I've posted previously about snake wine, which I thought sounded pretty gross, but I could understand how it was made. Snakes are simply added to rice wine. However, Army Worm Wine is another matter altogether. Ray Reigstad says that he makes this concoction directly from army worms (they're those creatures that hang in web-like tents from trees). In other words, he's not just adding them to rice wine. He's somehow fermenting the worms themselves to produce a wine that supposedly tastes like pinot grigio or white bordeaux. Here's how he says that it's done:

As far as the process goes, I simply treated them as a combination of a fruit and a flower, after all, they eat leaves. Other ingredients include sugar, water, champagne yeast (from Canada), yeast nutrient, pectic enzymes, acid blend and campden tablets. This wine was made in Duluth, Minnesota in small batches using highly sterile equipment. It registers approximately 11% alcohol on the vino-meter.

I'm not a wine expert (though I like drinking it), but just because the worms eat leaves doesn't mean they're sugary enough to ferment. Or does it? My gut instinct (for some reason) is to believe that this stuff is real, but I'd like to know more about how it's made.

Posted by Ray Reigstad  on  Sat Feb 26, 2005  at  03:46 PM

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Posted by Drunken_Bastard  on  Wed Nov 09, 2005  at  09:01 PM

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Posted by bamboozle  on  Mon Jul 10, 2006  at  06:55 PM

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