Notes from a Food Diva: The Wonderful World of Winemaking

How many people make wine in New York City? More than you might think.

I once did a story in the Daily News on the subject. Brooklyn appears to be the beehive center of winemaking, but you'll find it going on in all the boroughs, including Queens. And, yes, I’ve since learned, right here in Douglaston.

Proof positive: Dandelion Wine was the recipe I adapted and photographed for my former weekly feature in the Sunday News. I took my favorite heavy, cut glass decanter, filled it with the dandelion wine made from hand plucked local, bright yellow blooms in the Daily News test kitchen and we photographed it, close up, in a field of blossoming dandelions. 

The flowers were picked between the Cross Island Expressway and the upgraded Utopia Parkway exit.

Then the phone calls came. It seems that some had a problem with the wine overflowing during the fermentation period into their apartment closets. But wine makers are lovely human beings. Delightful chats. No recriminations.  

One summer, when I was giving a party, Douglaston Little Neck Historical Society President Bob Coddington came early to carve a small roast pig that had been sent over as a hostess gift. He suggested we carve in the Chinese fashion - hanging. 

Bob managed to suspend the glistening roast from the pot rack over a big carving board set on the marble-topped island.

He asked, “Would you like a few bottles of homemade wine?” Of course, I said, “Yes.”

“Would you like a personalized label?”

“Definitely!” 

And he returned in about 10 minutes with a bottle.

Bob has been a serious amateur wine maker for ten years. He goes to the Terminal Market in Brooklyn, Avenue D, to get the grape juice. “They bring it in from California, “ he explains, “in a refrigerated truck.” 

Then he decants it into 18-inch-high, 12 ½-gallon glass demi jars, puts in the yeast and lets it sit in the cellar for a year, siphoning it from one demi jar to another as the sediment gathers at the bottom. This, known as “racking,” gets rid of the impurities, and is the most important step in the process. But it does take a year for it to happen. 

Now, the bottling begins. “Where do you get the bottles,” I asked. “From people like you who drink wine,” he told me. After siphoning the wine from the demi jars into the wine bottles, he corks them. Bob lays them on racks, on their side, turning them over a few times during the half-year that the process takes. But then, you're all set. With a computer, labels are a snap to print.

Although I've never made wine in Douglaston, I have credentials set in glass. When I redid my house, interior decorator William Cohen said, “I finally know what we'll do with the kitchen cabinet doors, let’s use stained glass.” But he doubted whether we would get it done for the upcoming house tour. 

I had to have those doors - now! So, I called friend Rosalind Brenner, a stained glass artist who did church windows for Manor Art Glass, to ask if she knew someone. “I'll do it,” she told me.

Roz, who later sold her studio/home in Douglaston and built one in East Hampton, came up with the idea of adding a wine bottle and glass along with the grapes and pears in one panel.  I told her that my dad, Charles Lang, when he inherited his vineyard in Hillsbach, gave it to his nephew, my cousin Roland who was living nearby in Heidelberg. It was part of a communal vineyard, each owner growing grapes on his hillside land with harvesting and winemaking done professionally on site.

The duplicated label on the wine bottle in the panel, reads: “Baden - Lang Family - Hilsbacher Eichelberg - Weisser Bergunder.”

Now, to all amateur wine makers (or wine drinkers) in Douglaston, I pass on this advice from Dr. Tyler Colman, a wine educator at New York University and Chicago University, who writes under the pen name Dr. Vino, in an interview from his new book: “Wine Politics: How Politics Shape the Wine We Drink”:

“Use a thin, clear, tapered crystal glass: it makes every wine taste better. It elevates all wines.”

Dandelion Wine

This recipe is from “Spoonbread and Strawberry Wine” by Norma Jean and Carole Darden, a cookbook in my collection, which is now at SUNY Delhi. It is not the one I adapted. The times involved in the making are much longer. 

9 cups dandelion petals (discard stems and pods)
1 lemon, unpeeled, seeded and sliced thin
1 orange, unpeeled, seeded and sliced thin
1 gallon boiling water
3 pounds sugar
1 pound light raisins
1 package wine yeast or one 1/4-ounce package active dry yeast

Pick the dandelions on a hot, dry day when the petals are fully open and fairly bug free. Wash them well to remove any hidden insects. Pluck petals, measure and place them in a crock, adding the lemon and orange slices. Pour the boiling water over them and stir well.  Cover with a tea towel and let stand for 10 days.

Strain off liquid through a cheesecloth bag into a large bowl and discard petals and fruit slices. Return liquid to a clean crock. Stir in sugar and raisins, then the yeast. Cover and leave undisturbed for three days. Strain into gallon jugs topped with fermentation locks or loose corks. Rack after three months. Bottle when fermentation has ceased and wine is clear. Age for six months to one year. Yields approximately 1 1/2 gallons.