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Saturday, September 12, our last picking day of 2019  

We will be picking our last Concords, on our last picking day of the year, tomorrow, Saturday, from 10 am - 3 PM.

It will be cool and breezy, so dress warmly enough for the weather.

We will not be crushing or pressing grapes.

We thank all of you, who have visited our vineyard this year of 2019.

Tuesday (1-5:30), Saturday (10-4) and Sunday (12-4) 

A comment. We have recently tasted several blended wines of Foch and Petite Pearl. They have been delicious and have had a lot of depth of flavor. Petite Pearl ripens later than Foch so a method one can use is to ferment them separately, then blend them afterwards to get that deep, delicious flavor. 

For more info, please see the sidebar "Pick Your Own Grapes Info."

We are now picking. The grapes and vines looking good, though we are out of 7 varieties as of 9/23/2019.

Here's an early assessment of our varieties and likely yield. So far the clusters look nice with little or no disease issues.

Concord...a nice slightly smaller than usual, sized crop of this tasty purple immensely popular grape variety.

Frontenac...one of our larger crops of this variety. So if you like a sweet wine or a port this would be a good year for Frontenac.

Foch...we have a nice medium sized crop of this versitile red variety. Very easy picking.

St. Croix....this early picking, soft to the taste, red grape has a smaller than average crop  this year. If you liked it in the past be sure to get on it early. 

Marquette...this very popular variety has one of our larger crops. It came through the winter very well. We were pleasantly surprised as it dealt with negative 30F quite well. We have added more rows of this variety to have larger harvests in the future.

Petite Pearl...We have our largest crop so far of this shy bearing red grape. This late season red should ripen a bit early this year as we have controlled its quantity to have that happen. 

LaCrescent  a very popular white...we have a nice medium sized crop.

St Pepin white. This vine has been more and more popular . It makes a nice dry or semi-dry wine.

Delaware.  this very popular light red grape which makes a nice wine and is delicious eating has a limited crop. It did not like the extremely cold winter. The clusters we have are very nice though. It will go early..so be prepared.

Itasca...this very new 2nd year variety has an extremely limited crop. we expect a much larger crop in 2020. It is a new white with a low acicity so it should produce a white wine that is easy to make since it may need little or no acid reduction. We expect it to be very popular when we have sufficient crop of it. Our 2020 crop will go very quickly.

Items to sell:   We have alot of extra supplies at the vineyard, including:

Aluminum  picking trays, vineyard wire (and lots of it), in various lengths and sizes, trellis and vine equiment including wire catches, rubber tying bands, various VSP clips, bird netting,  GDC arms..all at very good prices. call us at 608 225 9210

Ruth Rossing 608-214-6013, has 2 winemkaing wooden barrels for Sale

10 gallon and 15 gallon Posted 9/18//2019

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2019 GRAPE AND VINEYARD INFORMATION  

GOOD CROP OF MOST OF OUR VARIETIES THIS YEAR!

This past winter was very cold locally with a low of -30F.  Still, I think our vineyard did OK considering the changing climate. Some of our varieties have smaller than average crops, but several of our varieties seemed to enjoy the bitter temps and have larger than average croploads.

SEEDLESS GRAPES

Sorry folks, we took out our seedless grapes. The problem? They ripened before most of our winemaking customers showed up....and the birds had a strong preference for them when no one was around.  So we took them out. 

So, do we eat grapes? Yes we do, just about constantly. But they have seeds you say! Yes they do, but we don't mind. And by our second bunch they don't even cross our mind. Some of us swallow the seeds, some of us spit them out, others simply chew them. They are full of vitamins and minerals. And grape seed oil is made from them commercially, which produces an available oil which is lighter than olive oil but contains higher amounts of minerals and vitamins than Olive oil. Dave cooks with it a lot, more than olive oil. And by the way....when the seeds are nutty, crunchy and taste good, the grape is ready for picking....it is mature.

REDS

Frontenac  Exciting news! Leigh's Garden Winery in Escanaba, www.leighsgarden.com  Michigan won a Double Gold for his Frontenac wine made from our Frontenac grapes. at a Cold Climate Wine Competition in Minneapolis. This grape is popular for making port wines and makes a good dry red wine if the higher acidity level is dealt before or during fermentation. We have winemaking directions at the vineyard. The crop looks nice this year and is our largest in a number of years. 

Foch  This is the most widely planted red wine grape in the midwest and upper mid-west. It can be made into a variety of styles. Try it as a medium rose wine, chilled. Delicious! Make a light red wine, easy to quaff or ferment on the skins longer for more tannins and aging potential. Foch has cherry notes. We have a very large, easy to pick  crop of Foch this season. A small amount of Foch in a white wine can give you an attractive, delicious rose wine.

Marquette One of our favorite red wine grapes.  This is one of our more popular red grapes. It has more tannins than other reds and has a high sugar and alcohol content. We have anice crop of it this year and next year will have even more since we've planted more.

St Croix Medium crop and juicy, juicy, flavorful and soft. This makes a very soft, early maturing, easy to drink red wine with low acidity. A good blending grape.  If you prefer mellowness in your wine this is a good choice. It is ready to drink sooner than most other reds.  We have a very nice and large crop this year.  St Croix makes a medium to full-bodied, dry, deep red wine with soft tannins and good fruit aromas, along with currant and other dried fruit flavor qualities. It is often picked at 17 - 19- % sugar for best flavor. Don't wait too long to pick this variety. It will likely be gone after September 16. Alcohol is typically around 11%   

LaCrescent is our most popular white wine.  This grape provides honey, grapefruit, and tangerine aromas and flavors. One of Mary's favorites. We have a very nice crop this year, our largest ever.. When you pick this grape make sure you pick the golden clusters, ideally on both sides. 

Istaca This is a new white variety. We will have our initial, virtually non-existant, small crop this season. Here is a brief description of it: Itasca produces a dry, or sweet,  white wine that is light yellow to straw in color and has aromas of pear, quince, violet, melon, minerals, and subtle honey notes. Itasca has exhibited lower acidity and higher sugar levels., Showing a high resistance to downy and powdery mildew and the insect Phylloxera. Itasca is considered a very hardy, disease resistant cultivar expected to reduce spray inputs. It should survive - 30 F temperaures.

For winemaking the Acid is low, needing no adjustment, the sugar is high, it is disease resistant, and production is good. Have fun with this new variety this year. But supply will be limited!

AROMELLA/Muscat  Wines produced are described as a white wine marked by big peach and tropical fruit aromas. It has excellent aromatic muscat wine characteristics. Wines have notes of pineapple, honeysuckle, citrus peel and floral muscat character

It ripens near end of September and is in high demand.  We only have a small crop of it this year since it prefers warmer winters than -30F. It typically will have 50% primary bud kill at -17F.  

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TWO VERY POPULAR SPECIAL GRAPES  CONCORD AND DELAWARE!  YEA!

CONCORD  What can you say? Big, purple, bursting with flavor, good for eating, juice, and wine. We have an large crop with large clusters this year. Everyone who has tasted this grape when young knows it will always be around. It is the ultimate in a very flavorful, very fruity, great tasting grape, How can you resist it? Why is it an extremely popular grape among the non-experts of wine tasting? It's because people like the flavor. It can be made dry, slightly sweet, moderately sweet, or as sweet as you might like. 

Did I mention sweet wine or fresh juice - again the Concord rules.  We expect to harvest it early-mid September to late September.

DELAWARE  Due to our extremely cold winter of 2018/2019, our crop this Fall of 2019 will be limited. The vines will be in a recovery mode this season. Hopefull 2020 willl find it back to its ususally fine place in our list of varieties. this is a pink, light red beauty, that is tasteee. Don't wait too long on it this year.  Among our fellow employees this probably takes top spot as favorite eating grape, seedless or wine variety. It is not well known outside the Eastern US, but once you taste it you won't forget it. It is popular as a pink and spicy, sparkling wine. The Delaware grape is also a table grape variety sold in supermarkets throughout Japan, where labrusca grape varieties are popular for their fragrance.  

If you would like to sign up for our newsletter, please fill out the info below.  We do not give away any information from our newsletter.  We will have mailings about 4 or 5 times a year announcing pruning and winemaking classes and our upcoming harvest. We also occasionally have some good used winemaking equipment available.