm, stir in the acid blend, yeast nutrient and crushed Campden tablet. Cover for 12 hours, stir in the pectic enzyme, and wait another 12 hours. NDSU suggests about a day between sulfite and yeast so the sulfite does not harm the wine yeast.

Step 4: Pitch the yeast

Add the yeast following the packet directions. Stir once a day and gently squeeze the bag to pull out color and flavor.

Step 5: Drain after two weeks

After 14 days, lift the bag and let it drip drain. Keller is clear that the berries are drip drained here, not squeezed. Combine the drippings with the rest and let it settle overnight.

Step 6: Secondary in the dark

Siphon the wine into a 1 gallon jug, fit an airlock and store it somewhere dark. Keller stresses that light fades elderberry’s color, so use a closet, dark bottles or both.

Step 7: Rack, stabilize, bottle

Rack and top up after two months, again two months later, and once more two months after that. Stabilize, wait 10 days, rack, sweeten if you like and bottle. Our guide to bottling and corking covers corks and storage. Keller ages the bottles in the dark for a year before opening.

Scaling Up: 5 Gallon Elderberry Wine

The 3 pound recipe scales in a straight line. A 5 gallon batch means destemming 15 pounds of berries, so plan an afternoon for it.

The Lalvin RC212 sachets in the kit box list one 5 g sachet as enough for 4.5 to 23 liters. Use a 7 to 8 gallon primary bucket and a 5 gallon carboy; see carboy vs bucket for which to buy.

Common Mistakes With Elderberry Wine

Leaving stems in

The CDC report is the reason this comes first. A few stems in a large batch are not worth the risk; take the time to strip them all.

Squeezing the bag at the end

Keller’s method drip drains the berries after the two weeks on the skins and tells you not to squeeze. Hang the bag over the bucket and let gravity do the work.

Letting light reach the wine

Keller’s whole note on color is about storage in the dark, from the secondary jug to the finished bottles.

Opening it too soon

Keller stores the bottles in the dark for a year before opening them. Our page on how long wine takes to ferment explains what is happening in the meantime.

For the general method behind every fruit wine, read how to make wine from fruit, or browse the full recipe collection. Make and drink wine responsibly, and only if you are of legal drinking age.