Category Archives: Winery

Linden Three Vineyard Vertical Comparison

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Few Virginia wineries are as terroir-driven as Linden Vineyards. Probably the best proof behind this statement is how many of Linden’s wines are named after the vineyards they come from; namely Avenius, Boisseau, and Hardscrabble.

These vineyards are the only places Linden uses for fruit, and their varying soil types and elevation means each provide a different tasting profile. While not every wine Linden produces is vineyard-specific (they also make a multi-vineyard Chardonnay called “Village” and red-blend named “Claret”), owner/winegrower Jim Law prefers to let the vineyards speak for themselves.

  • Avenius Vineyard (5 acres, 1,300-1,400 feet elevation). Linden’s highest and coolest site. Named for and farmed by Shari Avenius. Located less than a mile from the winery, but on a very different soil profile.
  • Boisseau Vineyard (4 acres, 600 feet). This is Linden’s lowest and warmest site. Named for and farmed by Richard Boisseau. As the smallest vineyard, it’s not uncommon for a vintage to lack a vineyard-specific Boisseau wine as the fruit was blended into Claret or Village.
  • Hardscrabble Vineyard (~20 acres, 1,100-1,400 feet elevation). This is Linden’s largest, oldest, and most diverse vineyard, located at the winery. The best blocks go into Hardscrabble (red or white), while the younger ones go into Claret & Village. Some vines date back to 1985.

Picking a favorite Linden vineyard is something of a parlor game for Virginia wine nerds. Hardscrabble arguably produces Linden’s most famous wines, but don’t discount the other two. “Acid-heads” love Avenius’ higher-elevation fruit, while Boisseau produces some of Linden’s easiest-drinking, more fruit-forward wines.

Nevertheless, I wanted to try all three side-by-side, and it wasn’t difficult to find helpers for this task. Most had tried Linden wine before, although only a few of them had been exposed to this kind of multi-vineyard, multi-vintage experience.

My tasting was both a vertical in that the reds came from two different years (2017 and 2019), and a horizontal in we had all three vineyards represented. 2017 and 2019 were also two of the better growing years in recent Virginia history.

Our Chardonnay flight (only 2019 vintage)

  • 2019 Avenius
  • 2019 Boisseau
  • 2019 Hardscrabble

Our Bordeaux blend flights (2017 and 2019 vintages)

  • 2017 Avenius (54% Merlot, 46% Cabernet Sauvignon)
  • 2017 Boisseau (40% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Petit Verdot, 20% Merlot and 6% Cabernet Franc)
  • 2017 Hardscrabble (57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 43% Merlot)
  • 2019 Avenius (50% Cab Sauv, 42% Merlot, 8% Petit Verdot)
  • 2019 Boisseau (61% Cab Franc, 19% Petit Verdot, 17% Merlot, 3% Cab Sauv)
  • 2019 Hardscrabble (65% Cab Sauv, 19% Cab Franc, 16% Merlot)

At the end of every round, I did a poll to determine our favorite from the flight. But in reality, “Best” was entirely subjective. Even the wine that was the ‘least’ favorite was something we’d have happily enjoyed.

All reds were decanted for 1.5-2 hours prior to the event. Jim has exceptionally detailed notes describing the vintage years and individual wines, so follow the embedded links more information on the Linden website.

2019 Chardonnay Round

Linden vineyards exist in no small part because Jim Law was inspired by Chablis. While most winemakers tend to advertise red blends as their ‘flagship’ wines, Chardonnay is of such importance that I’d argue Linden’s ‘flagship’ is its Hardscrabble Chardonnay.

These three Chardonnays had distinct personalities, but we usually saw more similarities than differences. Avenius and Hardscrabble are definitely ‘cousins’, while Boisseau was more of an outlier. Yet there was still a common thread of fruit and minerality to all three.

  • Linden 2019 Avenius Chardonnay. You could tell this was ‘mountain’ fruit because its acidity was more pronounced, plus it showcased minerality and structure. Very *bright*. Several of us detected notes of citrus, specifically lemon. Kathy mentioned chalk. Daniel mentioned ‘apple tart’.
  • Linden 2019 Boisseau Chardonnay. Lots of fruit notes. Tropical nose, notes of banana. Daniel mentioned maybe an herbal note. I heard someone mention tarragon and kiwi. Another guest mentioned a bitter note.
  • Linden 2019 Hardcrabble Chardonnay: This wine just felt ‘big’ on the palate. Apple and butterscotch notes. Also notes of orange peel, citrus, specifically a sweeter orange. The acidity is there, but you sometimes had to wait a moment for it to hit you. One person mentioned it had almost a certain waxiness to it.

When I did my poll, 7 out of 8 of us preferred Avenius. We almost universally felt the 2019 Avenius was very clean and ready to drink.

Hardscrabble was the runner up. It also had acidity, just not to the degree of Avenius. That said, we felt HS would only get better and better. Boisseau was definitely well enjoyed, but it was just a different animal than the other two.

Favorites (#1 Avenius, #2 Boisseau, #3 Hardscrabble):

  • Alex: 2/1/3. Voted for Boisseau; the outlier of my group!
  • Daniel: 1/3/2. By technical standards, #3/Hardscrabble was the ‘best’ wine of the lineup but felt Avenius was drinking great now. While both still had years to go, the Hardscrabble hadn’t yet peaked.
  • Kathy: 1/3/2.
  • Lieven: 1/3/2. Felt the Avenius was ‘ready to drink’ right now.
  • Matt: 1/3/2
  • Mark: 1/2/3
  • Todd: 1/3/2
  • Vanessa: 1/3/2. Felt the Avenius had the most lift and was clean, even waxy.

2017 Red blend round

2017 was one of Linden’s best vintages in years, for both reds and whites. These wines are likely to last for many, many years to come.

I was surprised that a vintage 8 years old tasted so fresh. As Virginia’s weather becomes increasingly erratic, we are seeing more instances of ‘hot years’ that causes local fruit to become disjointed and ‘rainy years’ which results in underripe fruit. Fortunately, 2017 was a goldilocks year where the pieces fit almost perfectly.

  • Linden 2017 Avenius red: 54% Merlot, 46% Cabernet Sauvignon. Refined tannin but a shorter finish. We detected newer oak but it’s so integrated you don’t mind at all. It also leaned heavily on the fruit, with notes of blackberry and boysenberry. Someone mentioned notes of pine, eucalyptus, and it was ‘forest-y’. This wine also evolved the most in the glass.
  • Linden 2017 Boisseau red: 40% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Petit Verdot, 20% Merlot and 6% Cabernet Franc. Fruit notes, especially dark cherry. Some felt it was almost too fruity, and they struggled to find notes beyond it. Others noted a root beer quality to it, plus notes of pyrazines and pepper. While the general consensus was while this wine had more fruit than we preferred, it was “nice” fruit; not jammy at all. It also had a good structure to it.
  • Linden 2017 Hardscrabble red: 57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 43% Merlot. Balanced; medium/medium plus acidity. Ripe fruit, especially plumb. But there were also notes of minerality, including graphite. Notes of cassis were mentioned, while another guest said it was “meaty” and had a cigar box quality to it. This was also the most food-centric wine of the trio.

By a unanimous vote, the 2017 Hardscrabble red was our favorite. Avenius came in 2nd and Boisseau 3rd, also with unanimous votes by all eight attendees.

I’m absolutely not surprised that the 2017 Hardscrabble red was the favorite wine here. I’ve blind tasted it numerous times, and it’s nearly always my favorite in a contest of other championship-level wines.

Note to self; I should decant it more the next time I pop a bottle, since I felt the 2017 HS initially presented more earthy notes than I personally prefer, but the complexity popped out once swirled in the glass.

Favorites (#1 Avenius, #2 Boisseau, #3 Hardscrabble):

  • Alex: 3/1/2. Thought of steak when drinking the Hardscrabble, but felt the Avenius could be enjoyed on its own
  • Daniel: 3/1/2. The Hardscrabble was “balanced and complex”. The Avenius shared many of its qualities, just less so.
  • Kathy: 3/1/2
  • Lieven: 3/1/2. Felt the Hardscrabble was “elegant and elevated”
  • Matt: 3/1/2
  • Mark: 3/1/2
  • Todd: 3/1/2
  • Vanessa: 3/1/2. Said “The Avenius has structure, but the Hardscrabble has everything”

2019 Red blend round

While this vintage was two years younger than the 2017 round, the 2019 reds actually presented as being older and smoother than the 2017s. I attribute that to 2017 being such a great year that balance was easy to achieve, while 2019 was a hotter, riper year.

  • Linden 2019 Avenius red: 50% Cab Sauv, 42% Merlot, 8% Petit Verdot. The barrel notes were well integrated. Notes of black cherry and raspberry were mentioned. Tart. Higher acidity than the other wines in this flight.
  • Linden 2019 Boisseau red: 61% Cab Franc, 19% Petit Verdot, 17% Merlot, 3% Cab Sauv. Our notes were all over, but my favorite descriptor was “Hedonistic”. Long list of fruit and/or earthy notes, with some tasters leaning one way or the other. Many mentioned notes of black cherry, perhaps with a compote/sweet fruit note to it. A few mentioned liquorish. Others said it was ‘grippy’ and chewy. Still others felt it had more earthy characteristics, maybe a little mushroom, even ‘spice box’.
  • Linden 2019 Hardscrabble red: 65% Cab Sauv, 19% Cab Franc, 16% Merlot. Balanced. Notes of bramble fruit, baking spices, maybe a little brett. Cigar box and leather was mentioned. The tannin was chewy bur refined. Not a lot of fruit notes, though.

By another 8-person unanimous vote, the 2019 Boisseau red was decreed the favorite of our 3rd round. When he first tried it, I believe Daniel said something to the effect of, “That’s what I’m talking about!”. Avenius was almost universally the runner-up, and Hardscrabble was 3rd.

My best guess was the warmer year accentuated the fruit qualities of the Boisseau. It was also an outlier in this was our only red that was Cabernet Franc heavy, and people seemed to gravitate towards some of the spice notes that better Cab Francs have.

Favorites (#1 Avenius, #2 Boisseau, #3 Hardscrabble):

  • Alex: 2/3/1. Felt the #3/Hardscrabble needed more time
  • Daniel: 2/1/3. Likewise felt the Hardscrabble needed more time
  • Kathy: 2/1/3
  • Lieven: 2/1/3
  • Matt: 2/1/3
  • Mark: 2/1/3
  • Todd: 2/1/3. Felt #2 was the most open and balanced
  • Vanessa: 2/1/3. Said that #2/ was “great right now”

The results

In summary, here were the favorites per round:

  1. 2019 Avenius Chardonnay (7 out 8 votes)
  2. 2017 Hardscrabble red (8 out of 8 votes)
  3. 2019 Boisseau red (8 out of 8 votes)

I love that every round picked a different vineyard as their favorite. The qualities of each vineyard definitely shined through, influenced by the year the wine was made.

That said, I’m positive that had we tried this event either a year earlier or later, we easily could have come up with different results. Certain wines we tried this day were just ‘in their prime’, while others (especially Hardscrabble) arguably needed another year to reach their peak.

I admit I was somewhat surprised how unanimous we tended to be, given my group was rather diverse. 3 of us had been visiting Linden for years. Another 3 were DC-based wine experts who had experienced Linden, although not necessarily older vintages. The last 2 guests had until recently been living in Sonoma and were just starting their Virginia wine journey. Yet this group was extremely consistent in how we rated all 3 flights.

I did one last poll regarding favorite vineyard…and the overall favorite vineyard was Avenius. Guests seemed split whether they preferred the Avenius red or white. Again; ask us on another day, or with a different variety, we may have selected otherwise.

But today; Avenius Vineyard was our favorite.

Sitting on the deck at Linden

Virginia Wine Wins Big in San Francisco

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The Governor’s Cup may be Virginia wine’s best-known event, but the wine world is full of wine competitions large and small. Two of the most prestigious are held annually in San Francisco nearly back-to-back.

The most recent San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition (SFCWC) and San Francisco International Wine Competition (SFIWC) collectively reviewed well over 7,000 wines from 20 countries. Some of the best judges in the industry sampled everything from classic chardonnays and red blends, esoteric hybrids, to fruit wines and vermouths.

30 Virginia wineries and cideries entered these events, earning a total of 182 medals. Of these, 22 were Double Gold and 38 were Gold.

A number of these Double Golds earned top honors in their respective categories. The SFIWC awarded Vint Hill’s Covert Wineworks “Madison” 2023 Story Petit Manseng “Best White Wine in Show”, as well as “Best Other White Varietal”. The SFCWC gave “Best in Class” awards to 6 of Virginia wines.

One of the judges at the SFCWC summarized his view of Virginia’s impact with this statement:

“Each year, some wine region of North America seems to gain recognition for a disproportionate share of high awards at the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition. In 2025, it was Virginia” SFCWC wine judge Mike Dunne, on Virginia’s entries

While not all wineries enter major competitions, they nevertheless provide an important metric on how Virginia wine fares on the international stage. These competitions also provide increased visibility, marketing value, and bragging rights to those who do well.

I asked Mark and Maggie Malick, former owners of Maggie Malick Wine Caves, their view of these events. Maggie once earned Best in Class/Double Gold at the 2021 SFCWC for her 2017 Tannat, and Double Gold for her 2014 Tannat at the 2017 SFIWC.

According to Maggie, “They’re both big hitters. Judging is pretty strict in both. If you enter a Virginia wine and beat another country, you’re doing good.”

Biggest Winners at San Francisco

Winning Gold is a major kudo at either the SFCWC or SFIWC, but Virginia’s haul of 22 Double Golds and numerous “Best of” awards is especially impressive for a wine region that makes less than 0.3% of the nation’s wine production.

It’s too much to describe every one of these Double Gold winners. But if I were to narrow it down to a handful of the Virginia’s ‘biggest winners’ by winemaker, winery, or as a category that deserves highlighting, these are my picks:

  • Mark Ward, Winemaker for Effingham, Pearmund, and Vint Hill. Mark took home 5 Double Gold and 5 Golds between the SFC and SFI events. His Vint Hill 2023 Petit Manseng also earned “Best White Wine in Show” at the SFIWC. He’s been the head winemaker for the “Pearmund trifecta” since 2020.
  • Jeremy Ligon, Barrel Oak Winery. Jeremy was awarded a Best In Class/Double Gold for his Sauvignon Blanc (in the $35 and over category), Double Gold and runner-up for Best of Class for this dry Rosé, Double Gold at the SFI for his sparkling Norton, and three Golds.
  • Philip Carter Winery. PCW earned two SFCWC Best in Class awards, for its Nomini Hall Cabernet Franc ($35.00 – $49.99), and Chardonnay ($38.00 – $42.99). Matthieu Finot is their winemaker.
  • Veritas Vineyard. Emily Hodson of Veritas earned SFCWC Best in Class awards for her 2023 Sauvignon Blanc ($30.00 – $34.99) and 2023 Monticello White ($31.00 and over White blend), plus four Golds.
  • The 2023 Vintage. 2023 is the kind of high-quality vintage that is often only seen once a decade. Virginia wine lovers already knew this, but now the rest of the world does too.

    It’s notable that 28 of the 59 Virginia wines (discounting one that used fruit from the west coast) that earned either Gold or Double Gold came from this magical juice. So far, most of what’s been released were white wines. That means our recently bottled reds are going to be making incredible waves on the competition circuit, once they are unleashed.

  • Virginia Sauvignon Blanc. I admit, I didn’t see this one coming. Yet it’s important enough to warrant its own mention, because the respective winemakers deserve it.

    Virginia earned two SFCWC “Best in Class” awards for Sauvignon Blanc; Barrel Oak ($35 and over) and Veritas ($30.00 – $34.99). Endhardt earned a Double Gold and was runner-up to Veritas for its Upper Block Sauvignon Blanc.

    This is a massive win for a category that is usually dominated by California. If we kicked-ass in Sauv Blanc, think of what the rest of the 2023 vintage is going to do.

    The SFCWC website had this to say on these Sauv Blancs:

    “At the 2025 San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition, two of the five best-of-class Sauvignon Blancs were from Virginia, an unprecedented showing. (In all, 198 Sauvignon Blancs were in the competition.)”

    “The Barrel Oak the richer, riper, and rounder of the two, its fruit fleshy and saturating,” while saying of the Veritas, “The wine is frank, lithe, dry, citric and astonishingly persistent for a Sauvignon Blanc. Its perky acidity makes it a perfect match for raw oysters.”

San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition (SFCWC) and San Francisco International Wine Competition (SFIWC) combined roster

WineryWineAwardCompetition
Barrel Oak Winery2023 Sauvignon BlancBest of Class/DG ($35 & over)2025 SF Chronicle
Barrel Oak Winery2023 “Paradox” sparkling NortonDouble Gold2024 SF International
Barrel Oak Winery2023 RoséDouble Gold
(Dry Rosé: 0 RS, $30 & over)		2025 SF Chronicle
Eastwood Farm and Winery2022 Cabernet FrancDouble Gold
(Up to $34.99)		2025 SF Chronicle
Eastwood Farm and Winery2022 Petit VerdotDouble Gold
(Up to $45.99)		2025 SF Chronicle
Effingham Manor Winery2021 “King’s Ransom” red blendDouble Gold2024 SF International
Endhardt Vineyards2023 Upper Block Sauvignon BlancDouble Gold ($30-$34.99)2025 SF Chronicle
Fifty-Third Winery and Vineyard2021 “Rock Ridge” red blendDouble Gold
(Red Blend: Petit Verdot leading)		2025 SF Chronicle
Greenhill Winery & Vineyards2022 “Eternity” Cabernet FrancDouble Gold
(Cab Franc $50 & over)		2025 SF Chronicle
Ingleside VineyardsNV “October Harvest” dessert wineDouble Gold
(White Dessert/Late Harvest – RS >3.5)		2025 SF Chronicle
Jefferson Vineyards2023 ViognierDouble Gold2024 SF International
Pearmund Cellars2022 Cabernet FrancDouble Gold2024 SF International
Pearmund Cellars2023 Petit MansengDouble Gold2024 SF International
Philip Carter Winery2023 “Nomini Hall” Cabernet FrancBest of Class/DG ($35-$49.99)2025 SF Chronicle
Philip Carter Winery2023 “Shirley” ChardonnayBest of Class/DG ($38-$42.99)2025 SF Chronicle
Slater Run VineyardsRosé of MerlotDouble Gold2024 SF International
Trump Winery2022 Reserve ChardonnayBest of Class/DG ($30-$34.99)2025 SF Chronicle
Trump Winery2018 Estate Blanc de BlancDouble Gold2024 SF International
Veritas Vineyards2023 Sauvignon BlancBest of Class/DG  ($30-$34.99)2025 SF Chronicle
Veritas Vineyards2023 Monticello WhiteBest of Class/DG (White blend: $31 & over)2025 SF Chronicle
Vint Hill2023 “Madison” Petit MansengBest White in Show / Double Gold2024 SF International
Vint Hill2023 “Vivian” ViognierDouble Gold2024 SF International

Background On The 2025 SFC and 2024 SFI Wine Competitions

Virgina SF International and-Chronicle Medals 2021 2025 v4Download

The 2025 San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition (2025 SFCWC) reviewed 5,500 wines submitted from over 910 wineries throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico, making it the largest wine competition in North America. 4,991 medals were awarded.

There are often multiple awards for the same variety or style for different price brackets. The “Best in Class” award goes to the highest-scoring bottle within that price bracket. It additionally has a “Sweepstakes” award to identify the top wine from among the “Bests” in different categories (no Virginia wine won this category this year).

The wines were judged in mid-January, and the results were released on 17 January 2025.

The 2024 San Francisco International Wine Competition (2024 SFIWC) reviewed wine submitted from 20 countries. 1590 medals were awarded to 476 wineries.

The wines were judged in mid-December, and the results were released on 13 January 2025.

Note on the Virginia medal winners: The La Grange Winery Syrah that earned Gold in the 2025 SFC used non-Virginia fruit. The other 59 Golds/Double Golds all used Virginia fruit. The ‘182’ medals includes 16 wines made using non-Virginia fruit. I include these numbers here only for the sake of being complete.

Jeremy Lingon, BOW
Slater Run Vineyards

Exploring Local Sake With Charlottesville’s North American Sake Brewery

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Several years ago while visiting wineries around Charlottesville, I encountered a curious sight. In the city that is the epicenter of Virginia wine was…a sake brewery.

What? Sake??? In Virginia?

Yet thinking about it, my surprise was misplaced. Sake exports from Japan have more than doubled from 2012 to 2022, according to figures provided by the Japanese Sake & Shochu Makers Association. Not only is the US the world’s top sake importer, there’s a growing local sake industry as well.

Charlottesville based North American Sake Brewery is one of only 20 or so sake breweries in the US, and the first (and only) in Virginia. Founder and head brewer Andrew Centofante gave me a lesson on sake brewing and a tour of his facility.

“Sake is such a fascinating and historic beverage. It’s a pretty niche market, but it’s one of the fastest growing beverages there is,” Andrew said during our interview. “As people explore Japanese cuisine, they are finding sake is a key part of it.

About 15 years ago, I went to an “izakaya” (casual drinking establishment) in Japan,” he continued. “The bartender walked me through different styles, regions, and profiles of sake, and it hit me that sake was similar to the craft beer movement. A few years later, I started making sake at home, and that led me to go back to Japan to work at a 200-year old brewery outside Osaka to learn the craft.

We’ve been open since 2018, making very traditionally handcrafted sake as well as some experimental styles.”

Defining Sake: Beer? Rice Wine? Or Something Unique?

The four basic ingredients for sake are rice, koji, water, and yeast. Of these, koji is likely the ingredient least-understood by American audiences.

Koji is a mold, cultured in hot, humid conditions to promote propagation. It’s an integral part of many of Japan’s most famous drinks and dishes, including sake, miso, and soy sauce.

Brewers apply the mold to rice, ensuring it’s thoroughly spread over every grain. When the brewing starts in the tank, the mold provides the enzymes to convert the rice starch into sugar. This sugar is then devoured by the yeast, which turns it into alcohol.

This process is called “multiple parallel fermentation,” and it’s what makes sake brewing unique.

While sake is usually referred to as ‘rice wine,’ that definition is a misnomer. Sake is its own category of alcoholic beverage, despite often being classified as either a wine or beer in the western world.

Andrew gets the question of, “Is sake a rice wine?” all the time. “Like wine, you can sip it, savor it, pair it with food. Sake is the same way. It has nuance of character, but the process is grain based, so it’s much closer to brewing than winemaking.

While they use similar processes, sake and beer come out at very different strengths. Since sake usually has around 15% alcohol and is sipped like wine, it’s often classified as rice wine.”

Balancing Creativity With Tradition

Unlike wine, which is ‘terroir’ driven, sake is more brewer-driven, according to Andrew.

“We talk a lot about the concept of intent in sake making. That’s what makes sake a difficult beverage to understand.”

The brewer’s treatment of their rice greatly influences the end product, a process called milling.

“Milling is where we remove fats and other proteins to get to the grain’s “shimpaku,” or starchy core, and it helps delimitate the style of sake you create,” Andrew explained while showing a handful of rice grains. “The more milled the rice is, the fruitier and more aromatic the end product is. The less it’s milled, the more earthy and savory notes you’ll get.

“Daiginjo” (50% milled) sake rice on the left, and sushi-grade rice on the right

The kind of rice you use is important, but think of it like a white canvas. It’s the brewing that helps bring out the nuanced flavor and aroma.

We get our rice from Arkansas. The farm we use has been making sake-specific rice for years. Sake rice is a short-grained style, usually with a great shimpaku that’s easy to mill and melts well in the tank.”

Japanese sake already comes in many different styles, based on the ingredients and production methods used. Local producers like North American Sake aren’t afraid to get even more creative to appeal to American consumers.

Andrew pondered my question regarding how far local sake diverges from what’s found in Japan before answering.

“It’s an interesting question. The sake industry in North America is so young, there aren’t defined styles of sake in terms of regionality. Being in the US, we have this huge opportunity to break out of traditional sake conventions.

We play on the edge of what sake is, and make everything from super-premium to fun, table sakes. There are people who are casual drinkers who just want something fun, or something gluten free.

For this crowd we make fruited styles using regional fruits or herbs, we make sparkling sake, and we’ve done collaborations with different brewers to make hopped sake.

But we also have customers who are looking for great sake. Since we’re in the game of making sake, we have to be as good or better than any Japanese sake out there.”

The 2024 Virginia Wine Year In Review

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I wrote my first “Year In Review” in 2020, mostly as a way to summarize my favorite articles of the previous year and post the latest winery openings & closings. Over time I added new material to these yearly updates, focusing on events and themes that stood out.

To see my other ‘Years in Review’, check out my 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 articles as well.

Five years in, it’s hard to write these annual blurbs without revisiting topics I’d previously mentioned. But that’s ok; topics such as climate change, diversity, and sustainability won’t ever go out of style, and there are always new events to keep things interesting.

Virginia ended 2024 with a total of 278 wineries, 36 cideries, and 12 meaderies, plus 30 wine/cider/mead brands that lack tasting rooms. Here is a link to my winery roster.

This article is entirely my personal opinion and doesn’t reflect the position of the Virginia Wine Marketing Board or any other entity.

2024’s Major Stories and Trends

1. Industry Still Expanding Despite Closings Creeping Up, Including Oldest Winery in Virginia

2024 Winery Openings and Closings:

  • 15 New Wine/Cider/Mead Tasting Rooms Opened: Blue Wall Cider and Wine, Domaine Fortier, Eagle Zen, Fallen Tree, Farm De Vine, Hermitage Hill Cider at Stable Craft Brewing, Muddy Paws, Private Label Cellars, Reitano Vineyards, Roslyn Farm and Vineyard (who for now, only sells other VA wine), Squabble State Hard Cider & Spirits, South Paddock Winery, Three Leg Run Brewery, Winery, and Meadery, Loudoun Cider House, and Thistle Rock Meadery.
  • 6 New Micro-Labels Started: Cavalier Wine, Delve Wine, Holmes Wine, The Parallax Project, Prelude Wines, and Wound Tight.
  • 10 Winery or Meadery Tasting Rooms Closed: AmRhein Wine Cellars, Blacksnake Meadery, Chapelle Charlemagne Vineyards, Forever Farm, Leo Grand Vineyard, Mountain Cove, Plumb Creek, Preston Ridge, and Spring Run (still open for events but not selling their own wine). Aspen Dale advertises itself as ‘mostly closed’ so I count it here, although it’s occasionally open to sell the winery’s remaining inventory. While not yet closed, Stanburn Winery will likely follow suit soon.

In summary; older, more rural wineries suffered the most in 2024, while new businesses generally chose to stay small rather than invest in a high-priced venue. For wineries who did open a tasting room, they nearly always opened in established wine regions.

The closure of Mountain Cove is an especially hard loss, as this was the oldest operating winery in Virginia (having purchased the land in 1973 and opening in 1977). That title now goes to Shenandoah Vineyards.

A total of 9 wineries closed. Notably, all were smaller venues located away from major wine trails. Economics almost certainly played a role in their closings, but other factors did as well.

Several had been open for years, even decades. But wine is a hard business, and eventually owners want to retire. Those who didn’t sell the winery may have simply decided to close shop and move to their next chapter.

Fortunately, new openings (surprisingly?) outnumber closings.

You’d think in a time of declining wine sales I’d be reporting that the number of new winery openings is shrinking. While 15 new venues represent a slower pace than the breakneck over ~20/year openings seen during the 2010s, it’s still comparable to an ‘average’ year in Virginia.

But there’s a catch. While the raw number of new wineries that opened in 2024 is strong, these businesses tended to be smaller in scale (both production capacity and tasting room size) than wineries that opened in previous years. If you measure only wine production, 2024 almost certainly represents a slowdown compared to 2023.

Moreover, some new businesses are forgoing tasting rooms all together. 2024 saw the opening of 6 ‘micro wineries’ (brands that sell their wine via pop-ups instead of a tasting room). This was a new record for this model, which I partially attribute to the success of ‘wine incubators’ (more on that later).

Even larger wineries are not immune to economic trends. Paradise Spring was set to open a new tasting room in Afton but decided to hold off for the time being, while Michael Shaps is selling his “Wineworks Extended” tasting room in downtown Charlottesville (but keeping his main location).

2. The 2024 Vintage & Another Year of Extreme Weather

In the words of one winemaker, “The 2024 vintage was…weird”.

It started off strong. Spring didn’t inflict serious frost damage, and the summer was especially hot and dry. These conditions allow vineyards to produce fruit with high-intensity berries, suitable for making powerful wine.

Alas, the drought was so harsh that winemakers actually wished for a few inches of rain. Yet when it finally came, it was a deluge. What could have been an awesome 2023-like vintage was knocked down a peg or two in many places.

Late-ripening reds such as cabernet sauvignon and petit verdot most likely suffered the most as they either had a hard time drying out or growers were forced to pick them prematurely. Fortunately, many vineyards brought in excellent merlot and cabernet franc earlier in the season, and their white grapes came in well before the rain.

Of course, this is a generalization. There are wineries that were extremely happy with their fruit and others that were less so. While uneven phenolic ripening due to the accelerated growing season may pose a challenge, most winemakers seem satisfied with the quality (but not the quantity) of the 2024 season fruit.

Some may label this as a year of ‘extreme’ weather, given multiple records for early harvesting were broken. But given how the last several years were crazy in their own unique ways, I think this proves that ‘extreme’ weather has become something of the norm.

3. A Good Year For Diversity and Inclusion

2024 was a triple win for diversity and inclusion, with well-deserved callouts to Pride in the Vines, Virginia Women in Wine (VWIW), and The Oenoverse.

Loudoun County’s ‘Pride in the Vines’ hosted its second wine trail this past June for Pride Month. Not part of the trail but thematically connected was Culpepper Pride, hosted by Mountain Run Winery. Pride flags are now flying in towns that didn’t welcome them even a decade ago.

Next up is Nancy Bauer’s VWIW, which launched its inaugural event in August. The necessity of this organization is driven by how two-thirds of the local wine industry workforce are female, yet women are severely underrepresented in industry leadership positions. The VWIW’s mission is to close this gender gap, offering opportunities for networking, leadership development, and highlighting the industry’s female trailblazers.

Blenheim Vineyards’ Oenoverse (Ee-Nuh-Verse) isn’t new, but this wine club/wine community/access & opportunity program has been ‘in the news’ in 2024 as co-founder Reggie Leonard received national recognition for his outreach to historically underrepresented communities.

Oenoverse-related events in 2024 included the Two Up Wine Down wine festival, which highlighted a number of BIPOC winemakers/owners. It also partnered with The Veraison Project, which hosted an immersion program aimed at members of historically underrepresented consumers & industry professionals.

4. Banner Year For Media Recognition

In 2023, Wine Enthusiast selected Monticello as their “Wine Region of the Year”. Since then, there has been a notable uptick in national recognition of the Virginia wine industry.

Major outlets which showered praise on Virginia wine include The Wall Street Journal, Decanter, Vogue, Southern Living, Travel & Leisure, and Men’s Journal (to name just a few). While Virginia wine has been recognized in the press before, it’s fair to say Wine Enthusiast supercharged the press circuit.

Hopefully, this will normalize Virginia as an ‘established’ region known for its quality wine, rather than constantly be identified as an ‘up & coming’ area to watch out for.

5. Small-Batch Wine and Eastwood Farms’ “Virginia Wine Collective” Project

The number of small-batch wine labels has grown significantly over the past decade, with six micro-brands opening in 2024 alone. This has given rise to ‘wine incubators’, which provide a space for these tiny enterprises to grow.

While such spaces aren’t new, Eastwood Farm’s “Virginia Wine Collective” may be the most innovative.

Eastwood plans on renovating the current Michael Shaps Wineworks Extended tasting room in Charlottesville, creating individual spaces that can be licensed separately. This allows the winemakers operating in these spaces start-to-finish control over their wine. This also sets Eastwood apart from other “incubators,” as their lack of separately licensable spaces prevents these entrepreneurs from operating heavy equipment because of insurance liability.

Owner Athena Eastwood hopes this facility will encourage fresh talent to enter the industry by lowering the startup costs encountered by new winemakers. Yet this facility isn’t just for new winemakers; many small-batch operations will operate from here.

Athena explained the goal is to create a joint tasting room for Eastwood’s participating “Wine Collective” members, which include local wine luminaries such as Jake Busching, Joy Ting, and Matthieu Finot.

6. Invasion of the Spotted Lanternfly

If 2023 saw scouting parties, then 2024 saw the full invasion of the spotted lanternfly (SLF).

It’s hard to visit a winery in NOVA without the little buggers flying all around you, and they’re now being spotted in the Shenandoah Valley and Charlottesville.

The SLF sucks the sap out of vines, potentially causing vascular damage. They also excrete a sugary substance that attracts nuisance insects. This ‘honeydew’ also creates a difficult to remove sooty mold that inhibits photosynthesis.

The only good news is Pennsylvania wineries (ground zero for the invasion) are reporting SLF populations have started to collapse, indicating nature is bringing things back into balance. Until then, vineyard managers will have to lean on their spray programs to control the infestation.

7. RdV Vineyards purchased by Château Montros

This June, RdV announced it was purchased by Château Montrose, a “Second Growth” winery in Bordeaux. This is the first time a high-powered French château has established itself in the eastern United States.

This acquisition is a huge vote of confidence in not just RdV, but the future of Virginia wine as a whole. Founder Rutger De Vink has already moved to Oregon, passing the reins to the Bouygues family. RdV will now be led by Charlotte Bouygues, who plans to split her time between NYC, Paris, and Virginia.

Charlotte explained this purchase was motivated by a desire to find a location abroad that stylistically fits with their Bordeaux wines. Locating a business where the existing team was willing to stay on, especially Winemaker Joshua Grainer, also encouraged them to make this move.

At some point in the near-future the winery will be renamed Lost Mountain, after RdV’s flagship wine and hilly location.

8. Norton (and Hybrids) Getting Well Deserved Recognition

Climate change is also causing winemakers to take a fresh look at American and hybrid grapes. Norton especially seemed to get some long-overdue respect this year.

This November a number of wineries joined together to form the “Norton Network”, giving special tastings to highlight this grape. Fred Reno has an entire podcast series on Norton. Even Lucie Morton is getting in on the action, raising funds for her film “Odyssey of Forbidden Wines” and testing if Cynthiana and Norton are the same or different grapes (she suspects the later).

Native and hybrid grapes are surprisingly not increasing as a percentage of total grapes planted, according to recent Virginia grape grower reports. I suspect this will change in the next few years, especially as more vineyards such as Briedé Family Farm plant a next-generation of hybrid grapes.

Honorable Mentions:

  • Passing of Paul Armstrong: This August, Virginia lost a huge advocate and amazing person with the passing of Paul Armstrong, half of the Virginia Wine Time team. Virginia Wine Time was Virginia’s first wine blog and an inspiration for my own. We miss you, Archer.
  • Low/No Alcoholic Wines Gaining Traction: I wrote an article in January 2024 about Low/No Alcoholic wines in Virginia, and it became my most viewed article of 2024. I can’t help but think there’s a huge, untapped market for Low/No beverages, and wineries had better take note of this consumer trend.
  • Frank Morgan Shakes Up the Governor’s Cup: 2024 was the first year that Virginia Wine guru Frank Morgan managed the Governor’s Cup, the state’s most prestigious wine competition. His changes include bringing in a slew of new judges and limiting wineries to 6 entries. Additionally, sweet wines are now excluded from the Case, a previous change that took effect this year.
  • New Tasting Spaces for Bluestone, Lost Creek, and Ramulose Ridge. Lost Creek Vineyards closed its Lucketts tasting room and will use its Echelon Wine Bar will serve as its de-facto tasting room until further notice. Ramulose Ridge opened tasting rooms in Staunton and Natural Bridge. Bluestone winemaker Lee Hartman opened the Rootstock wine bar in Harrisonburg in December 2023, which sells an assortment of wine and hosts Virginia wine events.

Walsh Bar Takeover With Jake Busching Wine and Wound Tight

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I think Jake’s Busching’s initial ‘bar takeover’ at Walsh Family Wine many years ago was the reason I started going to these events, and I still count it as my favorite ‘independent wine brand’ (a wine that doesn’t have a tasting room, that is). I visited Jake earlier in the year at Commonwealth Crush to try some of his wines in barrel, and since then had been looking forward to him pouring them at Walsh this December.

But as the commercial goes…“But wait…there’s more!”

In addition to Jake Busching Wine, Walsh also hosted Corry Craighill’s Wound Tight, her personal wine label. Corry is Septenary Vineyard’s winemaker but Wound Tight is where she gets to play around with different winemaking techniques. Together, Jake and Corry were a great double-header.

JBW and Wound Tight are two of the many ‘small batch’ independent wine brands that are making some of the most exciting wine in Virginia. While many wineries prefer their winemakers stick with what’s popular and conventional, these smaller brands have the flexibility to experiment as they see fit.

Jake Busching Wines

Jake’s been around the Virginia wine scene since 1997, first at Jefferson Vineyards but jumping around different places in the Monticello AVA. While working at Michael Shaps he had the opportunity to make wine under his own label, leading to the first vintage of “Jake Busching Wine”.

While he’s a longtime winemaker, Jake thinks of himself as a ‘dirt guy’. Jake consults all around Virginia, helping new vineyards get started.

That role gives him a leg-up on finding exciting new vineyard sites to source from. Jake has especially high praise of Beacon Tree and Belle Fox vineyards, but those are just two of the many sites he works with.

These sites were on display tonight. Jake brought with him three wines; his 2017 Tannat (from Honah Lee), his “Cheninquisition” Chenin (from Beacon Tree Vineyard), and his “2B” (Beacon Tree and Belle Fox Vineyard).

  1. 2017 Tannat: Jake’s tannat is always a favorite of mine, and he has high praise for how this grape does in Virginia. Tannat needs time to express itself, but even at 8-years this wine has not yet reached its peak.
  2. 2023 “Cheninquisition” Chenin: While Jake called this his entry-level wine, there was nothing simple about it. Lots of texture here. Chenin is tough to grow, but apparently Beacon Tree is one of the few local places that can do it well. I also love the pun-y name; why didn’t something think of this before?
  3. 2021 “2B” (red blend): The name is inspired as a follow-on to “F8” naming convention, and that fact that two vineyards that start with “B” were the sources of this fruit. Notes of spice and jam. It was still young, but that also means it will have time to get even better.

PS – 2B was sold out when I tried to buy it, so I’ll have to track Jake down for more. But besides tasting wine, we also had the chance to talk about the future.

Understanding “The Winemaker’s Collective“

Jake’s independent brand makes him something of a ronin, but he’s ‘settling down’ in the near future. While he was pouring, he described a project he’s closely involved with; the “Winemaker’s Collective”, organized by Eastwood Farm and Winery.

This ‘Collective’ is set to play an important role in the Virginia wine industry by providing a home for small-scale wine businesses that lack a tasting room or production facility. While new winemakers may especially benefit from Jake’s consulting expertise, it’s really for any label that lacks a permanent home.

For a winemaker to have front-to-end control of their winemaking, they need have their license parked at a facility. That’s challenging for many smaller operations, since operating a winery requires a huge up-front investment they just don’t have.

To get around that challenge, many startups borrow space at a separate facility. Yet there are problems in this approach as well. Due to liability issues, only the license holder can operate the equipment necessary to fully execute the winemaking process. That means the guest essentially loses creative control over their own wine.

What makes Jake excited about the Winemaker’s Collective is it solves this problem by creating a production facility designed to allow multiple licenses to operate at the same time. Not only that, but this building will also have a joint tasting space.

According to owner Athena Eastwood, Eastwood Winery is refurbishing the current Michael Shaps Extended facility to create this dream production building/tasting space. When complete, participating “Wine Collective” members Joy Ting, Jake, and others will be pouring wine under the same roof.

Wound Tight

Corry Craighill has been at Septenary Winery outside the Afton area of Charlottesville since 2020, having previously worked at Sunset Hills (where she started right after Nate Walsh). Ironically, only recently have her own reds been hitting the tasting room, since the owners at Septenary prefer extended aging on their bottles.

She and Nate previously collaborated on a pair of wines called “Sun Room”, which proved something of a precursor for this project. Wound Tight is the next step forward, with bottle art designed by her husband.

She created Wound Tight because she wanted to try something different from Septenary, which sticks with more conventional blends and styles. Those wines are great, but Wound Tight wines are definitely more creative.

The name comes from her dad’s nickname for her, but they also reflect the life cycle of every grape, which start of ‘tight’ in the bud. All told, she only makes 24 cases of wine from each batch, and aiming at 100 cases/year in 2025.

Low intervention and the use of natural yeast is prevalent here, but it’s more than that. She uses a mostly different set of grapes than what visitors to Septenary may be used to, including saparavi and chardonel.

  1. Root Chatter (Saparavi): A rare grape for Virginia, source from a farm outside Lynchburg. Juicy and bright, with earth notes and spice overtones.
  2. Little Light (Sauvignon Blanc): To make this wine, she dried SB stems for 2 days, wrapped them in cheesecloth, and steeped them in the wine for 10 days, like a tea. It wasn’t ‘sauv blanc-y’, although it did share the same zesty-ness. Think of a sauv blanc but with bite. LOVED this wine.
  3. Free Lens (Saparavi/Chardonel blend Rosé): Co-fermented; notes of lemon rind.

2024 Finger Lakes Trip

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I wrote in the opening sentence of my 2022 Finger Lakes blog that “The Finger Lakes is a region I can continually return to.” Well, 2 years later, I was back for my 3rd trip.

For this trip, I was the ‘tour guide’ to a group of 4 friends, none of whom had visited the area. The entire trip was 5 days, including a travel day of travel to get there, 3 full ‘winery days’, and departing the morning of the 5th day. We ended up visiting places on Days #1 and #5 as well.

To give my group their best bang-for-your-buck, I created an itinerary that mixed-in what I considered the Finger Lakes ‘greatest hits’ and added a few places that I hadn’t been to before. A total of 16 locations were visited.

Day 1: Keuka Lake

Living Roots Finger Lakes: Since this was our travel day, we only had time to visit Living Roots on our way to our Air B&B. This was someplace I’d wanted to visit, plus it didn’t close until 6 PM.

Living Roots easily had one of the prettiest tasting rooms of the trip, with a fantastic view of Keuka Lake. It also had more of modernistic aesthetic, as opposed to the rustic barns that most other wineries had.

They also had the greatest meet-cute story I heard on the entire trip. The owners had this parcel of land overlooking Keuka but no long-term plans on what to do with it. While their daughter was in Australia she met up with a local guy, fell in love, and they eventually got married.

The property turned out to be a great place for vines. They turned it into a winery, with their new son-in-law as their winemaker. They also import some wine from Australia, a nod to his heritage.

The wines were uniformly good, with my favorite was their pet-nat riesling. I sat back to enjoy gazing at the lake with a glass of it, plus got a bottle to go.

Day 2: South-West Seneca/Keuka

Stop #1: Herman J Wiemer

As one of the Finger Lake’s most famous wineries, Herman J shouldn’t require any explanation. It was one of my favorite wineries during my previous trip, and I wanted my group to likewise enjoy a visit.

Reservations are definitely recommended, but not necessarily required. Since we didn’t have reservations we sat in their open-aired barn with a space heater. It was OK for the early fall but not something I’d want on a cool day.

Herman J’s tastings are actually self-guided flights where you pick the wine and they are served in mini flight bottles. Since we had a large group this turned out to be a good deal, as we were able to pick out a bunch of wines and share them.

My favorites were the Magdalena Cabernet Franc and Magdalena Riesling. The former had all the traditional cab franc notes, with nice fruit and earthiness. The riesling was smooth, lemony, and had a great mouthfeel.

We also tried their Grüner, Reserve Riesling, Dry Riesling, Semi-Dry Riesling, and an Extra Brut sparkling.

Stop #2: Kemmeter Wines

One of the few stops I absolutely insisted on. Owner/winemaker Johannes Rienhardt did a great lineup against a backdrop of classical German music. One of the top visits of the entire trip.

Visits to Kemmeter aren’t just about wine tastings; they are about education. Johannes even will avoid tasting notes during a tasting because he doesn’t want to bias your opinion what to expect. Johannes also told us he was planning to start using cork for his wines in the future, since they preserved his wine more effectively.

He also took us through an impromptu comparison of two rosés; one of which had been opened for 24 hours and another he just opened. The consensus was most people enjoyed the one that had been opened longer, because the oxidation brought out a different flavor profile.

We tasted 4 wines; a rosé (0.2% sugar but didn’t taste like it), his “2014 Vines” riesling (more on the savory side), his “2016 vines” (off dry, more fruit-forward), and a pinot blanc (amazing color, felt even drier than it was because of its thickness). The cab franc and blau will likely be non-vintage blends, so he can get the best fruit from each year.

Turns out he’s also planting zweigelt, cab franc, and blaufränkisch in the future, and he was long sold-out of his limited pinot noir. I left with a bottle of rosé and one of the rieslings.

Make sure to order the Sans dumplings in advance!

Stop #3: Weis Vineyards

Weis was another high-priority stop. The winery was really busy, but we waited on the balcony until we were able to get a spot in the tasting room. Reservations definitely recommended!

We tried six wines, but my favorite were the very full and lush “Special K” and their Terroir Riesling “Limestone”. I also liked their 2023 Perele sparkling, which for $22 was a great buy.

Stops 4 and 5: Keuka Lake Vineyard and Dr Frank

Not a lot of notes here. I insisted on a stop to Keuka Lake Vineyard because I really wanted their vignoles pet-nat and their 2021 Riesling. Extra Points for being dog friendly.

By the time we made it to Dr Frank, it was too late to do a tasting so we just got a glass.

Dinner: Glenora Wine Cellars/Veraisons

A little on the expensive side but it was our 2nd night in town, so we decided to treat ourselves.

The Aurora Borealis also showed up this evening!

Day 3/Saturday: Eastern Seneca and West Cayuga

We started with a morning hike at Watkins Glen State Park, which is a must-visit for anyone. You can go as far as you want, or make it a short trip. An hour was good enough for us.

Stop #1: Boundary Breaks

This was easily one of the prettiest visits of the trip, since it had a great view of the lake. It helped they had a food truck that served lobster rolls, which we dined on while drinking sparkling and lounging on Adirondack chairs with a view of the lake. 55 acres of vines planted.

No one wine spoke to me, but we enjoyed several. They had a Bordeaux blend that was on the softer side and a dry gewürztraminer that I liked.

But the highlight were their three sparklings, with the “356” dry sparkling riesling being my favorite.

Stop #2: Forge Cellars

This was easily one of the top 3 visits of the trip, with a strong argument for the #1 spot for overall quality of wine. Definitely had the best reisling selection of the trip.

The main tasting room was being used for harvest, but we still were able to hang out at the ‘salon’. While it’s not on the lake, the views still impressed. Loved the laid-back vibe.

The assortment of vineyard-specific options here is impressive. There are too many to taste on your own, so bring friends to share! On top of that they also do a lot of club-only wines, a few of which I was fortunate to sample.

My favorites:

  1. Willow Riesling: At first I thought it had some tropical notes, but those faded fast
  2. Caywood Chardonnay: Herbal notes; just ok
  3. Tango Oaks Riesling: Very fruit driven, citrusy. Bought a bottle
  4. Breakneak Riesling: Salty and minerally; really good. I think this was a club bottle but snagged a taste. Bought a bottle.
  5. Liedenfrost Pinot: On the young side, lots of red fruit
  6. Tout Nu: A red wine brought in from the Rhône. Notes of graphite and earth, with a long finish.

Stop #3: Standing Stone Vineyards

We originally tried visiting here before Forge but it was so busy we had to get a later reservation. Fortunately our table was ready for us when we were done with Forge.

Julian was our server, and the dude was awesome. He gave us a great deal of education, including bringing out refractometer and some grapes in the later stages of noble rot. Julian also explained how Herman J now owns the winery, purchased in large part because their vineyard is on a warmer spot that is especially good for reds.

We kicked things off with sparkling, including a sparkling rosés and a Blanc de blanc made in the traditional-style. The later was excellent; with the lees giving it some weight.

For reds, we tried a cab franc and their saparavi. The later had great color; earthy but soft. The chardonnay was OK.

We also had a few dessert wines. Nice late harvest; like a lighter Sauternes. We also enjoyed a very rich port-style.

The favorite here was the Timeline Riesling. Very complex and weighty.

Stop #4: Silver Thread Winery

A smaller winery that we tried since it was close by. 10 acres planted but they purchase more fruit. They make 3000 cases/year.

I liked the vibe a lot. They really lean into sustainability, and their owner/winemaker was our server.

My favorite was their Blanc de Blanc riesling, that I got a bottle of to enjoy that evening. I also thought their estate riesling was good.

Day 4/Sunday: NE Cayuga and NW Seneca

Stop #1 Hearts and Hands Wine Company

Another highlight of the trip, so much so I wrote a separate blog about them rather than make them one of many entries in this trip report. One of my Top 3 visits of the entire trip, top place for service, and had the best blanc to blanc out of 16 places visited.

The quick version is since they are on east side of Cayuga, Heart and Hand is less crowded. The downside is a visit needs to be planned out, since they are further away.

Heart and Hands Wine Company

The name “Hearts and Hands” is a reference to a Claddagh ring, which is an Irish symbol of love. Co-owner Susan Higgins did our tasting, and was kind enough to open a little early since we were trying to make the most of our day.

What makes H&H’s growing location so great is their vineyard is on a limestone slab, which gives them somewhat different growing conditions. They make lots of sparkling, including a blanc de blanc which was one of the best wines of my trip.

That said, picking a favorite of ANYTHING was tough since everything was exceptional. My crew took maybe 2 cases worth of wine. I suspect this visit resulted in the single biggest haul of the trip.

Stop #2: Quarry Ridge Winery

Quarry Ridge wasn’t on our original itinerary, but since it was next to Heart & Hands we figured it was worth a shot.

It’s a shame that we visited when it was pouring rain, because the tasting room had a fantastic view of Cayuga Lake. On a nicer day, I’d have happily stayed longer on one of the Adirondack chairs and just enjoy the scenery. It helped that the tasting room was stunning as well.

Owner Gary Cuthbert saw my group come in and he came over to say ‘hi’ and tell us about his property. Turns out, the name was inspired by the limestone soil the vineyard is planted on, just like nearby H&H. Such soil is somewhat of a rarity in the Finger Lakes and is great for making high-quality fruit. They have 28 acres of vines are planted.

Several flights were available, but since we had a big group we were able to order all of them and share. All told, we shared samples of 9 wines.

I thought their dry Riesling was good, and the 2022 “11S” Pinot was nicely balanced and fruit-forward. But I thought the real standout was his cask Riesling, which was very dry yet ‘full’, with notes of mango.

Stop #3 Ravines Wine Cellars (Barracks Road)

This place was busy! We had to wait for a table to open up but eventually got one. Reservations are definitely recommended. Even so, those tables were pretty small for the number of people they are supposed to accommodate.

I thought their 17 Brut had a great brioche nose, and their ‘regular’ Riesling was really good. Kudos also to the Maximilian red blend and the very earthy Cab Franc.

The tastings and food were not cheap, but wine was good. Reservations definitely recommended.

Stop #4: Fox Run Vineyards

Too tired for notes at this point!

Day 5: Red Tail Ridge Winery

I had wanted to visit here earlier, but timing didn’t allow. Fortunately I was able to convince my driver to swing by on the way home. Red Tail does reservations, but this early it was unnecessary.

Kristin Evans did our tasting and gave us a lot of great info in a short time. I’d say Red Tail had the widest and best overall selection of sparkling of the entire trip, although the dry wines were both good and interesting. We also got to meet their winemaker, Nancy Irelan.

A number of flights were available, including one of ‘Innovative’ wines. I leaned into the sparkling options. Fortunately, with multiple members of my group available, we were able to get a wide selection and share.

Many in my group put this visit in their Top 3 of the 5-day/16 winery trip. Personally, I say they were tied for #3, maybe just below Forge and Heart & Hands, but tied with Kemmeter.

  1. 2019 Sekt (Traditional Method): Very nice, bright; orange notes
  2. “Perpetual Change” NV Sparkling (Traditional Method): Interesting, but in a great way
  3. 2019 Blanc de Blanc (Traditional Method): Bought a bottle home! Lots of brioche notes
  4. 2018 Blanc de Noir (Traditional Method): Tarter, also had lots of brioche.
  5. 2021 Miscreant. An interesting gewürztraminer blend/orange wine
  6. 2018 Sparkling Rosés’: Fruity and refreshing
  7. Riesling Pet-Nat: Pineapple notes; not lee-sy at all.
  8. Pinot Noir Pet-Nat: Juicy
  9. 2023 Pinot Noir: Young
  10. 2020 Langrine: Lots of depth and tannin

Next time I’ll have to try Once Finger wine bar, and revisit Heron Hill.

Heart and Hands Wine Company

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When planning my 2024 Finger Lakes trip, I made a list of old favorites and places that I’d heard good things about but never been. Heart & Hands was part of the later category. But it wasn’t until I heard rave reviews from a pair of friends who visited them months earlier that I decided they were a ‘must visit’.

Considering this turned out to be on of my Top 3 visits (along with Forge and Kemmeter) on a 5-day, 16-winery trip, I’d say I chose well.

Heart and Hands is located on the NE side of Cayuga, which added a good 30-minutes to our Day #4 trip itinerary. I know that seems far, but it’s worth the extra time. Not only did we avoid the crowds, it was some of the best wine of the trip.

The name “Hearts and Hands” is a reference to a Claddagh ring, which is an Irish symbol of love. Co-owner Susan Higgins did our tasting and was kind enough to open a little early since we were trying to make the most of our day.

When I asked Susan what they have planted, she said “Lots of fun things! We are a nerdy winery.” They concentrate on pinot and riesling, but also have some aligoté, langrein, petit arvine, and a little chardonnay.

Most of their fruit is estate, although they do source some from nearby vineyards. Heart & Hand makes between 2,500-3,000 cases/year, mostly (and increasingly) based on their 11 acres of vines.

During most of my Finger Lakes visits, people talked a lot about the lake’s importance in reflecting heat on the shoreline vineyards. That’s true at Heart & Hands, but a lot of credit also goes to their limestone soil that’s rare to this area. Limestone drains well, and minimal water retention is important to keeping the vines healthy.

The tasting room is small, but that’s fine with me. Heart & Hands didn’t design the winery to entertain masses of visitors; it’s all about the wine.

Susan walked us through multiple side-by-side comparison tastings, either from different years or different growing sites for the same grape. They make lots of sparkling, but plenty of dry wines as well.

My tasting notes:

  1. 2015 Blanc de blanc (traditional): Very nice; one of the best sparklings I had on the trip. Not tried was a blanc de noir.
  2. Sparkling Riesling; also very nice; wonderful nose
  3. 2019 Auxerrois: This grape is a cross between pinot noir and gouais blanc. Interesting, but not a favorite.
  4. 2020 Chardonnay: French oak; somewhat lees-y.
  5. Pinot comparison #1: 2021 H&H Pinot (estate and local fruit), vs their 2021 Nutt Road Vineyard Pinot. The ‘standard’ pint had lots of bright fruit, while the vineyard-specific one had fruit but was earthier. I took home a bottle of the ‘standard’.
  6. Pinot comparison #2: 2021 Hedrick Pinot, which had 20% stem inclusion for extra tannin. It was a great balance between fruit and tannin. Paired against it was a 2021 Estate Pinot (forgot the specific name), which was heavier, had a longer finish, and more tannin. 100% stem inclusion on the later.
  7. Riesling comparison: The 2022 was drier, with more petrol notes. The 2021 was more layered, with notes of tangerine.

This was certainly one of the best sparkling wineries I’ve visited in the Finger Lakes, alongside Red Tail Ridge. My tasting crew took almost 2 cases worth of wine between us in what was the greatest single-winery haul of our entire 5-day trip.

I confined myself to buying a blanc de blanc and pinot noir, but I’ll be back for more.

Virginia Wines That Showcase Innovation

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The European wine industry is steeped in tradition, much of which is codified into law. Bordeaux famously regulates everything from the kind of grapes grown within its borders, the amount of irrigation its wineries can use, and even the level of alcohol.

While the Virginia wine industry isn’t bound by the kind of regulations found in Europe, winemaking traditions derived from the ‘Old World’ still dominate the state. It has taken Virginia wineries decades to appreciate that not everything that works in Europe can be replicated locally.

This gives leeway to innovators to redefine how wine should be made. Whether it be trying out new grape varieties, exploring new blends, or creating new twists on old favorites, local innovators are pushing the industry’s boundaries forward.

Dennis Horton might be Virginia’s foremost innovator. When he founded Horton Vineyards in the early 1990s, Virginia wineries were relying upon either popular but fragile grapes such as cabernet sauvignon, or tougher but less commercially desirable hybrid grapes. Not satisfied with either option, he planted a dizzying array of less famous vinifera including viognier, petit manseng, touriga nacional, and tannat.

Dennis discovered these grapes by researching which wine growing regions have climates similar to Virginia. He reasoned that if a place like Condrieu had hot summers coupled with cool wet winters, then a Condrieu grape such as viognier would work here.

Given the changing landscape of the wine industry, this out-of-the box thinking remains relevant. Many grape varieties are becoming vulnerable to climate change in places they long called home, while others are flourishing in new locations.

At the same time, the clientele the industry caters to is changing. Younger buyers prefer sustainability and affordability over a wine’s fancy classification. Such consumers are open to wines that ‘break the rules.’

For oenophiles who want to try something new, here are four options from wineries that lean into this spirit of innovation.

Artemisia Farm & Vineyard’s Mentha

Artemisia is one of a handful of Virginia farms crafting vermouth, an aromatized, fortified wine. Vermouth may seem an odd choice for wine lovers, but Artemisia is proving doubters wrong with an assortment of uniquely crafted options.

Vermouth is typically thought of as a cocktail mixer, but Artemisia’s bottles are finding an audience as a stand-alone drink with ingredients that emphasize their local nature. Co-owner Kelly Allen explained, “We want to capture Virginia’s terroir as an abstract essence”.

One vermouth that particularly shines is Mentha, a mint-rhubarb aperitif made with traminette. Mentha is aged in apple wood and pecan, bittered with dandelion and wormwood, and infused with Kentucky colonel mint, mojito mint, and spearmint. The last ingredient is especially prevalent, giving it a full, fresh flavor.

Artemisia Farm & Vineyard’s Mentha

Briedé Family Vineyards’ 2023 Arandell Special Reserve

Briedé Family Vineyards’ 2023 Arandell Special Reserve

Owners Paul and Loretta Briedé originally farmed their vineyard to organic standards. While harsh weather forced the Briedés to drop their organic certification, they continue to apply many of the same techniques.

One lesson they took to heart is organic farming requires grapes that are naturally disease resistant. That led them to plant a number of hybrid and native grapes, including cayuga, marquette, la crescent, and arandell.

That last variety deserves special mention. Arandell was created by Cornell University, which is developing a new generation of hybrid grapes that are as flavorful as they are hardy.

Arandell’s flavor profile combines earthiness and acidity, with a hint of tobacco. While many oenophiles tend to look down their nose at hybrid grapes, such snobbery is uncalled for. Arandell is a standout in the pantheon of hybrids and is one of the few hybrid wines to earn a Gold medal at the 2024 Shenandoah Wine Cup competition.

Chateau O’Brien 2019 Arinarnoa

The French wine industry is notorious for being a stickler for tradition. This means when arinarnoa was announced as one of a handful of varieties now authorized for planting in Bordeaux, the wine industry took notice.

Arinarnoa is a cross of tannat and cabernet sauvignon, making it suitable to both Virginia’s and Bordeaux’s increasingly warm climate. Chateau O’Brien is the first winery on the east coast to plant this grape.

Owner Howard O’Brien explained, “I got the idea to plant arinarnoa during one of my trips to Uruguay, where they plant it next to their tannat. In the vineyard, it has characteristics from both of its parents. Arinarnoa has a leaf structure like tannat, berries like cab sauv, ripens like cab, and its growing season is very similar to tannat. I only do 1-3 tons an acre, but it crops very well.”

Howard’s arinarnoa showcases a nice balance of earth and mushroom notes on the nose, with soft tannin and some dark fruit on the palate.

Chateau O’Brien Arinarnoa

The Parallax Project What’s This? and What’s That?

The Parallax Project is a collaboration between winemakers Ben and Tim Jordan and owners Lance Lemon and Reggie Leonard. The Jordan brothers already have a flair for unusual blends, but these wines topped even their wildly creative imagination.

The project’s name was inspired by what’s called “The Parallax Effect”, which is “a difference in the apparent position of an object when viewed along two different lines of sight”. That name was inspired by how these two wines were crafted.

While What’s This? and What’s That? were both made using vidal blanc, chardonel, tannat, petit manseng, traminette, and albariño, they are very different wines. What’s This? is a white wine that leans more heavily on vidal and chardonel, giving it citrus notes and a floral aroma. “What’s That?” is a juicy red made with 83% tannat, yet it’s low on tannin and highly aromatic.

The Parallax Project

Welcome To the Oenoverse

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Comic book films have popularized the idea of “shared universes,” where heroes from multiple worlds join together. It’s great movie fodder, but it wasn’t until Reggie Leonard described the breadth of the wine club/wine community/access & opportunity program he co-founded that I realized why this initiative refers to itself under a similar moniker.

I say this because the “Oenoverse” (Ee-Nuh-Verse) is all of those things and more.

Reggie’s passion for wine began in 2015 when he took a job at the University of Virginia’s School of Data Science. An urge to meet people and try something new led to the discovery of free tastings at Market Street Wine in downtown Charlottesville. Little did he realize these tastings would introduce him to an entirely new community.

Photo credit: Kori Price

“I’m an ambivert; an introvert but in an extroverted way,” Reggie said over the phone. “I knew that community is important to me, and I wanted to make sure that I found a community that allowed me to be extroverted.

At first I didn’t understand any of the terminology used at these wine tastings. But over time, I surprised myself by starting to remember different names, recognizing different tasting profiles.

I connected to wine more than I realized, and through that realization I eventually discovered a Black Wine Lovers Facebook group.”

Learning the terminology of wine is difficult enough. But Reggie was encountering another barrier; the world of wine isn’t easily accessible to people of color.

The lexicon of wine relies on Eurocentric descriptors and food pairings that the BIPOC community doesn’t always relate to. On top of that, the lack of other Black faces made the experience more daunting.

“When I experienced wine, it didn’t mirror the rest of my life, since the traditional wine experience wasn’t built with me in mind,” he explained. Reggie didn’t realize it at that time, but this realization must have triggered an idea. If there wasn’t a community for those outside their comfort zone to learn about wine, he’d help build one.

Building a Community

In late 2020 Market Street Wine approached Reggie about hosting virtual events. One of the participants was Blenheim Vineyards Sales/Marketing Director Tracey Love. The two eventually connected in-person, leading to a collaboration with Blenheim.

Tracey encouraged Reggie to host an event to talk about his wine journey. That led to further discussions how they could replicate this theme of ‘community’, all along the backdrop of wine.

Reggie Leonard

The “Oenoverse” was born.

According to its website, Blenheim’s Oenoverse Club is “dedicated to expanding opportunity and perspective through Virginia wine for people who have never joined a wine club or are seasoned professionals.” While outreach to members of historically underrepresented communities is a key part of its mission, the club is open to everyone. Members are also encouraged to share their wine tasting experience during their events.

Yet the Oenoverse doesn’t exist by itself; it’s part of an ecosystem of similarly-minded organizations. Among them are Charlottesville’s Ethos Wine & Tea and RichWine, an online wine club based in Richmond. Both businesses focus on low-intervention, sustainable wines.

Probably their most active partner is The Veraison Project, which co-hosts the Two Up Wine Down music festival and Oeno Camp. The former takes place every November at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, while the latter is a three-day Virginia wine immersion program for historically underrepresented consumers and industry professionals.

Lee Campbell
Kindra Dionne
Seidah Armstrong

Showcasing Non-Traditional Grapes and Styles

The Oenoverse’s advocacy for the underrepresented goes beyond outreach to communities of color; it showcases other parts of the wine industry that are often overlooked.

“What else can wine look like?” Reggie asked rhetorically. “Historically, we’ve only paid attention to vinifera wine. But who doesn’t like more options?”

Reggie and Lance Lemon, owner of RichWine, were deeply inspired by Jahdè Marley’s “Anything But Vinifera” wine movement. Jahdè’s desire to spotlight hybrid and non-traditional grapes encouraged the two to found their latest initiative; The Parallax Project.

Lance Lemon and Reggie Leonard

Several years ago, winemakers Ben and Tim Jordan of Commonwealth Crush reached out to Reggie and Lance to explore ideas for a partnership of their own. At the end of that conversation, the quartet came up with the idea of making a small-batch of wine, produced at Commonwealth but under Reggie and Lance’s direction.

The project’s name was inspired by what’s called “The Parallax Effect,” which is “a difference in the apparent position of an object when viewed along two different lines of sight.”

Lance and Reggie applied this principle to their two wines, both made with a mix of vinifera and hybrid grapes. While one is a red and the other is a white, both were made using nearly the same grapes but blended in different proportions and made using different winemaking styles.

Reggie summarized his myriad of projects with this; “We are building a space for something that has not been built for. That’s not just for people of color but other aspects of wine, like hybrids and lower-alcohol wine.

If we do that, we can bring in customers that weren’t part of the market before.”

Lessons Learned as a First Time Grape Sorter at Linden Vineyards

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I’d never thought I’d write a blog about sorting grapes at a winery – but here we are.

2024 was an odd year for Virginia wine. We had an abnormally hot and dry summer, to the point many winegrowers were openly hoping for an inch or two of rain to relieve their parched vineyards. While dry conditions will reduce the volume of wine they produce, it gifted vineyards with intensely flavored berries which (we hope) will result in high-quality wine.

Yet when the rain finally came, it came in torrents. Tough decisions had to be made whether to let the fruit hang on the vine in hopes of achieving additional ripeness, or bring it in, else risk the grapes falling apart in the vineyard.

Hardscrabble Vineyard

Owner/winegrower Jim Law would have preferred to let his Cabernet Sauvignon hang for another week or two. But Mother Nature wasn’t cooperating, so it had to come in.

I had planned on making last Friday a leisurely wine-tasting day, but Linden Vineyards put out a last-minute request for assistance in sorting grapes that were being harvested that morning. They were short-staffed, the regular vineyard team was busy in the field, and Fridays are a tough day to get volunteers. I alerted a few like-minded friends about the opportunity, and we offered our services.

I told myself, “I’ve harvested grapes before; sorting them could be fun. How hard could it be?”.

It turns out – a lot.

So on a Friday morning, Linden harvested 10 tons of Cabernet Sauvignon from their estate ‘Hardscrabble’ vineyard. The harvest team was on the top floor with their destemmer, which separates vines and stems from the grapes. Those grapes would drop through a chute to the ground floor into a conveyor belt, where the rest of us stood ready to pick out bad grapes and smaller organic matter before they went into the grape bins.

If it sounds very “I Love Lucy at the Chocolate Factory”, that’s not too far off.

What is Sorting?

Sorting isn’t a sexy job, but it’s an important one. Alex Wilde, Jim Law’s son-in-law and newly-minted apprentice winemaker, related a story from one of Linden’s harvest interns. This intern asked Jim what was his most-important lesson-learned in improving wine quality during harvest.

Jim’s answer? ‘Good sorting’.

Alex gave us a quick lesson on what to look for. Priority should be given to tiny green berries (far too tart). Second priority were lightly colored berries (still too under-ripe to be helpful). Also watch out for the occasional grape with white-ish coating which indicated noble rot (good in some white wines, but not good for red grapes), grapes with insect punctures (they are also probably rotting), and grab any bugs that went along for the ride (be careful of yellow jackets!).

I tossed some bad grapes, but the vast majority of stuff we removed during sorting was green matter. This included tiny branches, some leaves, and stem fragments still attached to the grape which Alex called ‘stem jacks’. All of these contribute tannin; something important in small doses, but not the style Jim likes in his wine.

Alex assured us that there was no way we’d get 100% of this detritus, as there was simply too much even a group of 6 people (occasionally dropping to 3-4 people) working in concert could grab. Just do what you can, and don’t chase any grapes that gets away.

Since I’m a big fan of Linden’s Hardscrabble red blend, I had a vested interest in doing a good job. I’d quickly scan for objectionable material and toss the offender into the bucket next to me. Ideally, I’d remove stem jacks from the grape and send the grape back on its way. Occasionally, the pace was so fast it was easier to toss the entire berry out. Grab-yank-drop and repeat, usually for an hour on end.

We had 6 bins of grapes come down the line, each with fruit that usually aligned to a different vineyard block. Seeing the fruit first-hand was a lesson in what Jim calls the ‘vine-soil relationship’.

Older blocks have deeper root systems, which generally protects them from rainwater penetrating the ground. By contrast, younger vines get their nutrients closer to the surface, which makes them more likely to absorb surface water. This meant younger block fruit was sometimes water-logged and sloppy, while fruit from older vines were fairly clean and dry.

Not every winery performs this labor-intensive task. While nearby RdV has a fancy optical sorter, most Virginia wineries (if they bother at all) rely on humans for the job. ‘Human optical sorters’, Alex joked.

Once the grapes dropped into the bin, they were off to the cellar to begin their transition into wine.

While I complained about how much my back hurt afterwards, you always learn something when talking with the team at Linden. Plus, helping out gives you a deeper respect for the hard work that goes on ‘behind the curtain’. Everyone who loves local wine should volunteer at a winery, even if only once.

Over the years I’ve poured wines at festivals, planted a new vineyard, harvested grapes, and now helped sort them. Anybody need a junior apprentice winemaker?