[Sca-cooks] fortified wines

[Ted Eisenstein]

>> My understanding was that they had brandy added to the wine in a 1-4 ratio
>> and that is why they are called Fortified wine.
>Ok....  <blush>  what is brandy, I mean what is it made of? I always thought
>that it was just wine.

Wine's made by stomping grapes and letting the juice ferment, as you know.
Brandy is made from wine, by distilling it - you take some wine, heat it up
gently, and capturing the vapors into a separate vessel by means of tubing
(the vapors cool down on the way). The resulting cool vapor/liquid is
the brandy. And brandy is higher proof; it's got more alcohol in it than
does wine.
(If you've ever watched MASH on TV, Hawkeye and BJ have a still
in the Swamp which they use to make booze. That's a still, and that's what's
used (in a crude form) to make brandy from wine - although I think the Swamp
inhabitants used somewhat different materials to produce somewhat different
end products. But the process is in essence the same.)

(Now, if you take the stomped-on grapes, the leavings, add a bit of water,
let it sit, and ferment and distill _that_ stuff, you get grappa.)

Alban