Before becoming a chef, I wasn't much of a wine drinker. It was bitter and left a nasty taste in my mouth.  Champagne, on the other hand, had been my beverage of choice in college. I considered it to be the elixir of the gods. Although I was willing to substitute wine coolers for champagne, I was not likely to drink wine on its own.

In culinary school they taught us about wine: How to buy it, taste it and store it. I learned a great deal and was able to appreciate it far more than in the past. I drink wine now but am still not a wine snob. I find it silly to hold the price of a wine in higher esteem than its taste.  

Being the adventurous sort, my interest in wine has turned to the search for the unusual. This has led me down a strange and varied path. I have run into fantastic wines that have left me teary-eyed at the thought that they would live and die in obscurity. There have also been fair, bad, disgusting and just plain weird wines.

A neighbor of my mother's is very proud of her raspberry wine. Knowing my propensity for the unusual she brought us a bottle. In the bottle it was a pleasant, light magenta color with no obvious sediment. I poured about 1/2 inch into a glass. The smell hit me immediately. I don't mean bouquet, I mean smell. I was certain that she had fermented raspberry Kool-Aid with a touch of gasoline. But being a firm believer in the "try anything once" philosophy of life, I took a sip.

It was repulsive, to say the least. Still fermenting, the bubbles were sharp and acid. The raspberry flavor was overpowering. Even though I prefer sweet wines to dry, the sweetness of this bottle was enough to make me gag. Needless to say, that was enough for me. 

The bonus of this particular vintage was that I spent the entire night being sick.

Now, one would think that after that episode, I wouldn't try another wine from home winemakers.  Oh, ye of little faith! I was off on the hunt just as soon as I could stand the smell of wine again. 

On a visit to England, I was talking to an elderly lady in a tea shop about  the kinds of interesting things I run across in my business. She invited me to come to her home the following afternoon. I arrived to find her and her sister waiting for me in the garden. I was shown to a lovely little gazebo and was asked to sit down.  

They had arranged a beautiful luncheon for me. After enjoying pleasant conversation and a wonderful meal, her sister excused herself from the table. She returned moments later with a bottle of clear liquid with wax covering the cork and a pale purple ribbon tied around the neck.  She carefully removed the wax while I watched. She handled the bottle as if it were liquid gold.  Once the cork was removed, she poured three glasses and handed one to me. Emma, the elder sister, explained that they had learned the recipe for this lavender wine from their aunt and had been making it for several decades.

I held the glass to my nose to find an intoxicating bouquet rising from the glass. The first sip was like being lost in a garden. I had never before tasted anything like it and probably never will again. When I tried to get the recipe from them, they refused with gracious smiles and promises of someday. Before I left I was given two bottles to take with me and was asked to come back for a visit any time I was in England. I have since been back several times and have always been given the bottles to take home. I, too, have treated them like the rare jewels that they are and bring them out only on special occasions.  

In between these two widely different ends of the spectrum, I have found many others. There was the potato-mint wine that a fairly odd gentleman had made in his basement. The aroma was like that of the less expensive Russian vodkas, but the taste was pleasant and refreshing.  

There was the dandelion wine made by my brother as an experiment in his garage when the new house he bought had a lawn covered with dandelions. It was actually very good and he has since become quite the home winemaker.  

There was the herbal wine from Singapore that tasted like boiled grass and the mango wine in Jamaica that was so syrupy I couldn't swallow it.

But by far the weirdest wine was something I tasted in California at the Gilroy Garlic Festival. I have been going to this festival for years since I grew up in the area and it is always a great place to find fun new things to do with garlic. But garlic wine is a little on the strange side. While the taste isn't bad, it isn't good either and the aroma of garlic is definitely apparent. The thought of garlic wine is as strange to the public as garlic ice cream (also available) and is more off-putting than the wine itself. I love garlic, but I don't really want to drink it with dinner. 

While I have found more fair than wonderful wines on my search, I continue undaunted. I have been sent wines from around the world to taste and review. And I have since added the search for unique beers to my latest hobby. Someday I will bring these unique vintages and brews into the public eye. But until then the search goes on.