A small piece of wine trivia

I'll bet there are still older native vines in Norte Americana - and I don't mean Labrusca: Norton/Cynthiana for one.

Tom S

Seems the vikings might have made wine a lot earlier...

Juan de Gijalva tasted wine made by the aztecs from local labrusca in

1517. The wine tastes bad, and Hernan Cortes in 1524 orders 1000 plants of vinifera to be planted in Tenochtitlan; from there, viticulture spreads all over New Spain. Already in 1589 Jose de Acosta publishes a book describing wine consumption in America. Production increases so much that it is competing with Spain, so Philip II forbids wine production in the colonies, except California is allowed to continue.

Mike Tommasi, Six Fours, France email link

You think maybe the Vikings were making wine in Vineland? And of course there was Sir Walter Raleigh's colony at Roanoke Island where Virginia Dare was born. The first wine I ever drank was Virginia Dare, made in Norfolk, VA. I wonder if it was the same winery. 1597 was long before the Jamestown Colony.

Bill wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@verizon.net:

Sorry, Bill:

I used to see bottles of their wine, maybe 20-25 years ago? Only seen the flavorings these days, and not frequently...

It was my mother's favorite, too!

d:D