Happy Mother’s Day
Happy Mother’s Day!
Happy Mother’s Day to all those moms out there! Today we celebrate our own mom – the co-founder of the winery, Lucille Aellen. A far cry from her Brooklyn, NY roots, when, by Divine Providence, she landed here, with my dad, on a farm in the middle of nowhere (seems a little Green Acre-ish, don’t you think!)…and then to help my dad start a winery and run a farm and still try to be in charge of us kids – yikes! Who signed her up for that job! Well, anyway, she must have done something right! Happy Mother’s Day to a fantastic mom! Below is a picture of our Mom with one of her oldest sons (Victor), and her youngest son, Eric.
When we think about Mother’s Day, the big question comes up – right? What to get or do for mom? If you are having a cookout for mom, or having her over, how about the gift of a lovely bottle of May wine – and you can make the recipe below!
May is traditionally the time we bring out the new May Wine. None of us can remember exactly why westarted producing the wine, other than my dad wanted to produce it, so that’s what happened. We have been producing May Wine since 1979.
For those of you who have never tried May wine, it is a semi-dry white wine. Originally a wine of German origin used to celebrate May Day, it was flavored with sweet woodruff which was an herb found in Germany/Europe, which flowers around May/June. Sweet Woodruff imparts a very delicate slightly herby/spicy flavor to the wine. Typically served with strawberries or other berries sprinkled with sugar, it makes for an elegantly impressive drink that can be served at any time, especially to make a backyard barbeque or dinner party more festive! For those of you who prefer to drink something other than Mint Julips while watching the pony races this time of the year – this is a perfect drink to sip in its place!
Below we have added a little recipe of how we have made our May wine drink here for years…
4 oz. May Wine, chilled
2 medium chilled Strawberries, sliced
2 tsp. granulated or extra fine sugar
Slice strawberries and sprinkle with sugar. The sugar will look like it’s dissolved on the strawberries
after a few minutes – then add the strawberries, with the sugar on them, to the wine. Stir to dissolve
some of the sugar and sip leisurely!
Enjoy!
-p
