4Jun

The Blenheim 2011

The Blenheim 2011 was brewed between 2010 and 2011 in my house.

It’s apple wine, made from the Blenheim Orange variety. Picked in October 2010 from a tree in Oxfordshire, the apples were chopped, briefly boiled, put into a fermenting bin with yeast, fed ritualistically, filtered, fermented, racked, fermented, racked, aged and finally drunk. Serve chilled.

On the nose: grapefruits, apples, sauvignon blanc, a distant earthy note. In the mouth: surprisingly delicious actually. The same notes as the smell again – tropical fruit notes, very sauvignon blanc – perhaps a little stronger. One of the dangers of home-brew is that you don’t always know how strong this actually is…

Very happy with the results. Here’s a snap back when it ‘looked like sludge’ as my girlfriend put it. It’s incredible how it’s turned out after all these months; we’re going to leave one demijohn for another few months to see how it matures, before we begin again with this year’s batch.

Cheers!

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About Mark Newton

Born in 1981, live in the UK. I write about strange things.

3 comments

  1. I think if people knew how ridiculously easy it actually is to make wine, they’d all be at it.

    Fortunately most don’t and home-brewers like us end up looking like domestic geniuses. With several gallons of wine at our disposal…

  2. I popped by to steal your topic-ball html but saw this post and it reminded me of a joke my grandfather used to tell about a horse, a vet, a urine sample, and some home-made wine… there’s a mix-up & the punch line is ‘Sir, your horse is very sick.’ I think your brew could fit in there somewhere…

  3. I must confess, it does look a little bit like that. Whatever I brew next, I’m going to put raspberries in I think. Then there will be no confusion!