The third edition of the Romanian Wine Festival will take place at Sts. Peter & Paul Romanian Greek-Catholic Church of Chicago, at 3107 W Fullerton St., Chicago, between 6 and 7 November.
Participants will bring their home-made wine to be tasted at the festival. At the previous edition about 60 Romanians brought their wine to be tested. Everybody will taste the wine they want and give an opinion.
Grigore Coardos, the festival’s organizer, hopes that “in the future the festival will be organized at a bigger level, with jury and prize winners.” Besides wine, people will have the opportunity to try traditional Romanian food and listen to Romanian folklore music.
Romanians are known for making their own wines. Every region of the country has its specific process and methods. That is one of the reasons why every home-made wine will taste different from house to house. Even if the recipe is the same, the taste is not. The tradition is being kept even today, and it’s transmitted from generation to generation, and even if they are far from home.
The Romanians living in Chicago buy their grapes from farms in Indiana or Michigan, usually Concord grapes “because they make an aromatic red wine” says Coardos. Besides being the organizer, Coardos is also a participant.
He has stared making his wine a month ago, to be ready “in time for the festival.” The process “is not so complicated,” he says. The grapes are grounded in a large container that has a hole with a tap cover with a strain, which filters the seeds and the peel. After 2 or 3 days the juice from the grapes is filtered into wood or glass barrels and is kept for 3 or 4 weeks to ferment.
The process of fermentation creates a lot of impurities that will be eliminated through a narrow hose. In this way, the wine will have a clear appearance. “The best barrel to use,” says Coardos, is “the wood because it gives the wine a fine aroma.” But he warns that the plastic one is the worst. Every year he makes around one 26 gallons.
“The Romanians take a lot of pride in the preparation of the wine” says Todica Bulbuc, one of the festival’s participants. Bulbuc is one of the regular at the festival, last year his wine was “among the best,” he says with pleasant pride.
It is easy to detect if the wine is good or not, even thought it depends a lot on people’s taste. “If it is too sour,” says Bulbuc “something went wrong and you have to put some sugar in it and let it ferment more, until the spring and use it for ‘palinca’ (a Romanian moonshine made from fruits).” The Romanian home made wine is made without any preservatives or sugar, “it’s all natural,” says Bulbuc. The trick is the right temperature. “If is too cold, then the wine will be too sour,” he says.
Every year, Sergiu Cornea, the priest from the Peter & Paul Romanian Greek-Catholic Church, blesses the wine and the food. To keep the tradition alive, Cornea compares the festival with the Harvest Day, when Romanian peasants used to reap the harvest and stock it up for the winter. After all the crops were gathered they will have a big celebration. “Everybody makes their wine following their own methods and traditions. In each house, the wine has a different flavor” Cornea says.
The price is $25. The festival will start at 7 pm, on both days.