9-10 October 2011 - Some Wine-making

We went for a walk today up the hill behind Hredle because Josef wanted to pick some ‘fruit’ to make wine with. The walk was only short, but it was uphill through the recently planted barley fields. The soft footing made the walk more challenging than it should have been. We were going to the edge of the forest to see if the plants had enough berries on them.

The view of Hredle behind us was outstanding and I decided to take a picture.

The berries that we were looking for looked like a cross between a blueberry and a small plumb. They were blueberry sized and their skins had that blue/white haze to them, but they looked more like a plumb than a berry. They also had a large seed in them.

We needed about 3 liters of fruit to make wine, and we were hard pressed to pick all of these small berries. The small black berries grew from the stems of this plant and were surrounded by thorns. I kept thinking to myself, “I wonder if these are blackthorn berries? It would be a fitting name for them!”

When we got back home I asked Josef what the plant was called and he told me it was trnka. Popping the word into the translator on my iPod to find out that they were indeed blackthorn berries!

The berries were very dirty and even after washing them a few times the water was still coming out a bit brown. Josef said it wouldn’t matter because he’d filter the wine before bottling it.

We attained some big glass bottles from Alan, Josef’s friend, and cleaned them. In went the water, sugar and yeast and then the berries. Corks were placed on the tops of the bottles with those special bubbly thingies to keep the bugs out, but to let the air from fermentation escape. Now all there is to do is wait for fermentation to begin!

Update: a few days later and we have bubbles!

It should take about 5 weeks for the wine to be ready for bottling/drinking. That’s right before I leave, so hopefully I’ll be able to taste some before I go.