Fight the cold and flu season with Autumn Olive Oxymel Medicinal

Autumn Olive is a superfood

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Autumn olive berries have a high amount of Vitamin C. The Ruby red variety has more lycopene than even tomatoes.

I have autumn olive growing in my pasture. I harvested the berries in October and froze them for use in this recipe in the winter.

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Autumn Olive Oxymel Recipe

Ingredients:

• Autumn olive berries
• Filtered, unchlorinated water
• Raw honey
• Vinegar – I use asparagus vinegar from my recipe on another page on this site: https://freedomfarmer.net/make-asparagus-vinegar

Step 1 : Blend autumn olive and filtered water in a blender.

Step 2: Strain through a fine mesh sieve to remove the seeds and debris:

Step 3: Add raw honey to taste.

I add as much honey as I like. Make sure it is raw honey!

Step 4: Add vinegar to taste, just to make it tangy.

This depends on how strong the vinegar is. Bragg’s apple cider vinegar is too strong for me, so I only add a few splashes. For my own vinegar, which is very mild (see recipe link above), I use a couple of tablespoons.

This oxymel can be used to boost your immunity when you feel a cold coming on. Drink a half cup twice a day.

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Is Autumn Olive Invasive?

Some sites call Autumn Olive invasive. Some states outlaw it. Why?

Autumn Olive is a nitrogen fixing plant that is extremely vigorous. It may outperform other plants. Some sites say that autumn olive is spread by birds eating the berries and will take over a pasture. I have not seen that in my pasture nor in the Community Garden in town.

My autumn olive gets to be a very wide and tall bush, but I have not seen it spread. One of the Red Ruby varieties I have is somewhat thorny. But overall, it stays put. I do not eat the berries off the tree – I always process them into oxymel.

I have tried propagating autumn olive by cuttings. They initially do well but usually do not make it through the summer heat.

Try autumn olive in your food forest.