Ever heard of a wine block or a grape brick? During Prohibition, it was a way for a vineyard in northwest California’s wine-growing region to make some money when wine was illegal to sell.
Federal law after 1920 prohibited the production, transportation, and sale of spirits BUT…homeowners could make 200 gallons of wine a year for home consumption. A family could buy Tokay, Sauterne, Burgundy, Port, Muscatel, or Riesling dried grape blocks from the Vino Sano Company.
Detailed instructions came with the blocks, which cost $1.25 each. To make non-alcoholic unfermented grape juice thirsty fruit juice fans soaked it in a gallon of water for two weeks. But beware! Don’t let it sit too long! The juice could turn into wine, or if left too long vinegar.
The Vino Sano Company claimed they were helping farmers sell surplus grapes and providing a public service by producing easily transportable grape bricks. The kind of product produced was up to the buyer.
Another legal commercial venture for vineyards during Prohibition was the production of sacramental wines. Priests and Rabbi in the USA needed wine for religious ceremonies. Beaulieu, Concannon, Martini, and Beringer vineyards all produced it.
An interesting historical sidenote: when Winston Churchill passed through California in 1929 traveling by car he always tried to stay overnight at vineyards where he could get a good bottle of that special wine.
So let’s praise “Bacchus Blocks” as a way to sell wine bricks and the “liquid poetry” they produced.
I can’t wait till mushrooms are off prohibition and we can all increase our visual and emotional acuity.
I love comparing intoxicants. Remember when we was illegal but finally you could grow like 6 for personal medical use? It’s like the establishment knows they’ll create an underground and competing market and then they won’t be able to …oh.
*weed