Hi,
I'm coming out of lurkdome to share some info about elderberry syrups and tinctures. Recently, with the swine flue I've heard a lot of talking about elderberry as a remedy for the seasonal flues and as a possible preventative for the swine flue. I bought a few pounds of sambucus nigra (the best variety) and I made a syrup with it.
We had been dealing with the flue for about a week. First my kids getting it, and then my husband and myself. It could have been the H1N1, but we'll never know. It was a little early for the regular flue and the weather was warm and beautiful. So I think the timing was good to try this out. I put one cup of dried berries into a pot with 5 cloves and a tsp of ginger and 6 cups of water. I brought this to almost a boil, and then simmered gently for about 30 minutes. The liquid was reduced to about half. I strained this out, added the pulp back to the pot and added 2 more cups of water and simmered again for 15 minutes then I strained that into the same liquid. I mixed the decoctions, and added a cup of raw honey to the liquid and 4 oz of vodka. (This acts as a preservative and will help keep it from spoiling as quickly.) I had about 6 cups of syrup. I split it into thirds and froze most of it but we all started taking some right away. A dose for an adult is about a tablespoon, maybe more if you are actually sick, every few hours. A childs dose is about a teaspoon or two depending on their size and how sick they may be. The pulp can be saved to make tea with, which I did because by the end of the day I was feeling really sick, and was starting to get chills. After I drank the pot of tea I felt a little better. Throughout the next couple of days, I took a tablespoon of the syrup every few hours and I didn't end up very sick at all. I had a mild sore throat which left in two days and a mild case of the sniffles. I have the real sense that it helped a lot. That it did prevent a more serious infection. I feel this because fore 3 weeks prior, since the start of our home school year, I've been dealing with a ton of stress, and about one week prior, I developed a nasty breast infection. So, I didn't want to face another week of being sick and not able to do my mommy duties. With all that stress, I wouldn't have been surprised to develop one of those nasty, lingering colds that I sometimes get.
So there is my first experience with elderberry and the cold/flue season. I want to repeat that I don't know if it was the swine flue or not, but I did think it was helpful for me, and for my children. I'm going to keep experimenting with it this year and we'll test it out when we can.
Does anyone have any experience to share with me about this? I'm sure somebody must know more than I do about it.
Since this worked so well, I've started a elderberry and echinacea tincture for the adults and will make more syrup for the kids. I do not like to use a lot of sugar when we are sick, so the amount of honey is really cut back. If you put more in it the keeping quality will improve, but I think freezing works, too.