Posts Tagged“featured”

North Country Viticulture Education

Two educational events of interest to North Country viticulturists and winemakers, are being held this week, and come shortly after a series of dormant pruning workshops held in the Lake Champlain Region. A day-long vineyard and winery planning workshop will be held on Wednesday May 4 in Herkimer County. On Tuesday May 8, the next installment of the Northern Grapes Project webinar series will be accessible to anyone who registers. Details for both events can be found below. Over the past couple of weekends, volunteer pruning and informal training was completed at the Cornell Baker Farm Trial Vineyard in Willsboro,…

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Massachusetts-Based Shelton Brothers Slams a Door on New York Breweries

Venerable import and distribution company Shelton Brothers, of  of Belchertown, Massachusetts, has been invaluable to beer lovers across the United States. They have been visionary in their quest to bring us the finest beers from Belgium since way before Belgian was cool. If you’ve enjoyed a Cantillon, Dieu du Ciel or Mikkeler and you don’t have a passport, you have the Sheltons to thank. Now, Shelton Brothers can claim yet another accolade: stalwart defenders of the New York State Constitution. We New York residents are thankful that, in 2006, upon being refused State Liquor Authority approval to distribute six English…

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New Winery is a Regional Bellwether: Third Finger Lakes Producer Plans to Make Only Riesling and Pinot

If two times is a coincidence, then perhaps three times is a trend, and in the Finger Lakes, a trend seems to be emerging: A third wine producer has decided to focus on riesling, pinot noir, and nothing else. There is no denying riesling’s regional strength, but the search for a regional stalwart red wine has led winemakers down many paths, not all of them successful. Pinot noir would be the most challenging of paths, a cliffside stroll as opposed to the more leisurely journey to quaffable reds such as cabernet franc or blaufrankisch. That’s not to say that any…

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Op-Ed: Some Thoughts on Local Terroir (by Jim Silver, GM, Peconic Bay Winery)

As the head of a winery, I am very frequently asked about terroir.  Does the concept really exist?  Is it real? Of course it is, I answer, but it’s difficult to understand.  But, it has actually helped me to define myself while I strive to better my knowledge of wines.  Finding terroir in wine is an existential and personal study, and very rewarding. For me, it sharpens the mind — here your senses are tested along with your memory, as you try to find nuances in a wine, and categorize them.  While you sniff and swirl the glass, you are…

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Long Island Sustainable Winegrowing (LISW) Announces Formation and Sustainable Vineyard Certification

Most wineries on the East End of Long Island like to talk about being “sustainable” in their vineyard practices and winemaking. There’s discussion about windmills and compost piles and this spray or that application, but let’s be honest, “sustainable” is a nebulous term… at least in the way they are using it, to denote a certain “green”-ness without formal biodynamic or organic certification. Those require strict adherence to defined rules over a set period of time. “Sustainable” is a bit of a “green” grey area without any local definition or certification. It is a term that is decidedly open to interpretation.…

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Keuka Lake Vineyards Worker Killed in Tractor Accident

Daniel Martin, a member of the vineyard crew at Keuka Lake Vineyards, died in an accident on Monday. The 51-year old was pinned underneath a tractor, which he had been operating on the hill of the property. “He will be greatly missed,” KLV owner Mel Goldman said in an email. “It is deeply shocking. I knew him quite well.” Martin had worked for KLV for the past ten years, and was familiar with the vagaries of the property. Keuka Lake Vineyards is perched on some of the steepest vineyard sites in the region; it’s the kind of terrain that is…

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Welcome to the New New York Cork Report

Welcome to the new New York Cork Report! For weeks (months?) we’ve been working behind the scenes to migrate more than 3,300 posts from the old system over to this new one, cleaning up non-New York posts (the site didn’t start with a New York focus, after all) and redoing the categories and information architecture. In essence, we’re been maintaining two sites for over a month — loading content into both systems because the bulk migration was done, but the new site just wasn’t ready.  It’s time to cut the cord and leave TypePad. Is this new site as perfect…

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Standing Stone Vineyards Vertical Gewurztraminer Tasting: As Unique as the Grape

The wine tastings at Standing Stone Vineyards are hardly typical, but then again, owner and winemaker Marti Macinski isn’t your average wine industry professional. A former lawyer with a degree in piano performance and philosophy, Macinski purchased the winery with her husband Tom in 1991; they’ve been making wine since 1993. On April 1, Standing Stone conducted a vertical gewurztraminer tasting, featuring six wines from their library: 1995, 1996, 1997, 2006, 2008 and the recently-released 2009. With 9 of us seated in the main tasting room around a low picnic table outfitted in a white tablecloth, it felt more like…

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