Hi Scott ! the thread was old when i read it...i live in boston where
there's a relativly
large immigrant community: Italian, Spanish, Portugese & more. we all go to
the regional wholesale produce center ( all New England produce passes thru
the Chelsea Produce Terminal on its way to restauarnts & markets) in
september when california commercial varietals come in for us old schoolers
to pick over.

I'd always suspected that there was a local winegrape outlet; i was stunned
to learn that there were 4 seasonal, competitive dealers of cali varietals,
fresh juices, cali & some imported, and quality equipment.

I'd bet that if you investigated a little, you'd find that there's a
semi-local winegrape source in your regional produce center. I'd suggest
going into a small, sucessful looking local fruit & veg stand and simply
asking if they know where to get wine grapes, etc. If you're lucky, that
person maybe a HWM himself!

the link that i've enclosed is an example of one of the 4 families who
operate out of our produce center from september til thanksgiving-ish, 7
days a week, 5AM til sunset+ until the grapes/juices are sold out. i've got
no stake in this except that we've bought grapes from the for 8 years.
they're typical. HTH, regards, bobdrob

http://www.americanwinegrape.com/index.htm

http://www.americanwinegrape.com/everett.htm
"Scott Lindner" > wrote in message
. ..
>> Scott - I'm no fan of red wine kits (white wine kits make pretty good
>> wine). It will be hard to produce a proper tasting Cabernet without using
>> whole grapes and a fermentation scheme that includes primary fermentation
>> in contact with the skins.
>
> Grrrr..... I asked this precise question before buying wine making
> equipment. I asked if I can make good red wines of the same quality I
> enjoy today. The answer was an overwhelming yes. It's not your fault,
> but long ago I feared that the places I asked (not on RCW) had a bunch of
> folks that don't really know what good wine is.
>
> I live in Colorado so getting good whole grapes is going to be
> challenging.
>
> Scott
>