This article is classified "Real"
In article <30e9fu$7fg@hq.hq.af.mil>, Steve Boyd <boyds@lmgapo1.hq.af.mil>
wrote:
>
> I missed the wine reference in the Oracularity, though.. :<
> (Oh, yeah- Amontillado is a very good wine.. Italian, I think...
> anyway, supposed to be excellent and very expensive. Never tried
> it myself... yet, anyway... :> )
It(shudder)alian? No, no, never! Not in a million years. Amontillado
is one of the several grades, or types, of Madiera (along with Bual,
Sercial, Malmsey, and Rainwater.)
Amontillado comes (the real stuff, not the various fakes) from the island
of Madiera, off the Portuguese coast. When the Portuguese (NOT the
Italians) settled the island, they needed to clear off some of the dense
forest, so they tried burning it off. The fire sorta got out of hand and
burned for about a century. As a result, the island soil has an ash
content that's unique in the world.
Anyway, the soot-blackened settlers raised grapes, among other things, on
the terraced hills of Madiera. The grapes produced a thin, sour,
undrinkable wine, which needed a good marketing type to dispose of. Or a
real sharp operator.
What it got was the latter. See, nobody in Europe would buy this stuff,
as just about ANYthing was better. However, there were these other folks
settling in a distant colony known colloquially as "California," who
wanted to buy European wine. What they got shipped, courtesy of our
sharp operator, was this Madiera stuff.
Slick, no?
So, tons of it were stowed in the bottom of the hold, shipped down through
the tropics, round the Horn and its violent weather, BACK up through the
tropics, and so to LA. This treatment, the combination of motion and heat,
will absolutely kill most wines. The result is undrinkable, and even has a
name: the wine is said to be "madierized."
But with Madiera, it produced something truly wonderful - a fortified,
sweet, nut-like flavor and a heady bouquet, that could compete with the best
of Jerez. (That's sherry, to the English).
Our sharp operator was a bit surprised not to hear any complaints (knowing
they'd take two years to get there, and what could anybody DO about him,
from sunny CA?), but he was astonished to hear they wanted MORE of the same
stuff he couldn't give away, even to the barbarians across the Channel.
(A few years back, I made some madiera myself. I aged it by carrying it in
the back of a Chevy Blazer for six months). It turns out that heat is more
important than motion, so Madiera can now be produced on the island in a
sort of solera-like setup, as is used in making sherry, but exposed to the
heat of the island's climate.
Now these days, Madiera, even amontillado, is not really very expensive --
expect to pay less than $20 for a very good bottle. But in THOSE days, you
had to ship the stuff to California, and then back again. THAT made it
expensive.
As grades go, Amontillado is generally the most nut-like, about midrange in
heaviness, and a bit on the dry side of the Madiera spectrum. Most of your
larger liquor stores will carry it.
If you'd like to try some before you buy, I have a cask I've been saving,
down in the cellar...