Mixed Flower & Nettle Wine - Second Bottle (1), 5th August 2021

This wine was unexpectedly popular at Rydal, and of the three that I took, this was the one most enjoyed. Francesca said that it was the best wine of mine that she has tried - though I think her experience is limited. Someone compared it to a Chardonnay, and I am suspicious of their palate.

Thursdays at Rydal tend to be the day that "Too much fun" catches up with you - and so it proved for me. I didn't do any walking (mind you, the weather had broken), but there was still plenty of music, including Dvorak's 8th Symphony, a Beethoven overture and March to the Scaffold

Too Much Fun at Rydal

Blackcurrant & Raspberry Wine 2020 - First Bottle (6), 20th March 2021

Claire and I had our first Covid 19 jabs on Saturday, and that makes me happy. It was a remarkably speedy and efficient process. I had expected long and slow-moving queues, and in fact it was the opposite. 24 hours later, my arm feels bruised but otherwise there are no other side effects.

In the evening we celebrated with a rather nice (if floppy) gin & tonic and then this bottle of wine. The wine is excellent, tasting of both blackcurrant and raspberry (odd, that). It is fruity and light and delicious. We also watched Return to Oz at the Snarkalong Film Club. This is a deeply disturbing and surreal children's movie, which has more scenes of electro-convulsive therapy than one might expect for a film aimed at the under-12s.

Immediately before the Jab

If you want to see how I made this wine, click here.

Rhubarb, Elderflower & Mint Wine 2020 - First Bottle (6), 14th February 2021

Our Valentine's meal was sponsored by mint. Not only did we drink this bottle of wine, but we had gin & tonics with a mint garnish, Vietnamese Mint Chicken and Nigella's Vietnamese Salad, featuring mint. We must have had delightful breath after all of that.

The wine was excellent and I opened this vintage because Claire has been disparaging about the previous two years. It is zingy and light, and it is a shame that I have given a bottle to Liz!

Our Vietnamese Chicken was another Padian Food pack that we cooked along with Rachel & Duncan. (Who says Valentine's Day should be a romantic meal for two?) It was blistering hot but delicious - the correct level of sourness. Another lovely evening.

I also made cake - a nut meringue slice

If you want to see how I made this wine, click here.

Xmas Tutti Fruti 2018 - Final Bottle (A4), 13th February 2021

What a splendid bottle of Xmas Tutti Fruti. It was rich and full of berries, and it is a shame that this was the last of its vintage. We drank it after having a Zoom Gin & Tonic (or two!) with Catherine and whilst firstly eating sausages (sausages are a wonderful thing) and secondly whilst watching Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Apart from the zombies, it was remarkably close to Austen's original - but I flaked out three quarters of the way through and had to go to bed.

Pinned to a park notice board.

Prune & Parsnip Wine 2017 - Eleventh Bottle (B6), 30th December 2020

Today has been an excellent day. It has mostly involved a walk round Fairburn Ings and Ledston with Jenny (and Claire, of course). The weather was perfect for a winter walk: low sunshine and never above freezing, with thin dustings of snow. The planned walk went through large swathes of water so this involved much re-routing, but to the benefit of the day. Once home and after a gin & tonic, we drank this Prune & Parsnip to leftover duck cassoulet and an episode of The Queen's Gambit.

Jenny & Claire in perfect winter walking conditions

Blackberry Wine 2018 - Tenth Bottle (B2), 17th-19th December 2020

Thursday was very nearly a whole bottle of wine night. I finished work at 7:30, having ended with a fractious meeting about an £8m purchase of land in Calderdale that had been stuffed with bad temper and awkward silences. Therefore, most of a bottle between the two of us did not feel excessive. And it is a good one - there is a reason that bramble wine is one of my very favourites. 

Tonight we finished the remainder in a mix with sloe gin - and that works brilliantly. It transforms a good wine into an excellent one with distinct hints of port.

Another Advent Window - this
time in Chapel Allerton

Magnolia Petal Wine - Second Bottle (4), 26th July 2020

I think that this flavour of wine is fabulous: it has an unusual taste - almost earthy, with a distinct bite to it. Claire says that she won't be upset if she never has to drink Magnolia Petal wine again. I fear that it may not become one of my regular wines after all.

We drank the bottle after I had spent the day walking round the Harewood Estate. It was a pleasant walk, taking in designed-in-the-18th-century landscape, a hidden church and rolling fields. The hidden church was my highlight: locked, unfortunately, but surrounded by gravestones peering through long, yellow grass.

In the evening we had a Zoom Gin O'Clock gathering with many of those that we should have been with at Rydal Hall. A pleasant alternative, but not the same as the real thing.

Harewood Church

Dandelion Wine - Second Bottle (1), 19th April 2019

On a day that I started my next batch of dandelion wine, which was Good Friday where Andrew, Sooz and Jayne were all here, it seemed right and proper that we should drink this year's bottle of dandelion wine. This was after having an early (and floppy) gin and tonic, followed by Cosmopolitans in the garden. The weather has been idyllic over the last few days (though we do need some rain quite badly, just not this Easter weekend).

This wine was good without being outstanding: a medium-dry sherry with a definite hint of lemons. I wonder how next year's bottle will be.

Cosmopolitans in the garden

Strawberry Wine 2016 - Final Bottle (3), 31st December 2018

New Year's Eve is traditionally a time to drink in excess, and I am happy to report that we kept that tradition.

We have spent the New Year in Cambridge with Rachel & Duncan, which is always a pleasure. A cup of tea was presented on our arrival but soon this was followed by gin & tonics, a gin fizz cocktail and too many bottles of wine (of which this was one and delicious). At nine o'clock I was convinced that, like most years these days, I would fail to see midnight and 2019 arrive. Claire went to bed at 10:30, but by then I had got a second wind and stayed up to hear the chimes of Big Ben and watch fireworks explode over the Thames.

Blackberry Wine - Sixth Bottle (C5), 29th December 2018

We have done the Taylors and now it is the turn of the Hardys. Christmas really is an opportunity to see as many people in as short a time as possible. Our visit to York has coincided with Chris, Rachael, Paul and Myles being here - and I saw Keith and family on the 27th. It has been fabulous to catch up with everyone and I had not seen Chris since early June.

Myles is squarely into his dinosaur phase and three quarters of his presents - socks, books, toys, Bingo - were dinosaur related.

There was plenty of booze in the evening and I contributed this bottle of blackberry. It was rather better than the Parma-Violet flavoured gin on offer.

Apple Wine - Third Bottle (3), 8th December 2018

Seeing as my parents could not come to the Wine Party, on account of Pop's slipped disc, I decided to take one of my better bottles to York with me. Guessing correctly that we would be having fish, I chose Apple. Pop, though, was mostly drinking beer and Mom really only drinks gin these days (not in the quantities that suggests). They both tried the apple wine, possibly to humour me, but both said they enjoyed it.

As ever, when staying over with the parents, we had a lovely, relaxed evening, full of conversation.

Rhubarb Wine - Second Bottle (B5), 15th June 2018

A Friday night on Bentcliffe Drive, and this was the fifth bottle opened and finished between the six of us. I think I had more than my fair share of those bottles too, so I have not opened one for Saturday. It was an evening with our neighbours and the theme was 'Indian'. By the time we had finished our marmalade kulfi and gulabjam, it was clear that a Rhubarb wine was required. Liz says that it is different to hers, and we are now planning an evening dedicated to alcoholic rhubarb. I still have bottles left from 2015 and 2016, and we have rhubarb gin in the cupboard. This plan has potential.

Rhubarb Wine - First Bottle (A3), 9th May 2018

I decided that our holiday in Dorset would be a suitable occasion on which to open the first bottle of rhubarb wine. This was to accompany a pork, ginger & rhubarb stir-fry, made by Nick (who supplied the rhubarb for this wine). The general consensus was that this is a rather decent white wine, and possibly the best of the holiday.

We had an excellent day before the wine, walking around Cerne Abbas and its hillside chalk giant. The village is impossibly beautiful - the sort of village I thought only existed in films. The giant is intriguing - a rampant masculine figure that can only be viewed from the other side of the valley. In the evening I named my gin & tonic 'The Cerne Abbas Giant' on account of it being large and stiff.

If you want to see how I made this wine, click here.

Fig Wine - First Bottle (3), 16th September 2017

Perhaps not quite as good as my previous batches of Fig Wine. But it is still a great bottle. The aroma and taste are distinctly figgy and my one complaint is that a certain depth is absent.

We drank it with Rachel and Duncan in Cambridge, having travelled down for Emily and Marco's wedding the following day. The evening started with rhubarb gin, before moving through a Prosecco and a Riesling before ending up with Fig Wine. As the wine flowed, so did the conversation and good humour and it was just a pleasant evening spent with close friends. Hard to be beaten.

If you want to see how I made this wine, click here.

Prune & Parsnip Wine - Fifth Bottle (B5), 22nd-23rd June 2017

Work has been very noisy of late. Not just literally noisy (it has been that as well) but mentally noisy. I come home and my head is full of things to be resolved and incidents of the day just gone. On Thursday night I was partially successful in creating some stillness, or at least shifting the noise to a different quality, by bassoon practice, cooking, Doctor Who and Prune & Parsnip Wine. We were careful to leave half a bottle for Friday - and supplemented the evening drinking with a rhubarb & ginger gin and a nightcap of whisky. Claire got me a bottle of Welsh whisky (Penderyn) for my birthday and it is Wonderful.

Rhubarb Wine - Second Bottle (A2), 26th May 2017

On the strength of this bottle, wine making may be contagious.

It being a lovely evening, we invited Liz, David, Phil and Angie for a sit round the pond and an end of week bottle of wine. The rhubarb wine was delicious (though maybe not as much as the rhubarb gin that Phil brought) and I have now made arrangements to lend a bucket, a couple of demijohns and some yeast to Liz so she can make her own. Bentcliffe Drive will become its own wine region should Liz catch the bug. She has an excess of rhubarb, so at least that is a start.

Fig Wine - Fourth Bottle (2), 12th April 2017

Sooz has come to stay over Easter so I have welcomed her with one of my best wines. Actually, we began with a gin & tonic. This may not have been the best idea - I do have work tomorrow. Anyway, we all agreed that the wine is a good one - very figgy with a nutty aroma - and the bottle is now empty.

My father has just rung - he is off to America for five weeks and rang to say 'goodbye'. I get the impression that each time he goes, he is never absolutely certain he will survive until he is due back. Generally he won't ring otherwise.

Blackcurrant Wine - Tenth Bottle (A2), 19th February 2017

This weekend has involved remarkably little alcohol. Particularly if you discount tonight. On both Friday and Saturday we were at the opera - The Snow Maiden and Hansel & Gretel respectively. The Rimsky Korsakov was fine but the Humperdinck was excellent. This left Sunday to have a bottle of wine plus a couple of gin & tonics, and this blackcurrant wine was delicious. I'm now on the bush tea to sober up a little, before I go to bed.

I have spent the day having an exploratory walk around north Leeds, where Council Estate slots into seven-figure dwellings nearly seemlessly, and finishing Eight Months on Ghazza Street, which was chilling, ambiguous and thoroughly recommended.

Hansel & Gretel, the Opera North way

Crab Apple Wine - Final Bottle (B2), 21st-24th August

On Sunday night, Claire and I had another blind gin taste test, to see if the results from our last experiment (maybe a year ago) still held true. We tried two posh Lake District gins against Gordons. Neat, there was a barely discernable difference. With tonic there was none at all. This is pleasing - from now on it is cheap gin for us.

Much of the crab apple wine followed this and half a bottle of Blackberry between us. On a Sunday night this was a bit too much and Monday was spent feeling slightly delicate. Still, I survived to have the rest of the wine over Tuesday and Wednesday.

Lemon & Lime Wine - Fifth Bottle (4), 31st July - 3rd August 2016

This was not my most popular bottle of wine taken to Rydal Hall. That it took four evenings to finish speaks for itself. Janet said that it was evocative of her teenage years, which were apparently spent drinking Cinzano. Other than me, only one person braved a second glass. It was spurned at the next day's gin o'clock in favour of sloe gin and rhubarb schnapps. I can't think why.