The Elder at the Edge of the Wood

Walk any country lane in late May or early June and you will smell it before you see it. Elderflower has a heavy, sweet, almost wine-like scent that drifts out of the hedgerow on a warm afternoon, and once you know it you will never mistake it for anything else. Elder is a shrub of the woodland edge and the old hedge bank. Traditional woodland management has always suited it: it coppices readily, grows quickly in sunlit gaps, and crops heavily on the sheltered side of a laid hedge. A hedge cut on a sensible rotation, and laid every ten or fifteen years, gives elder exactly what it wants — light at the top, damp soil at the root, and the occasional bit of disturbance.

In return it feeds a whole summer's worth of wildlife. The creamy flower heads are a magnet for hoverflies, beetles and solitary bees, and later the dark berries see blackbirds, song thrushes and wintering fieldfares through the lean months. Picking a few heads for the kitchen does no harm at all, provided you pick with care.

Choosing and Picking Your Blooms

Timing matters more than anything else with elderflower. Go out on a dry morning, after the dew has lifted but before the sun gets high — that is when the pollen is fresh and the scent is at its strongest. Flowers picked in the rain, or late in the day, will be limp and will give you a dull, slightly cabbagey cordial.

• Choose heads where the tiny flowers are fully open and creamy-white, with a little green stem showing. Avoid anything brown, closed or dropping.
• Shake each head gently over the hedge to dislodge insects. Do not wash the flowers; you would wash away the pollen that carries much of the flavour.
• Snip the heads cleanly with scissors, leaving a short stem. Never strip a bush bare — take no more than a quarter of the open flowers from any one shrub.
• Leave the flowers on bushes beside busy roads, and those growing where you do not have permission. Ask first if you are in any doubt.
• Get the flowers home quickly. A cool bag or a basket lined with a cloth will keep them fresh for an hour or two.

The Traditional Method

This is the old farmhouse way, and it has barely changed in a century. The quantities below make roughly three litres of cordial.

• 20 to 30 large elderflower heads, freshly picked
• 1.5 kg granulated sugar
• 1.7 litres water
• 2 unwaxed lemons, zest pared in strips and juice reserved
• 30 g citric acid (optional, but it helps the cordial keep)

Bring the water and sugar slowly to the boil in a large pan, stirring until the sugar has dissolved completely. Take it off the heat and let it cool for a few minutes, then add the lemon zest, the strained lemon juice, the citric acid if you are using it, and finally the elderflower heads. Push them under the surface with a clean spoon. Cover the pan with a cloth and leave it somewhere cool for twenty-four hours — some people leave it forty-eight, which gives a stronger, more perfumed syrup, though it can begin to taste slightly bitter. Strain the liquid through a double layer of muslin into a clean jug or bowl. Do not squeeze the flowers; let gravity do the work.

Straining, Bottling and Keeping

Sterilise your bottles by washing them in hot soapy water and drying them in a low oven, or by filling them with boiling water and letting them stand. Funnel the cordial in while it is still slightly warm, filling each bottle to within a centimetre of the top, and seal immediately. It will keep for several weeks in the fridge and for a year or more in a cool, dark cupboard. If you prefer, freeze it in plastic bottles — leave a good gap at the neck, as the syrup expands.

To serve, dilute roughly one part cordial to five parts chilled water, sparkling water or dry white wine. A sprig of mint and a slice of lemon turn it into something worth putting on a table.

Elder in the Craft Year

Elderflower is only the first of the shrub's gifts. In autumn the berries make a dark, rich syrup and a traditional country wine, though they must always be cooked — the raw berries, and the leaves, stems and roots, contain compounds that will make you unwell. The wood itself is a craftsman's standby: pale, close-grained and easy to cut, it has been hollowed for whistles and flutes, split for skewers and nets, and its pith was once used to clean the delicate workings of clocks. An elder cut back hard in winter will throw up fresh straight rods by midsummer, which is precisely why it has always been welcome in a working hedgerow.

So when you next walk the lanes with a basket, remember you are taking part in an old arrangement. The hedge gives you flowers and berries; you give it a tidy hand here and there, and it goes on feeding the bees, the birds and the next person along the path. That is woodland management of the most agreeable kind.