The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-08-18
TRICKS Of THE
WINE DOCTOR
Makes With Ease Any Brand
Desired by the Most Ex-
acting Customer.
TURNS WATER INTO WINE
OF COURSE DRUGS ENTER INTO
THE COMPOSITION.

But I prefer to regard him as an en-
tertaining juggler, writes Armiger Bar
clay in the London Daily Mail. who
Goes surprising feats with a magic
bottle.
HIS apparatus, arranged on a mar
row shelf, consists of a dozen or so of
small glass stoppered bottles of various
colored liquids, big jar OF caramel
and another of silent spirit There are
other things, such ais an aerated water
plant, but it is openly displayed down
stairs. For the aeration of table wa
tiers is the wine doctors ostensible
calling
Fact is, there's too much wine
made already" he says Real wine,
mean. It's not wanted. 1t keeps
down the price. Besides, it's wasting
good land to plant it with grapes lust
10 keep up the old myth that they're
necessary for wine making / don't
wonder at the disturbance in France
and L wouldn't mind betting that the
regiments that have mutinied were
driven to it by swallowing too much of
the wine of the country"
he draws my attention to his row of
bottles with comprehensive wave of
the hand.
See those? Wine in embryo. Tons
or IT. Give me good water''-he indi-
cafes an innocent looking tap in the
corner-"and Ill turn you out a bottle
or anything you like to name-while
you watt"
That is what 1 have come for. 1
ought perhaps to explain that 1 origin
ally met the doctor in distant colony,
where men talk more openly than they
do here. and-well, he knows that what
L may set down in print about him will
convey no clue to his identity
Ject TO the real wine in modera ton NV
own best qualities have a base of sound
sherry or Burgundy. Take claret, for
instance. Why send to Bordeaux when
with gill of Australian Burgundy or
Spanish RiOja, Water-Watch while [ do
ia few drops of French vinegar and
20 per cent of potato spirit that's col
orless and odOrless and only costs a few
pence per gallon, can give you chem
ically the same thing with more alco-
holic strength?"
Presto! 1t is done. He pours some
of the result into a wineglass and hands
IL TO me. 1t has the look. smell and
taste of the wine for which l pay one
and six pence a bottle.
Total cost a fraction over three
pence. bottle and label included" he
exults. Hooks and Sauternes the same.
A little real sherry for the base, suf-
ficient acidity, say citric-an astringent
like fannie acid to dry them. spirit and
water in proportion, and there you are!
Leave out the fannie and use white
sugar syrup instead, and you have
Chablis."
dispensing druggist in a hurry
could not make up a prescription more
quickly than he manufactures wine be-
fore my eyes. I taste a "Niersteiner"
Light elegant dinner wine with
good body, from the Hoggen- Hochheim-
er district he remarks in the tone of
one quoting from a wine circular Now
try the Graves Dry and favory, Ell?
The 'Chablis' soft and round, isn't it?
You quite recognize the vintages you've
had to pay respectable prices for?"
Is it so? Or has he the power of
suggestion, like a prestidigitator, who
can make ycu believe that you hear
your 1s-carat gold hunter ticking inside
a boiled egg?
These, Of course, are new Wines" he
explains THE addition of a teaspoon
full of sterilized glycerine ages them at
once You might remember that when
you've got new whisky, It's worth
knowing"
l know some WHISTLES that would
need a pint of glycerine to the bottle
at least 10 make them palatable, and I
begin for the first time to suspect their
sOurcei
"A whisky or brandy properly made
OuSnt not to want glycerine, though"
he observes. as if he had read my
thoughts. Here's a brandy that l
made yesterday from silent spirit and
Oenanthis ether. co1ored and sWeetened
with caramel that hardly differs from
well matured natural cognac. That's
because its been heated to 140 dgrees
Fahrenheit"
My palate may be getting corrupted.
] do not know: but i'm spite of natural
suspicious the brandy seems above re-
proach. So does the champagne, which
is his next deXterous concoction. As
far as I can see it consists merely of
a mixture of "Chablis' and Hook"
with which little aerated water is re-
quired. He Gals ii CuVee Reserve, Ex-
ira Dry. I admit that is what I should
have thought it under the disguise of
tinfoil and a label!
The doctor shrugs his shoulders.
Anybody can print labels and brand
corks." he declares contemptuously.
f'LabelSi The average man win drink
anything and enjoy it so long as it's
labelled with one of the few names he's
acquainted with. 'Beaune or 'Rudes-
heimer' for instance. He imagines
these are vintages, but they're only dis
tricts and don't mean more than the
collective expressions beer or whisky.
The thing is TO ADAPT the liquor to the
label If you want an illustration OF
what I mean. here's one"
From the bottles on the shelf he
takes benzoic acid, benzoic ether acetic
acid and ether. oenanthic ether and
glycerine-a drop or two of each-and
fills up the glass with the ever indis-
pensable alcohol 1 raise the cOlOrless
mixture to my lips and behold! it is
Maraschinoi
NO troublesome or expensive pro-
cesses for mel" he protests. There you
have about a pennyworth of different
essences that you'd pay siXpence for in
a restaurant add cochineal to It, and
it's NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. and it's
whatever you like to call or label it!
You're astonished?
IF you were TO tell a wine mer-
chant what I've told and shown you
he'd pretend establishment; and II you
printed il some of them-the ones the
cap fits-would write TO the papers for
the sake of advertisement and call you
names!"
what about yourself, thought"
ask with polite anxiety.
.'Oh, I'm all right" he declares. I'm