[singlepic id=58 w=220 float=left] Since arriving at Gwalia we have started to get keen on the ‘good life’ of making stuff, some such stuff is wine. This isn’t really a new idea. Harry and Livy used to make wine when I was little so there’s a fair amount of bottles and equipment tucked away at the back of one of the barns. I went exploring!
[singlepic id=55 w=220 float=right] We were surprised to discover a very, very old looking bottle of wine. “Let’s try it!” I said. Thinking about it, we have calculated that the wine is probably 25 years old (at least), Harry and Livy stopped making wine c.1988 so let’s discover if this was a vintage year…
I had some difficulty persuading the others to try. We identified it as crab-apple wine, it had a very dry, sherry-like smell – not too bad. It looks great, clear and colourful a deep amber it reminds me of a yummy dessert wine. However “dessert wine” was not a good thing to be thinking when tasting this one, it was really, very dry and had a slightly pungent flavour. Here’s Dee after I persuaded her to try –
We tried adding lemonade to sweeten it up a bit. This made it clear that it was crab apple wine, it tasted and smelled like cider. Much more palatable as it lost the dryness but unfortunately maintained the pungent slightly off flavour. Here’s Dee with the lemonade added –
We threw it away and endeavoured to make our own. Probably not worth ageing this stuff for 25 years though.
Have a look at the wine-making gallery here