Helen S. Wright, my paternal grandmother and author of Old Time Recipes for Home Made Wines, took quite a shine to gooseberry wine and includes eight in her book. She notes that one recipe comes from a French work. The one shown here is the first of her entries. Other entries include two more for plain gooseberry wine, and one each for gooseberry and currant, pearl gooseberry, red gooseberry, red and white gooseberry, and white gooseberry wine or champagne. Grandmother seems to have made quite a collection of these.
In Grandmother’s words:
Boil four gallons of water, and one-half pound of sugar an hour, skim it well, and let it stand till it is cold. Then to every quart of that water, allow one and one-half pounds of gooseberries, first beaten or bruised very well; let is stand twenty-four hours. Then strain it out, and to every gallon of this liquor put three pounds of sugar; let it stand in the vat twelve hours. Then take the thick scum off, and put the clear into a vessel fit for it, and let it stand a month; then draw it off, and rinse the vessel with some of the liquor. Put it in again, and let it stand four months, and bottle it.
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