Lt and sour red cabbage-or
t his special wine collection-
L red current to mead (hon-
I
henry Endres Winery, located
|13300 S. Clackamas River
L, Oregon City, began in
K5 when Henry Endres, Sr.
L his job during the depression.
I "He always made good wine
I he decided to make a living
| it," Endres said. "He built
twine in 1935 and in 1936
hot his permanent license and
Led selling."
||n 1951, Endres and his wife
Irgaret took over the winery
I Endres, Sr. retired.
I'Every year we try to make it
liter than the year before,"
Irgaret said. "It's a challenge,
lery year it's different—diff-
Lt amount of .rain and sun-
|ne-so it makes the wine dif-
Bt."
■Endres begins his wine with
fch fruits and berries which he
rows on his 15 acres of private-
lowned and leased fields. Hen-
fs Winery holds a farmer's wine
Lense rather than a commercial
lense. They grow their own
Lit opposed to importing and
lying fruit.
rWe use pure, ripe, sound
Lit out of the fields in sea-
an," Margaret said. "We like to
irry it all the way through."
I To start the process of build-
« wine, Margaret begins with a
Lt tube slant of ye ast and a
quart of fresh, sterilized berries
or fruit.
"In about a day and a half
it will be bubbling up and she'll
add more sterilized fruit and
build it up until we get a five
percent culture and 95 percent
fruit," Endres said. "Then we'll
innoculate the vat which is 400
to 500 gallons of fruit."
After the fruits are put in to
the vats, sugar solutions are add
ed to feed the yeasts and keep it
going well.
"My husband has analyzed all
the fruits to find out how much
natural sugar and natural acid
there is," Margaret said. "This
way he'll know how much solu
tion to add to bring it up to the
alcohol content he wants."
"Wine without sugar around
here is about seven to eight per
cent," she said. "It's hard to
to keep and many wine diseases
come up with this type of wine.
A good sipping wine is around
11 and 13 percent.
This is
where our wines
are. Wines
that are 18 to 19 percent just
get you drunk."
"We adjust it," Endres said.
"We're not allowed to fortify
it. We have to let .it ferment
naturally. It's a natural product
that ends up to be about as
natural as you can get."
Aging, finishing and racking
take place after the fruits are
placed in the vats.
"We age everything in oak
tanks," Margaret said. "If we got
bigger, we'd have to go to metal.
Wine connoisseurs can tell the
difference because the winesseem
to have a metalic taste."
Some wines need little aging,
according to Endres.
"Cane berries are ready to
drink when they're clear," he
said. "Some of the fruit wines, on
the other hand, need lots of ag
ing. Some of them we won't
crack for about 18 months."
Previous wines made by Hen-.
ry's include cherry, plum, apple,
current,mead,rhubarb,red grape,
white grape, elderberry, logan
berry, raspberry, strawberry and
rose.
"Now on deck," Endres said,
"are apple, rhubarb and
red
grape. Elderberry, rose and lo
ganberry will be ready for East
er."
Henry's wines are sold out of
the Endres farm. Prices are $6
per one-half gallon of wine.
Endres son, also a Henry, is
intending to take over the winery
in the near future.
"We're going to retire on a
piece of property I own," Endres
said. "I'm going to just raise
fruit for him."
"Henry is also a chef," Mar
garet said. "A gourmet chef
that is. He makes Chinese dishes,
spaghetti, German dishes, etc. It
sure helps me out a lot. He can
even cook more after we retire."
"We've made a living doing
this," Endres said. "We've work
ed hard to make it the best fruit
wines in the Northwest."