Vintage 1979

When I was growing up, my parents made wine.  They started in 1979, when I was only 9 years old.  The bought crates of grapes, pressed them in the garage and stored them in barrels and demi-johns in the basement till it was time to bottle them.

That first year my father set aside 2 gallons of wine, with the plans to open them to toast with at my wedding.  Since I never got married, the bottles have been sitting in the basement for the last 33 years.  After Dad died, Mom decided to break them open for a special occasion.  Hilary, Liam and I coming home for our first Christmas in Guelph was just the occasion she needed.

We opened the bottle with a little trepidation.... would it be wine or vinegar?  The first sniff seemed okay.  The glass gallon jar it was in seemed to show that the wine was a very dark red, but once we started pouring it, we quickly discovered that the coloured had all leeched out of it and onto the sides of the bottle. We were left with a very light coloured wine.

Mom enjoyed the first glass.  The taste is hard to describe... not really red, not really white, but it sure has some kick to it!!