Earlier this year, I was introduced to an herbal liquor called Agwa de Bolivia, which is made from coca leaves. To me, it tasted quite medicinal and I think has to be mixed with something to be enjoyable. Of course, we're all familiar with another product that was originally made from coca - Coca Cola, of course. But soon a new version of an old product will be entering the market. Coca wine is being introduced by the UK-based company Mariani Amalgamated Ltd. The red wines will be produced and bottled in Peru. From the press release:

According to historical accountings coca-based wine is nothing new, per se. In fact the first coca wine 'Vin Mariani (French: Mariani's wine)' was a tonic created circa 1863 by Angelo Mariani, a chemist who became intrigued with coca and its economic potential after reading Paolo Mantegazza's paper on coca's effects. In 1863 Mariani started marketing a wine called Vin Mariani which was made from Bordeaux wine treated with coca leaves. The ethanol in the wine acted as a solvent and extracted the cocaine from the coca leaves, altering the drink's effect. It originally contained 6 mg of cocaine per fluid ounce of wine, but Vin Mariani which was to be exported contained 7.2 mg per ounce in order to compete with the higher cocaine content of similar drinks in the United States.

And indeed, a quick Web search turned up several pages discussing "vintage" coca wine. (And in this case "vintage" is not referring to a year.) Vin Mariani became hugely popular and many famous figures drank it regularly. Some of these people included Henrik Ibsen, Émile Zola, Jules Verne, Alexander Dumas, Robert Louis Stephenson, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Queen Victoria, and by William McKinley, President of the United States.

This ad for another type of coca wine was featured in a Sears, Roebuck and Co. Consumers' Guide in 1900:

And more recently, Spiegel Online International ran an article in March 2006 about Bolivian President Evo Morales, who at that point was trying to "make coca the new hemp." [via Blood & Treasure] The article discussed Bolivian-produced coca wine:

The wine, a bit on the sweet side, is supposedly a remedy against Parkinson's disease and impotence and, according to the label, it is especially suitable for "athletes and singers." In small doses, that is, because the wine is pressed from coca leaves, enhancing the effect of the alcohol. If you get drunk, you don't have to worry about how you're going to feel the next day because "coca wine doesn't cause a hangover," says Melby Paz.

I couldn't find any indication of whether or not Mariani's coca wine will be available in the United States. However, the company will produce a version of the wine made from denatured coca leaves (also used in today's Coca Cola as well as the Agwa de Boliva I mentioned earlier) for markets where coca-based products are illegal so the possibility for US distribution exists.