The State of the Grape

Do you ever notice how one idea will lead to another?  This one is comes from the previous post.  “The State of the Grape” will be a monthly post with an update on the family muscadine grape vine.  Maybe boring, but fun for me and since I might be the only one reading this…it’s all about what I want to write/read.

yes there is a vine in there

Well as you can tell from this picture there seems to be 2 stray trees trying to grow up through the middle of the vine.  Paul is going to be taking care of that in the next week or so.  I love trees but these have to go. 

As far as the vine is concerned, it looks to be doing very well.  It's running all down the fence up all over the structure that the neighbors put up for it. 

I guess all I can say about it now is that it is dormant for winter and will be coming back to life in the spring.









 

If I had only shown this image, you might never have known the true state of the vine but then I would be acting like a politician.  I felt that the whole truth was best. 

Hopefully next month the trees will be gone and we can see the entire vine.

ideas and innovations

It’s all about ideas and innovations.  But without time and money it seems that these two things are a bit harder to achieve.  Maybe not the ideas.  Those are the free part.  The hard part is the innovation which takes experimentation which is where the funds are needed.  Time is another challenge.  With a full time job to support the funds needed for the experimentation/innovations time for the experimentation/innovations is limited.  Thus I wait.  I do the small things that build up to the big things.  I outline.  I keep notes.  I plan (in my head, thus the need for the note taking.)  I research.  I wait.  
Speaking of waiting, I can’t wait for my parent’s muscadine grape vine to produce grapes this year.  I used to eat the grapes from this vine as a kid.  It is over 30 years old.  It wasn’t tended to properly as a grape vine, just allowed to do it’s natural meandering up and down a chain link fence.  I never really thought much about the vine as a kid, it was just always there.  I never even conceived of making wine from it.  It wasn’t until around 2000 when I took a trip to the Lakeridge Winery did I even think about this grape as anything other than just a vine in my backyard that I ate grapes from.  So now that I’m making mead, I’m excited to pair the grapes with the mead in what is called pyment.  Here’s my dilemma.  I tend to fuss with things and I’m having a really hard time not fussing with the vine.  I know nothing about viniculture.  If I start messing with it I’m afraid I’ll kill it or ruin it.  I keep telling myself to just leave it alone.  It has been there for over 30 years without my intervention, it doesn’t need me now.  Let me tell you, I’m so very excited.  Can’t ya tell?  I feel like I found a hidden treasure in an attic only this one is in a backyard.  Back to the ideas.  One idea (depending on the yield) is to do two versions of muscadine pyment.  1 using some grapes at the peak of ripeness (not a proper phrase I’m sure), and 1 using grapes that are a little past peak.  I’m wondering if like some dessert wine which use grapes that are overripe because of the concentration of sugars, I wonder if using these in mead will have the same effect.  With ideas come concerns.  I’m debating with myself over the juicing options.  Three options that I can think of.  Two of which are very similar.  First, putting the grapes threw the juicer.  Second, mashing up the grapes.  Third, mashing the grapes and then boiling.  I’m a little concerned with the boiling thing, I don’t boil anything in my mead so I just don’t want to go that route.  Idea juice or Idea mash?  Keeping in mind that I will have limited supply of grapes so I have to decide one way or the other.  
I could go on and on but I'm tired and will not bore you any longer.


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image is sweeter than me

I've been trying to write this post for 2 days now.  I don't know why it is so hard for me to write.  I'm almost considering just not posting but I think that I really need to tackle this challenge.  I'm trying to address the misconceptions about mead.  I want to address the renaissance fair, hippy, sweet wine image of mead. 
Here's the thing.  Contrary to what most wine and beer lovers would like to believe most evidence shows that mead was the first fermented beverage.  Sorry, but it's true. 

And another thing, mead does not have to be sweet.  Just like wine it can be syrupy sweet or dirt dry.  Did ya know that?

Also, it's not just for ren fairs and hippys.  Although fun to have at ren fairs, it can be just as sophisticated and refined as wine.

So, here's is the thing.  Because as I've said before I have a tendency to have these grand ideas.  You know the one where I own a meadery and make award winning meads.  You know that one. **ahem**   Well, I've been thinking that to get to that point I'm going to need to change opinions and misconceptions about mead.  Not only make a tasty product and a variety of products but change the preconceived ideas about mead.  Would I be up to this challenge?  I think so.  I like to educate people.  Of course this means I need to make sure to thoroughly educate myself.   Speaking of, here is an interesting little article Mead, drink of vikings, comes out of dark ages just written in December. 

Let's see, where to go from here.  Yes, I will be trying to educate myself and others about mead, but also I would like to change up some standard mead techniques.  There are several things that are done as a standard way of brewing, but I would like to switch it up.  I've got ideas.  I've got no one to tell me "no" so we will see what happens. 

I can only find one thing wrong with everything meadery...it takes at least 9 months for mead to be ready to drink.  Even then, waiting a year would be even better.  Geesssh, I hate to wait. 

Oh, I think what I'm going to try to do this week is draw and color my own label.  We'll see what happens with that.

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vino wino

FYI - This is not a resolution.  Just so we are clear.  However this post is a declaration of a goal. 

It is my goal to visit 5 wineries in the coming year.  That is my goal, but I don't know how practical that will but so fine print reads: "or at lease purchase and taste wine from 5 wineries that I would have liked to visit in the SE region of the United States but due to financial restrictions could only afford to buy a couple bottles of wine."

It is also my goal to attend 3 wine tastings, not counting the tastings at the wineries. 

I've picked out the wineries I'm interesting in visiting.  3 in Florida and 2 in Georgia (we plan on vacationing in Georgia in April).  The wineries are:

Lakeridge Winery

Keel and Curley

Chateau Elan Winery

Habersham Winery

Schnebly Winery

I've listed these in likely hood of visitation.  Let's just say that I will most probably be ordering wine from the last two. 

As far as tastings are concerned, these will be done locally and maybe with groups of friends.  Hopefully with groups of friends, I think that would be really fun.  Ooh, I would also like to throw a couple of wine tasting parties. 

So yes, the vino is a new obsession, and not for intoxication purposes.  For instance, I just tried a wine that had the obvious "hey I contain alcohol" and I'm about to pour it down the drain.  I've even allowed it to breath and open up.  Still not good.  This is a good place for a wine review using my very unorthodox terms and young palette. 

First wine review by Julie Ford...how exciting (for me and nobody else I'm sure).

Brand: the Little Penguin - Shiraz
Price: $5 (2 for $10)
Year: 2009
I know, I'm such a sucker for a cute label and name and I'm such a nubie that I'll buy a $5 wine and then expect good things.  First impression: burn.  I felt like I was sniffing everclear liquor.  The taste was not bad, there was a fruitiness that wasn't bad, but then the alcohol burn on the back end.  This is what I mean by the "i contain alcohol" statement.  This just hit me with alcohol burn.  I opened and let it breath for over an hour.  Still burn, a little less and I tasted other nice fruit flavors.  But then burn.  Maybe this wine just needs some time on the shelf to mellow out, maybe in another year I'll try the 2009 again.  I still have another bottle of a white (can't remember which).  Here's hopping it doesn't scream alcohol too.