I KNOW how difficult it is to grow grapes in Northumberland. Some 20 years ago I planted a tiny vineyard in Bedlington. The vines looked lovely and produced lots of lush green leaves, but as soon as the fruit began to set it was greedily devoured by the birds.

I never harvested more than a few sad, searingly acidic berries. As even my attempts to grow grapes in south west France have been rather less than a triumph, I am full of the deepest admiration for anyone who can ripen healthy bunches of grapes in these Northern climes.

So when I was invited by Radio Newcastle to sample Northumbrian Wine live on air I was intrigued, impressed and rather worried.

I don’t enjoy being nasty about wine. I’d rather talk about something that’s worth drinking. I feared the Northumbrian wine would present me with an unfortunate dilemma.

When I first met Stan Abbott, the brains behind the project, in the dingy antechamber that passes for a green room in the Pink Palace, I was not reassured. I got the distinct impression that he seemed to think I was going to say something rather horrid about his wine, and when he muttered that I probably wouldn’t approve of the way it had been made, my heart sank a little further.

But I began to cheer up considerably when I discovered that all that was strange about it was the grapes had been helped along by a bit of sugar – standard practice in commercial wineries in England.

He told the listeners that he got his idea for Northumbrian Wine after hearing about a scheme to make wine from grapes collected from back gardens all over South London. Stan had planted a couple of vines on a sunny south-facing wall of his house in Newton Hall, Durham, and wondered if there were other amateur grape growers in the region who fancied emulating the London scheme. He found three who were willing to have a go and they arranged to send their grapes to High Cup Winery in Cumbria’s Eden Valley.

The first 60 bottles of Northumbrian Wine were distributed last April, a rather fetching pink, made from a mix of black and white grapes fermented together. The other grapes came from gardens and greenhouses in Chester-le-Street, Shildon and Cornforth. Stan sticks to a definition of Northumbria as the ancient kingdom, “anywhere north of the Humber”.

The wine was solemnly uncorked and served, slightly chilled, in elegant BBC plastic cups. And it tasted just fine, grapey and medium sweet. A final dose of sugar is a cunning and entirely legitimate way of masking the rather tart acidity of less than perfectly ripe grapes and bears witness to the skills of winemaker Ron Barker. I was so impressed that I asked Stan if I could drive down to Newton Hall for a chat and take a look at his vines.

They looked very perky indeed. They’d just finished flowering, and promise a harvest in October, like last year, as long as the next two months are not a washout. He bought them three years ago from a local nursery along with a wisteria to cover the wall, but the poor wisteria is now dwarfed by the runaway vines.

One is Müller-Thurgau and the other, according to the nursery, is Chardonnay – though I have my doubts. I’d like to see the grapes once they’re fully formed. No matter what they are, they’re healthy and that’s reason enough to be grateful.

The growers kept in close contact last year and agreed a time to pick. Stan stored the grapes in his freezer last year until he could transport the entire harvest across the Pennines to High Cup. Freezing grapes may sound harsh, but top Aussie wineries are perfectly happy to keep part of their harvest in a cold store until they have the capacity to process it, and makers of Vinho Verde in northern Portugal regularly freeze grape juice to make wine later in the year.

My notes from our conversation lack a bit of coherence, not because we drank any more of the precious wine, but because Oscar, one of Stan’s cats, insisted on rolling on my notebook; but I learned enough to realise that fun as it is, this Northumbrian Wine is no joke. Stan hopes other amateur grape growers will join the scheme and they’ll be able to make more and even better wine. “Our objective is get a drinkable wine and it would be great to able to make a red and white this year,” he told me.

There’s a new website about the project at www.northumbrianwine.com

Stan can also be contacted via email on stan@gravity-consulting.com. Just £2 per bottle is enough to cover the cost of production, Stan calculates. For that you’ll get a bottle bearing the red and yellow shield of Northumberland.

The wine is not for sale, of course, but it has the wonderful potential of enabling a number of amateur grape growers in our region to enjoy the fruits of their labours. Newton Hall may not exactly be “Châteauneuf” as Stan likes to suggest, but who’s to say we’ll not raise a glass of crisp dry Cullercoats or a sparkling Sunniside one day?