A Retraction AND I’m (Gonna Be)
Sorry,
So Sorry...

In an earlier column of mine, I stated that the wine industry in New Mexico was wiped out by the institution of Prohibition. This is not so, and I retract this misinforming statement. In fact, during the years of Prohibition, (1919 to the early 1930’s) the number of vines in the state of New Mexico more than doubled. According to Henry K. Street, in his ‘The History of Wine in New Mexico, 400 Years of Struggle’, wine was still a moneymaker, Prohibition Laws not withstanding. "...so, at $4.00 per gallon the wine market simply went underground." This interesting little history, of no more than 15 pages, succinctly documents the beginning of the wine industry from 1633 (long before California) to the present. It states that, in fact, in 1943 there was the greatest Rio Grande flood this century that wiped out the vineyards in New Mexico. For an industry that produced a record of almost a million gallons in the late 1880’s, this flood caused a total loss. Nowadays, the biggest noticeable change has been the construction of earthen levies all along the Rio Grande, containing its channel so that a river that is the life blood of an agricultural economy will no longer be the means of its death.

This part of my column was done in conjunction with an article written by Dave Lustig (also in this newsletter) and concerns flavoring wines. You see, it all started with Tom Shudic mentioning that he’d like to do a habanero wine, just for the fun of it AND to see the looks on the Judges faces at some upcoming home wine competition. I tried to tell him that it really is not a good idea to surprise Judges that way -they’d probably never forgive him. But that what he’d really ought to do was to make a chili-flavored wine using a gallon or two of Chardonnay and some chili flakes or powder. The best chili to use would be that grown in New Mexico. Now don’t get me wrong, California Agriculture has a lot to offer.

But, let’s face it, there are just some things that California Agriculture cannot duplicate and one of those is New Mexico chili. I mean chili with good heat AND flavor. Those Anaheims that are grown in California only masquerade as chili or are meant for those wimps who can’t handle the real stuff! So I sent Tom a package with a pound each of Extra Hot dried flakes and powder. Tom e-mailed me back saying that when it arrived a Hazmat team was dispatched to make sure it wasn’t nuclear! At any rate, I couldn’t talk Tom into parting with a gallon of his Chardonnay to see how well it would flavor with flakes. Instead, he has gone ahead and started a batch of full-fledged habanero wine and has somehow talked me into taste-testing it when it’s done! I stipulated that I’d do so only on the condition of an unlimited supply of ice-cream was to be on hand, for me to soothe my burning tongue afterwards! Oh the things you get into when making wine.... But the message in this column is this: that wine is versatile. Whether you make it from the ingredients desired (whether fruit or vegetable - no matter how weird) or flavor an existing wine to turn it into something else, that there are options that one can choose to create with...I left a request for information on flavoring wines on the Usenet group for home winemakers. As it turns out, a local Albuquerque winery did make a chili-flavored wine, but used a fresh chili puree to flavor some white wine. I was informed that the green chili wine was okay but the red chili wine was not so good......Sounds like I’ll have to experiment with some flakes, just to get to the bottom of this! And this is all part of the joy of making wine. That you CAN experiment with something, you don’t know until you try!