Back in July, I began a blueberry wine according to this recipe. I made one gallon, specifically for drinking with whatever we were going to eat for dinner on Christmas Day.

I was remiss in not sampling the wine in the past two months so I was not sure what it was going to be like. I had also never bothered to bottle it, instead allowing it to bulk age in the one gallon carboy which I poured from into our wine glasses at dinner time.

Being the host, I asked Wendy to take the first sip . She tried it but wasn’t too sure as she had just been munching on some food and asked me to try.

I was disappointed. The wine seemed far too thin to enjoy with dinner and I was thinking I’d have to open a bottle of Vieux-Chateau Du Roi. However, knowing that it was all friends and family sitting around the table, and there were no wine snobs present, I decided to serve it regardless.

The color of the wine was a brilliant cranberry red – perfect as a Christmas color. It was also very clear even though this wine had not been filtered. So as far as appearance goes, this wine was excellent.

On the nose, well… with the dining area filled with the odour of thyme, sage, rosemary, and steaming turkey, it was difficult to detect much of anything. At first.

Something interesting happened though. After about ten minutes in the glass, the wine had improved dramatically. As the blueberry wine had been exposed to oxygen, the the “thinness” disapeared, there was a much nicer mouth feel, and more complexity found on the tongue. This wine definitely is one that would benefit from decanting like a good red grape wine would.

And as the evening wore on, and we had started out with a gallon which meant plenty for all that were interested (except my mom, who was driving), each glass improved upon the previous.

I did quickly pour some into a 750 ml bottle which I gave to my mom before she left so she could continue to enjoy the wine that the rest of us would be sipping on throughout the rest of the evening when she arrived home – which of course cut down on the amount the rest of us were able to consume.

Although I had pies and icecream ready for dessert after dinner, none of us were able to even think about finding any spare square inches in our belly; none of us had hollow legs either so dessert was declined by all.

I did however open an “ice style” blackcurrant wine for dessert – a heavenly delight called “Black Iced Passion” from the Scotch Block winery. A wine that you want to hold on your tongue for as long as possible, and yet at the same time look forward to it drizzling down your throat.

Ah, wonderful!

But returning to my homemade blueberry wine – almost the entire gallon was consumed, and alas, I’ll have to wait another six months or so before I the next batch I made will be ready. But this time, I decided to make five gallons – 30 bottles, which I’m sure will be appreciated gifts, as well as a special occassion wine and I’ll also be able to lay some bottles down for further ageing.

There is also some evidence that blueberry wine has even more of the health benefits than red grape wine. It’s been reported that blueberries contain one of the highest amounts of antioxidant compounds which possibly ward off heart disease, cancers and other diseases. When made into wine, these antioxidant compounds remain to be beneficial to the human body. More information here.

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