Colonial Quaff

Colonial Americans of the eighteenth century drank wine liberally as part of a healthy lifestyle. Folk medicine pamphlets of the time suggest wine and herb/ wine tonics as remedies for everything from warts to injuries inflicted by witchcraft.  One of the most influential health writers of the time, Christopher Sauer, a Pennsylvanian apothecary, suggested that wine possessed “the noble capacity to warm the stomach, promote digestion, increase and improve the blood, promote circulation, strengthen the constitution and make men merry.”  Sauer recommended four ounces (about one glass of wine) each day—before breakfast.