Just like the big vineyards, amateur winemakers can age their wine in French oak barrels.

Throughout the ages, winemaking has become surrounded in a shroud of myth and folklore, but the basic process of turning fine grapes into great wine is not a very complicated one. With a moderate initial investment of money and spare time, you can ferment and bottle your own wine to enjoy at home or share with friends.

Scott Parker is a video editor in Los Angeles and a serious wine enthusiast with over two thousand bottles in his collection. After catching the wine bug while attending a tasting with his wife Julia, Parker let wine collecting overtake his former hobby of mircobrewed beers. Parker and his friends also make their own wine, and here he gives us a peek into this unique and satisfying hobby:

• Start a club. Making wine in large quantities does require some fairly specialized equipment, so to defray the startup costs, Parker and his friends decided to form a collective. Each of the 25 shareholders in the club puts in 500 dollars a year for equipment and supplies. A portion of this money goes to buying fresh grapes from professional vineyards.

• Barrels and tanks. Parker and his friends then ferment the must (that's the juice and crushed fruit) by adding yeast and placing it in stainless steel tanks. From there, the wine is moved to brand new French oak barrels for aging.

• Bottles and labels. The club also has a little bottling line to transfer the wine to glass bottles. Then the labels are affixed and the bottles are placed in cases. Each club member gets about five cases of wine.

• Fun and inexpensive. The club members get very busy at certain times of the year, but they all find it fun and exciting. Recently, Parker's club produced a zinfandel and two different syrahs. After the initial investment, the cost of each bottle came out to about nine dollars.

• Starter kits. If you're not yet ready to start a club and produce large quantities of wine, you might consider buying a winemaking kit. Kits provide all the equipment and ingredients necessary to make a small amount of wine in a small space and for a low cost. If you enjoy the process, you can start setting your sights higher and try something like Parker's club. The important thing, Parker says, is just to have a lot of fun!

Winemaker Magazine
winemakermag.com/index.html

The Joy of Home Winemaking
www.joyofwine.net

The Amateur Winemaker's Resource
www.geocities.com/NapaValley/Cellar/2800

Grapestompers
www.grapestompers.com

Century Wine
www.centurywine.8m.com