Neighborhood Trade: Bread for Wine

To trade a loaf of homemade bread for a bottle of home made (excellent!) wine is not a bad trade! Over the last couple of weeks I've befriended a very kind neighbor who has quite the little homestead set up. He grows a large amount of food on his rather small plot, has the most adorable dogs, cultivates bees which produce honey, has chickens, and .... he makes his own wine. He's a wine maker by profession and creates Pinot Noirs, Cabernets and Champagne for his own use. Yes, you heard me right. He makes his own Champagne. Not to mention rich, flavorful red wines. 

Lucky for me, he doesn't seem to bake much bread... But I do! Crusty, soft, dark and light, I bake with sourdough and yeast, and I'm more than happy to trade a loaf for a bottle. Luckily he feels the same way, and doesn't mind trading a bottle for a loaf!

Sourdough spelt loaf traded for Champagne (which can't technically be called Champagne, since then it has to be made in the Champagne region in France to be called that, but you get the idea), and I also received some wonderful rhubarb, arthicokes and a head of garlic.

Not a bad trade I would say. So far I've also baked crusty sourdough bread as well as a sourdough crown, and received one wonderful bottle of Pinot Noir and one Cabernet.

When you get offered a bottle of homemade wine, you might want to turn around and go the other direction, because let's face it - not all homemade wines are good wines. But these... these have been wonderful! Wonderful as in - we rarely buy this quality at the store. We have savoured every drop. The Champagne in particular was great, however the reds were fantastic as well.

So, this has given me some energy to do some baking, we have had some lovely wine, and I've enjoyed getting to know our neighbor. Who by the way is such a friendly, industrous man - I wouldn't mind ending up with a garden like this some day!