Fruit Wine

[Sam Salmon]

Hope this isn't too OT.

I have here a Fruit Wine that tasted not bad/best of the bunch when I tried it back during the summer-well everybody makes mistakes.

There's a green twig taste that lurks in the background and doesn't improve the balance.

Has anyone here ever had a Fruit Wine that was truly outstanding in terms of taste/acidity/sweetness or is that asking too much of a palate accustomed to the Real Thing?

[Malkavian]

The only good fruit wines I've had that come to mind were made from: stone fruit (apples or plums particularly) and blackberries. To my mind a proper blend of apples (ie sharp, bittersharp and etc, just as in cidermaking) fermented skillfully is a wonderful thing. Ditto blackberries, as they are tart and flavorful enough to be made into a wine that doesn't need sweetness to be palatable. Complexity seems to be the key.

Not to say those necessarily demonstrated the complexities or aging potential of grape wines, but they could certainly be a far cut above typical fruit wines i see (which tend towards sweet berries and wild grapes) Each has its place, I would say.

[Sam Salmon]

Yes now that you mention it I've tasted a Blackberry Port that was worth wile.

[MattJohnson]

I have a bottle blackberry port from a Columbia valley winery at home. Have to bust that out sometime.

[Rebel Rose]

I bought a bottle of Bartlett pear wine made in Washington State as a novelty--I thought it would be awful, but it was actually very, very nice. I also had a completely dry strawberry wine that was a lovely rose red and had a surprisingly floral aroma and flavor without tasting "sweet."

A lot of the "home winemaking" recipes I have seen require a disgusting amount of sugar. I don't believe it's necessary if you ferment the fruit in the right conditions.

[Daniel Rogov]

In the beginning, God created the grape because in her great wisdom she knew that no other fruit would ever produce wines with such complexity and elegance. Because God gave men and women free will, they went on to mess with a whole bunch of other fruits to make wines. God didn't really rest on the seventh day. After a few glasses of Brut Champagne she did take the time to clean hercellar of all of those fruit wines.

On a more fully serious note, I have tasted many pleasant fruits wines. I have never tasted one that came anywhere near greatness.

[Jonathan Kaplan]

Well... Greatness *is* a lot to ask of a wine...

Bartlett Winery, in Maine, produces some very fine non-grape fruit wines. I think their dry peach has hints of a very good Alsace in it -- not a great one, but then, very few Alsace wines are great. Their dry blueberry is perhaps overrated by them, but it is quite nice, again, not great, but really quite good. And their sweet wines are fun -- not serious, not remarkable, but very pleasant for dessert.

And given that they don't cost too much $, whenever I'm in Maine, I tend to buy a lot of their stuff, and enjoy it.

jk

[nibor]

In the beginning, God created the grape because in her great wisdom she knew that no other fruit would ever produce wines with such complexity and elegance.  Because God gave men and women free will, they went on to mess with a whole bunch of other fruits to make wines.  God didn't really rest on the seventh day.  After a few glasses of Brut Champagne she did take the time to clean hercellar of all of those fruit wines.

On a more fully serious note, I have tasted many pleasant fruits wines.  I have never tasted one that came anywhere near greatness.

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Mr. Rogov, you are my favorite eGulleteer.