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it's coming down raisins:
these days shriveled is in
By: Thomas M. Ciesla
Originally published in texaswinetrails.com; December, 2000
Article has been reformatted for online publishing
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As the door to the 3rd
Millennium opens before us, Texas winemakers are rediscovering a wine
production technique associated with the celebrated wines of antiquity.
Dried grape wines are naturally sweeter, intense and complex; made by
either allowing the grapes to raisin on the vine, or by picking them at the
proper ripeness and drying them out.
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HISTORY
Having learned how to create wine from
dried grapes from inhabitants of Asia Minor, the ancient Greeks went on to
perfect these vinification techniques in the 8th century BC. The stems
of grape clusters were twisted to prevent sap from reaching the grapes,
causing them to shrivel. Another technique was to pick grapes and dry
them out in the sun on racks. Depending on the varietal, the grapes
would lose between 40-60% of their water. Wines produced from these
grapes were rich, larger-than-life, benefiting from years of maturation, and
were prized by ancient writers such as Homer, Cato, Pliny and Virgil.
The early robustness of raisin wines – the need to "loose their teeth" -- is
indicative of their longevity, critical in an era before the invention of
stoppered bottles.
Like the Greeks, Roman explorers planted
vineyards wherever they went. As a result, dried grape winemaking
techniques became embedded into the complex fabric of vinification traditions
in France, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Romania, and England. These
wines flourished from the 13th to 17th centuries, especially in Italy and
France, but today the practice survives only in isolated European enclaves.
Italy alone appears to have an unbroken tradition of raisin wine, often
produced at only the best estates around Tuscany, Trentino and Umbria.
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RAISIN WINE IN THE U.S.
California supplies half of the world's
raisins, 95% of which are made from Thompson Seedless grapes. Most
people know little about raisins beyond the clever marketing campaign
featuring the infamous Singing California Raisins.
The fact that you could make wine from
raisins was considered taboo in promoting sales of raisins until 1970. That
year the Raisin Advisory Board organized an American Raisin Vintners Guild,
and began selling home-winemaking kits for raisins in order to bolster
declining sales. A few years later sales of raisins rapidly increased, and
California wines gained national and international recognition.
Coincidentally, the subject of raisin wine seemed to, well, shrivel away.
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RAISIN WINE IN TEXAS
In 1998, you could be arrested for
making and selling raisin wine in Texas! The following year, the 76th
Texas Legislature passed Senate Bill 1676 which removed 'dried grapes, dried
fruits or dried berries', from the list of prohibited items in Section 101.65
of the Alcoholic Beverage Code. This legislature was passed due to the
diligent lobbying efforts of Shawn and Rocko Bruno. Shawn Bruno and
Gary George are co-owners of Bruno
and George Wines,Inc. in Sour Lake, Texas. Part of their goal in
establishing their winery was to be able to produce their grandfather's
favorite traditional Sicilian wine made from raisins. In 2001, Bruno
and George Wines will offer their Raisin Wine a big, bold dessert wine, and
Raisin Limited, which is slightly lighter in character.
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Comfort
Cellars in Comfort, Texas is planning to offer a raisin wine in 2001,
after an experimental batch created for fun received accolades from friends.
The brother and sister team of Cathy and Bob Winmill, trace their
interest in dried grape wine back to generations of family winemaking.
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Raisin wine can be
treated like any other dessert wine. Enjoy them on their own or with your
favorite dessert.
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