Postcard from the Road: Nan K. Chase – Wine for Apple Season

When life gives you apples, make apple wine. 

Photo courtesy of the author

On the way home to Asheville, North Carolina, from the Mother Earth News Fair in Seven Springs, Pennsylvania, my husband and I stopped in to visit our super-gardener friend Tom in rural Virginia. Since I had been toting around a bottle of homemade apple wine for my demonstration at the fair, we decided to open it and taste the contents to see how several days in a warm car plus some jostling might have affected the flavor. Not to worry! We poured some, took a sip, and were amazed at how well it had traveled. The flavor was crisp, finishing slightly sweet and with just a hint of apple flavor. Yum.

And to make it even better, Tom suggested making a wine cocktail using an essence of his homegrown pink variegated Meyer lemon blossoms. That’s right: lemon blossom extract. His potted citrus trees are so successful that he regularly harvests the fragrant flowers to preserve in vodka. Such fruit thinning makes for a better crop in the long run.

Apple wine: a perfect accompaniment for an autumn brunch. Make some with this year’s apple harvest and enjoy it a year from now.

Making wine at home doesn’t have to be intimidating. Drink the Harvest co-authors Nan Chase and DeNeice Guest demonstrate:


Web Bites: Garden wine with Nan Chase and DeNeice Guest from Mountain Xpress on Vimeo.