Hippie Wineries

What the @!#&@! is a Hippie Winery?

Seriously, go to any wine festival and you'll hear people saying "oh you have to try Hairy Frog Winery...they're a hippie winery." Why????

What makes people thing a hippie winery will make better wine? Because in my experience hippie wines taste AWESOME at the tasting, then not unlike wet dog from the bottle you bring home.

Couple of years ago we went to the Finger Lakes and were told we had to try the wine at one winery, because "they're a fun, hippie winery." We got there, and they were racing their Coleman Coolers in the driveway. No, I'm not making that up.

They were closed, but with some cajoling, they agreed to open up for us. They opened gallon jugs from the fridge and poured liberally as we happily tasted their wares. They drank some along with us, laughing and joking...we had a ball and had so much fun that we bought a whole case of their wine!!! Were they real hippies? They dressed the part, and they all had that half-baked look...so they were at least trying.

We ended up drinking 2 bottles of that wine...the rest tasted like a locker room smells.

This past Saturday at the Wine Fest we tried a hippie winery...or at least a winery staffed by people in tie-dyed clothes. Their wine had a head on it!!! It didn't taste too bad, but I want to know why there was a layer of bubbles in the bottle. Their drier wines were very acidic, their sweet wines were better, and obviously what they expected to sell.

There were a few other stands that purported to be hippie wineries; again, loads of tie-dye, Bob Marley posters, and 'fun' labels and names. None of their wines were anything to write home about either.

Is the hippie winery a marketing ploy?

I've done a little research and found 3 kinds references to hippie wineries.
The first is recipes for wine in a jug using baker's yeast and grape juice concentrate.
The second is a winery that's organic, possibly going back to the 70's.
The third is a winery that proudly proclaims their hippie status.

So I have to wonder if the second type of reference is the source of the 'myth' of their wines being something special, or is the third the real source; painting a mental image of happy hippies making great wine, all naturally.

Anyone have any ideas or answers? Contact me at the link in the right column.