Let me preface this by saying I live in a "dry county". Some may not know what that is, and will find this hard to believe. A dry county is an area that forbids the sale of alcoholic beverages, except at private clubs. This sad fact means I have to drive 1 hour (round trip) to purchase wine for home consumption.
So years ago I started making my own wine, in my basement. It's easy, and the wine is good. I just ran across a website that sells juice pressed from Italian grapes, and I've already placed a big order. Each "kit" makes 30 standard bottles of wine. They have kits for Brunello, "Castellina Supertuscan Di Sienna" (this kit also includes the grape skins, for full flavor), "Italian Montepulciano", "Italian Sangiovese", plus a few other kits from Italian grapes.
The Brunello kit costs $119, making it about $4/bottle, but I'll bet it's much tastier than the price would indicate.
I'm sure there are other sites that sell these kits also. Really, the only problem is the 3-to-5 year wait before they're ready to drink!
________________ When life gives you lemons, make limoncello.
Frankly, it seems far more worthwhile to drive 30 minutes to stock up on several cases of wines, then to go through the trouble of making it and then waiting for it to age.
Posts: 162 | Location: Campbell, California | Registered: 18 January 2005
Originally posted by hazel1: Frankly, it seems far more worthwhile to drive 30 minutes to stock up on several cases of wines, then to go through the trouble of making it and then waiting for it to age.
Dry county. You're not allowed to bring in "several cases" at one time. But you can make a good supply each year for personal consumption.
Mainly, it's the fun of the hobby, of drinking something you produced yourself, and the ability to enjoy wines that would never be available commercially in this part of the world...for example Brunello, "Castellina Supertuscan Di Sienna", "Italian Montepulciano", "Italian Sangiovese".
________________ When life gives you lemons, make limoncello.
I'm curious who would stop you from bringing in the wine?. Assuming its the state police or highway potrol what are the odds of being stopped? I've been stopped maybe 3 times in a million miles of driving. RR
I'd drive to the west coast and bring back a few cases of grapes
I thought the prices of wine must and grapes in Toronto had been getting out of hand. But over $100 for less then one pail? Yikes somebody is getting rich on those prices.
Originally posted by Robert Rainey: I'm curious who would stop you from bringing in the wine?.
The state police occasionally sit near the liquor stores and make random stops of customers who leave them and drive into the adjacent dry county (the stores are just over the county line).
I choose not to risk getting stopped.
But the point of my post was just my excitement to find the great Italian grapes available to me for home wine making. It was the only thread of Italian travel connection that let me make this post (one that I expected to be deleted immediately, but I was excited and wanted to share it)!
________________ When life gives you lemons, make limoncello.
Robert, you are used to the liberal California rules concerning alcohol and its sale. In many border states, controls are run regularly for bringing alcohol across state lines. In southern Pennsylvania, for example, alot of people run accross to Delaware where there the alcohol laws are more liberal and there is no sales tax. State trooper controls have the right not only to confiscate the booze but also the vehicle.
Back to the OP, well, you know, I think it is a solution for the position in which you find yourself. I would imagine it is impossible to control the quality of the juice, or whether it is pure Sangiovese or whatever, but it is guaranteed to be better than no wine at all. Maybe you could get some Cabernet juice from Napa, mix it 8 to 1 with the Brunello and start making your own SuperArkansas??
Originally posted by Diana Strinati Baur: Maybe you could get some Cabernet juice from Napa, mix it 8 to 1 with the Brunello and start making your own SuperArkansas??
Cindy ~ "Follow your Bliss." Find where it is, and don't be afraid to follow it. ~ Joseph Campbell
Posts: 767 | Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA | Registered: 16 November 2005
Originally posted by Nick z: But over $100 for less than one pail?
The kits come with 16 liters of 100% pure varietal grape juice, so it's a lot more than a pail.
Plus its one of those deals where you pay their price or do without. Where else can you get it? I want that real Italian juice!
I'm used to a pail being either 20 or 30 litres. I forget
Drive up to Toronto after Labour day. You'll find plenty. To be honest must is often in stock more then that. It's fresh grapes that are basically a fall thing.
Originally posted by Tim in Piemonte: Somebody brought us a "SuperTexan" wine to try out, but frankly all I could taste was the oak. I needed a chainsaw to get it out of the glass
That's Texas for you. I'm pretty sure the SuperTexan is aged in mesquite, but they sometimes use Live Oak
________________ When life gives you lemons, make limoncello.
Originally posted by JuniorBalloon: This sounds like a great and fun idea. What kind of a container do you use to age the wine?
You can buy oak barrels for aging, but it takes a lot of wine to fill one. I make batches of just 30 bottles (6 gallons) at a time, let it ferment in a plastic bucket, then move it to a 6 gal. glass jug with an air lock to clarify a few weeks before bottling (I use "saw dust" of French Oak in the ferment/clarify stage to give a little of the oak flavor). I age them in the bottle, in a wine cellar I built in my basement. The white wines are good to drink after about 6 months in the cellar. I age the red wines 3 years before drinking. I make a few batches each year, so there are always new batches coming of age and ready to drink throughout the year. Life is good. Not as good as in Italy, but good.
________________ When life gives you lemons, make limoncello.
