Chabot Spectator

Issue date: 12/14/06 Section: In Focus

Media Credit: Jack Barnwell Royce Wood, Chabot's custodial supervisor, inspects one of his self brewed bottles of wine.

For the last five years Royce Wood, the custodial supervisor at Chabot, has been making his own wine.

Wood has been working at Chabot for 26 years, and is also an alumnus. Whereas most wines are made out of grapes, Wood's wines are made out of other fruits and vegetables.

"(It) started as a by-product because I planted trees for barbecuing," Wood said.

Wood used to grow plum trees so that he could later use the wood for burning. According to Wood, plum wood is the ideal wood for barbecuing.

Wood's brother-in-law got him started in wine making. Since all he wanted was the wood from the plum tree, he gave away the plums to his neighbors and to his brother-in-law, who would use it to make plum wine.

His brother-in-law later moved out of California, but left the plum wine recipe with Wood. From this one recipe, Wood has branched out into other flavors and recipes. Since then he's been experimenting on everything from bananas to peaches, and he hopes to one day make a wine out of onions.

He now has over 35 different recipes for wine made from various fruits. His most popular flavors are apple, peach, plum and cherry.

Wood now keeps his plums and collects other fruits from his neighbors, to make his wines.

On the overall process of making wine, Woods said the "hardest part of the whole thing is the wait." Wood said the best time to make wine is during the summer because yeast ferments better in the heat. It takes anywhere from a month to three months to make wine, but Wood said it's best to wait a year to drink. Letting the wine sit or age for about a year gives it a better taste and adds to the wine's aroma.

He asks people for their empty wine bottles to be reused, as "The most expensive things are the bottles." Wood mainly gives his wines away to friends and neighbors, but there are a few who offer him small donations.

Regular grape wines usually have to be thrown away if left to spoil, but the great thing about the wines Wood makes is that if it spoils, it turns into vinegar, which can be used for cooking.

If one tries his apple wine, one would be surprised and pleased by the sweetness of the wine. From those that have drunk Wood's wine, most have told him that the wine gives them a nice level of intoxication, and wake they up the next day without hangovers. After finishing a whole bottle in one sitting, he can now add another happy drinker to that list: this reporter. Wood attributes this to the fact that his wines are not made with preservatives like most wines.

One of the things Wood plans on doing when he retires is start his own micro-winery. When he does open his winery he certainly won't have problems attracting people to his sweet hangover-free wine.

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