Method

Clean your nettles, tag out any grass etc

Boil nettles for 1 hour with 9 litres of water.
Leave to infuse till the mixture is at blood temperature.
The nettle water should turn the colour of a green tea.
I had to do this in 3 litre batches as I don’t have a big enough pan for 9 litres!

Drain the nettles through muslin cloth into large brewing bucket.
Give the muslin cloth a good squeeze to get as much of the fluid into your brewing tub as you can.

Add the  juice of two oranges and two lemons
Slowly add sugar, stirring constantly to ensure sugar dissolves fully.

At this stage you can test the taste if you want, it should taste like a nice fruit tea, but you don’t want tea you want booze!

Mix in 40 grams of Cream of Tartar.

Ensure mixture is at blood temperature then add 7g of bakers yeast.

Now cover the container and leave to ferment for 2-3 days in a warmish place.

I kept my mixture between 19-22 degrees centigrade.

Once fermentation is complete (should no longer be bubbling madly), remove any scum from the top of the mixutre. I used a seive for this. Then sipon the beer off into sterilised bottles and seal.

I use old beer bottles and have a crown capper to reseal, but have recently got hold of a load of the re-sealable Grolsch bottles! These are ideal,and eco-friendly!

Once you have siphoned and sealed your beer move it to a cool place and leave for at least 3 days before drinking. I’d say it’s best drunk within the month, but mine didn’t last that long!

Be carefully when opening as the beer can be fairly lively, now sit back relax and enjoy!

Let us know how you get on!

Thanks for reading,

Tom.