Posts Tagged“baco noir”

Hudson-Chatham Winery 2007 Empire (Red Blend)

By Lenn Thompson, Editor-in-Chief We'll end our Regional Wine Week reviews this week with a recently released "Super New York" (think Super Tuscan) blend from Hudson-Chatham Winery in Ghent, NY. Hudson-Chatham Winery 2007 Empire Reserve ($22) is the brainchild of owners Carlo and Dominique DeVito, and is made with grapes from three vineyards in New York's three biggest wine regions blended in equal proportions — Long Island merlot, Finger Lakes cabernet franc and Hudson Valley Baco Noir. According to Carlo, "The idea of Empire was to create a wine that was uniquely New York, and attempt to blend vinifera and…

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Quick Q&A with Kristop Brown, Winemaker, Benmarl Winery

The Hudson River Valley is a sometimes-forgotten wine region in New York, often losing out to Long Island and the Finger Lakes for the attention of writers and much of the wine-drinking populace. But there is an emerging group of quality-focused producers in the region. One winery making some very good wines is Benmarl Winery, which boasts what may be the oldest vineyard in the United States, dating back to the 1770s.  Today, we sit down with Benmarl's winemaker, Kristop Brown, to learn a bit more about him. What (and where) was the first bottle of wine you remember drinking?…

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Three Hudson Valley Baco Noirs

Last night, as a part of my Week of 3s project, I tasted three different Baco noir wines from three different Hudson Valley wineries. These were actually the first Baco noirs I had ever tasted and after the tasting I'm still not sure that I quite know what to expect from the hybrid variety. They were all quite different. So what is Baco noir exactly? It's a cross of Folle Blanche (a French vinifera wine grape) and an unknown American grape from the Vitis riparia family. It first created by French wine hybridizer Maurice Baco, so that's where the name comes…

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