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5 Questions with… Robin Ross, Arrowhead Spring Vineyards

Robin Ross, Co-owner, Arrowhead Spring Vineyards

For those that know Robin Ross, co-owner of Arrowhead Spring Vineyards, it may be difficult to believe that when she met her husband Duncan she wasn’t even a wine drinker. Ross has come a long way since then. She now dedicates herself day and night to the 7-acre vineyard in New York’s Niagara Escarpment, with much of that time in between the vines. If asked 10 years ago if she thought she would be a winery owner working full-time in the wine business, my guess is that she probably would not have said yes. Winemaking was her husband Duncan’s passion,…

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5 Questions with… Dan Mitchell, Fox Run Vineyards

Dan Mitchell, Regional Sales Manager, Fox Run Vineyards

This week, the New York Cork Report spoke with Dan Mitchell, Keuka Lake native and Regional Sales Manager at Fox Run Vineyards as part of our “5 Questions with…” feature series. Dan has spent the last 9 years with Fox Run Vineyards, four as tasting room manager which then evolved into his current role as regional sales manager. He now is a wine-fueled road warrior logging over 30,000 miles on his car each year. Although his territory is primarily New England he has recently found himself as far away as Western Canada promoting Fox Run and the Finger Lakes. What was…

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5 Questions with… Kelby Russell, Red Newt Cellars

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The New York Cork Report recently had the opportunity to sit down with Newark, NY native Kelby Russell, Winemaker at Red Newt Cellars. After graduation from Harvard, Russell found himself as an intern at Fox Run Vineyards and under the tutelage of Peter Bell. While there he was able to make a few wine pilgrimages and work around the world in New Zealand (Whitehaven Winery, Marlborough), Tasmania (Pipers Brook Vineyard) and Australia (Yalumba Winery, Barossa Valley). Armed with a variety of experiences Russell joined the Red Newt team as Winemaker a little over a year ago. In addition to the…

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5 Questions with… Cassie Hitchner, On-the-Spot Wines

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Cassie Hitchner, proprietor of On-the-Spot Wines, spent her undergraduate years in Ithaca, New York at Cornell University and that is where she fell in love with wine. “The Finger Lakes wine country presented me with the many facets of the wine industry that make a great glass of wine,” she said in an email. Cassie graduated in 2009 and moved to Manhattan to pursue a career in consumer public relations, but after three years she decided to “switch things up.” Moving away from publicizing other peoples’ projects, she followed her own passion for wine and started promoting a wine region…

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5 Questions with… Edward Lovaas, Head Winemaker, Pindar Vineyards and Duck Walk Vineyards

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Edward Lovaas, head winemaker at Pindar Vineyards and Duck Walk Vineyards, grew up in Crescent City, CA but moved to Ukiah, CA — the heart of Mendocino wine country — when he was a sophomore in high school. After high school he spent four years in the United States Marine Corps before returning Ukiah where he got into the wine business almost by accident. Over the years, he worked for a handful of wineries, but he learned the most at Graziano Family of Wines studying under Greg Graziano where he got to work with “almost every variety you could thing…

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5 Questions with… Lisa Donneson, Owner, Bouke and Bouquet Wines

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Lisa Donneson founded Bouké in 2007, and produces eight aromatic, fruit-forward, affordable wines. Bouké (her dry wines) and Bouquet (her sweet wines) aim to be “a pleasure for all the senses – the eye, the nose, and (of course!) the taste buds.” Trained originally as a musician, Lisa honed her business skills as a securities analyst and media industry consultant before earning the coveted Diploma from the Wine and Spirits Education Trust. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, and they have two daughters who are in college. What was the first bottle of wine you remember drinking — and…

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5 Questions with… Alicia Valle, In-House Epicurean, Lieb Cellars

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For this week’s “5 Questions with…” feature, we sit down with Alicia Valle from Lieb Cellars. She is a dean’s list graduate of the Culinary Institute of America and freelance artist who found her way to the North Fork from the Hudson Valley. Alicia works at Lieb Cellars’ new location in Cutchogue, but lives in Rocky Point and spends her days off geeking-out on culinary topics, exploring the Northeast, and visiting friends in Brooklyn. What was the first bottle of wine you remember drinking — and where did you have it and who were you with? (I will immediately discount…

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5 Questions with… Antoinette Di Ciaccio, Wine Club Manager, Sheldrake Point Vineyards

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For this week’s edition of “5 Questions with…” we sit down (virtually) with Antoinette Di Ciaccio, wine club manager at Sheldrake Point Vineyards and someone I’ve enjoyed tasting with on a couple different occasions. What was the first bottle of wine you remember drinking — and where did you have it and who were you with? Since you ask about my first bottle, I won’t expand too much on my early experiences with glasses of wine except to say that my parents, both born and wed in Italy before immigrating to the U.S. in the 195-s, enjoyed wine with dinner every…

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5 Questions with… Gabriella Macari, Macari Vineyards

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Every wine not only has a story behind it, but a surprisingly large group of people as well. And, by bringing back “5 Questions with…” our once-popular feature, we will introduce you to the people that make up the New York wine community. Sometimes we’ll talk to winemakers, sure, but there are people in a variety of roles that you may not even be aware of. For this week’s installment, we talk to Gabriella Macari of Macari Vineyards. Her parents, Joe and Alex Macari, own the winery, but Gabriella and her brother Joey represent the next generation — and are…

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