First Official

I guess this is as good a way as any to begin my first official post about making wine. I've been making beer for a few months with other people but not on my own. I hope to change that. I thought about keeping a diary of my process and see where it takes me. I finally got around to doing that and so here is my first official post.

I have a longstanding love affair with beers, being from the Pacific Northwest, where even the most modest dive bars will have amazing microbrews on tap. Where in my sleep I imagine rolling hills of hops, rivers flowing with dark wildflower honey, fruits are bursting on vine, branch and brambles, and bees are lazily pollinating. Unfortunately, where I live now is less than the dreams I have, and has left me starved for good beer.

In 2002 right before I left PNW I started hanging out with a friend whose husband homebrews. I mean whole grain brewing, outside in a huge vat. My contribution was to taste beer while he worked, keep up lively conversation, and pass items. I enjoyed that kind of learning and probably would have worked my way into being more of an active participant if I hadn't moved to the Midwest. After about 4 years in MN I met up with a fellow student's roommate, and together we did our first batch of homebrew. I was hooked. The late summer of 2008, a friend had a beer setup and we did up batch. I was rehooked. I talked about how I had wanted to do beer but it didn't make sense to buy equipment when I could just borrow his, but I wanted something that I could do in my own home, so made the decision to buy wine equipment instead and that we would just split up labor and exchange bottles and fruit picking.

Money, equipment, and space have kept brewing just out of my reach but when I decided to get the winemaking equipment I knew that brewing was just around the corner.

My first wine was a Vitner's Reserve Merlot because I love Merlot. I broke down and bought all the gadgets that would make my life a little simpler: the stirrer, the thief, the italian floor corker (oh baby was that a pleasure to use when bottling came), etc...I think I knew it was going to be something I enjoy, not just for the end result but for the peace it seems to bring me, when I realized that after a month into my wine making I was out buying more equipment. I had joined three online forums, I was picking up used books about wine, and generally annoying my friends with picture texts of my latest.

I'm 2 months into this and I can't wait to go out and pick fruit this summer.