The Wine Road - Missouri 3 and Kansas

Missouri turned out to be a mix of serious winemakers, those that are just looking to cater to the lowest common denominator, and mom & pops that are selling what amounts to home made wines.

I have already written about Stone Hill, and after touring more of the (northern part of) the state, I still find Stone Hill to be my highest overall quality producer. Not far behind, and probably better known outside of Missouri is Mt. Pleasant.

Mt. Pleasant is yet another large property with an even larger parking lot. Their tasting room is the usual collection of gifts and wines for sale and they charge for tasting (as is common near St. Louis). I would love to see a more professional tasting environment (like the one at Stone Hill) but Mt. Pleasant is catering to the casual visitor, and they know what they are doing.

Mt. Pleasant has Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay planted. A rarity in the Midwest as most of the vinifera based wines I tasted were made from California fruit. This is not to say that Mt. Pleasant is making world class Cab and Chard, at least not yet.

The Cabernet Sauvignon was not at all successful, but the Chard was heavily oaked, with lots of buttery flavors (from the secondary fermentation) and these common winemaking flavors hid any and all fruit the wine may have had. The style was more than a little reminiscent of some well known Napa Valley Chards (I don't like those either) and so will probably sell pretty well.

Mt. Pleasant's Chardonel (a Chardonnay hybrid) was more to my taste, with some actual fruit along with the heavy handed winemaking flavors.

Port like wines are common throughout Missouri and it might turn out that these are the most successful on a national scale, but hybrid whites such as Chardonel, Vidal and Seyval seemed to me to be what the state does best. The red native grape Norton is Missouri's official grape (also sometimes called Cynthiana) and while I tasted many examples of various quality, I was never impressed. It is the basis of the state's port wines and this may be where it shines, because as a dry red wine it ranged from unpleasant to unexceptional.

The lush rolling hills of Missouri are a sport car enthusiasts idea of heaven (I would have had much too much fun in a Porsche) and there is no question that the grape wines are of a higher quality than any of its neighbors, but fruit wines and low expectations still abound.


Kansas

Standing between me and my home state of Colorado is the unlikely wine producing state of Kansas. Steeling myself for what I assumed would be a sea of indifferent fruit wines, I plunged ahead.

My first stop was Wyldewood Cellars, who's billboards and high perched roof promised me a taste of wine as I zipped down I-70. As I feared, fruit wines were lined up for tasting and I dutifully saddled up to the bar to do my part.

I was pleasantly surprised by their Elderberry wines. Their semi-sweet and Reserve Dry styles were both well balanced and well made. They each had a complexity of flavors I was delighted to find. Once again my biases were dealt a blow as I realized that talent, like wine, may come from the most unexpected quarters.

Generally I have little to say about fruit wines, not because I don't think they are worth talking about (although this is not altogether an undeserved admonishment) but mostly because I have nothing to compare them too. I have tasted thousands, even tens of thousands of grape wines, and so I know what to expect, and how to judge them. Fruit wines are just outside of my scope.

Fortunately, Kansas did have grape wines to offer me. Smokey Hill Winery presented me with a wide selection of wines all made from Kansas grapes. The Merlot that they were proud of did not wow me, but it did have a touch of recognizable character, although their Cabernet Sauvignon was not even that successful. What they did well, is what so many others have done well throughout this Midwestern foray, they made decent lightly sweet, and even very sweet wines.

Smokey Hill's simple red wine, labeled appropriately enough as Simply Red was pleasant. With enough residual sugar to hide any off flavors it was easy to enjoy, and would probably be great with pizza. The real find though was their intensely sweet red wine called Opulence. Complex and not as cloying as some sweet reds, it was the stand out wine of Kansas for me.

Home now, I will be wrapping up the trip and talking a bit more about hybrid grapes, in the days to come.

The Wine Road - Missiouri part 2

In a striking contrast to the amusement park like Crown Valley, Stone Hill Winery is a 150 year old property that is working hard to raise the bar for quality wine in Missouri.

The history of Stone Hill is a familiar one. In the 19th century Missouri was a thriving wine producing region, rivaling any in the country. In the early 20th Century that pesky ole Prohibition put an end to the appellation and the winery.

For decades the hallowed halls were used to grow mushrooms. Hardly a fitting use for the cellars that were hand carved out of the hill side, so long ago.

In the 1960s the mushroom farmer had a twinge of guilt and sought out Jim and Betty Held and asked them to return the winery to its original purpose and glory. Overcoming their resistance with an offer too attractive to pass up, the Helds re-opened Stone Hill Winery in 1965.

The Helds were serious about their commitment to creating quality wine, and when their children were old enough they sent them to off to learn the craft. First at University, and later at some of the top wineries in the world. The next generation of Helds returned to Stone Hill, armed with knowledge and brimming with enthusiasm.

Their passion shows through in their wines. By far and away these were the best made wines we found in the Midwest, much less in Missouri. Nor are they resting on their laurels. While chatting with the Held's daughter, the ever personable Patty Held-Uthlaut I noticed she dutifully noted every comment, pro or con, I made about the winery and the operations.

The willingness to explore ideas, even when they come from a verbose wine writer like myself, is a rare and wonderful trait in any industry, and all too rare in the wine business. This is the dedication to improvement that will launch Stone Hill into national distribution long before their neighbors.

Located in Hermann, an hour and a half or so west of St. Louis, the Stone Hill Winery is an impressive old property with sprawling stone structures. This is the original winery, and their success has spawned two more. One for sparkling wine, and the other to produce a very respectable Cream Sherry.

This main winery has the ubiquitous tours and restaurant that support the thriving tourist trade, but here there is a difference. The tasting room is not in the middle of the gift shop, it is a clean, clutter free environment where you, as the Held's have, may concentrate on the wines themselves.

When you visit Stone Hill Winery, spend a little more time on the wines, it is worth it. And if you see Patty running around in her guise as Director of Public Relations say hello for me, and see if she has time to share the history and wonder of her family's heritage.

The Wine Road - Missiouri part 1

This blog series is more about wine touring, than the wines they make at those locations. As such, I am going to skip over the various wineries we have visited in the last few days, and concentrate on a single property that epitomizes the emphasis on wine touring, even to the detriment of the wine.

South of Saint Louis, just an hour away, in the heart of the country, lies the quaint town and wine region of Ste. Genevieve, Missouri. A visit to the tasting rooms in town is not much different than any other tasting room.There are wines to taste, and gifts to buy.

Follow the wine route out to the country and again it all seems like any wine country anywhere. Lots of country, and a few vines. That is until you turn on to Highway WW. Obviously, they were thinking WoW when they named this road!

Crown Valley Winery (and neighboring Chaumette Winery) are huge. Not just by the standards of a Midwestern winery, but by any standard. The parking lot can hold dozens of busses and hundreds of cars. The building is simply impressive in scope, and the thousands of acres with Elk, Bison and Angus cattle (much less vines) add to the surreal surroundings.

Here is what wine touring is really about. An hour from a major city, this is an adult fantasy land. As in any amusement park those that come here come to indulge. The hordes sip and swallow with very little regard for what they are tasting. Quantity, not quality, is the catch word for these consumers, and so the winery gives them what they are looking for, while conspicuously charging for everything they can.

Crown Valley Winery is by far and away one of the best funded wine ventures I have ever seen, anywhere. From the imported French wine maker, to the countless plastic wrapped barrels just waiting to be used, no expense has been spared. There is no wine technology they don't have, and no whim unfulfilled. All to make mediocre wine that nobody is really paying attention to.

There is a chicken and egg thing here. Since the consumers do not expect quality, and they are willing to buy anyway, there is little attention paid to making the best wines possible. Since the wines are mediocre at best, the consumer pays little attention to what they are drinking. A vicious cycle that is in the winery's favor, since the consumers still buy almost 50,000 cases a year from Crown Valley alone.

There are tigers and musicians and picnic areas galore. There is an incredible walk to the tasting area where you promenade directly over the tops of the stainless steel fermenting tanks. There is every wine nick knack known, just waiting to be bought. What there isn't, is a tradition or even an expectation of quality wines.

With the exception of the sweeter white wines, I have not been a big fan of much of the wine of the Midwest. It seems unlikely that these wines will make much of a dent in the national marketplace, but they don't really have to. As long as there are people willing to visit, and to buy from the winery, there will be a place for these properties. From the quaint mom and pops, to the megalithic destinations, wine touring is alive and profitable, in Missouri.

Next time we will look at the plethora of wines just to the west of Saint. Louis.

The Wine Road - Southwestern Michigan

At last! Vines as far as the eye can see. Granted, many of them seem to be Concord grapes, but more than a few are the old familiar friend of the wine writer, the Vinifera grape.

This part of Michigan (as opposed to the part of Michigan I will not see on this trip) is well set up for wine touring. Just an hour or two outside of Chicago, the wineries here have big tasting rooms, and are prepared to be inundated.

There is a wine trail with corresponding map, to follow. This makes finding the wineries relatively easy (although our GPS was even more help). Most are within a few miles, or even a few feet, from each other.

All of the wineries offer sweeter wines, which I found to be more successful than the dry reds, but they offer these sweet libations with a twinge of guilt. There is a common feeling that only the dry, especially red, wines are "serious" wines.

This sugar guilt is pretty common in nascent wine regions, I have run across it in various areas, but especially New Zealand. This is not the only comparison I can make with New Zealand, or at least the New Zealand of two decades ago.

Southwest Michigan too, is suffering from an identity crisis. Not only the sweet dilemma I mentioned, but a searching for the ideal grape variety and style. Europe has always had the advantage here, generations ago they worked out the proper grapes for the micro climates (at least in theory). This trial and error period is time consuming and expensive, and the winemakers here know it.

The upshot is that most of the wineries grow 15 or more types of grapes and make various styles of each. There are simply too many choices for the consumer and confusion is inevitable. On the plus side, there is something for everyone.

Starting from the south and working your way north, Tabor Hill is one of the first wineries you will run across. They have a tasting room right off the highway, but their winery, and restaurant is far out in the country, surrounded by vines. Dinner at Tabor Hill was built up as spectacular, and indeed the view was. The food was less inspiring, and most of the wines were not our favorites from the area.

We visited nearly every winery in the region, and they were universally charming, friendly and well prepared for visitors.

Here are the wines that most impressed me:

N.V. Tabor Hill Winery, Grand Mark Sparkling Wine (Champagne method and grapes.)

2004 Lemon Creek Vineyards, "Moon Shadow" Cabernet Sauvignon Ice Wine (a rare and wonderful treat - the name comes from the fact that the grapes were picked on the night of a lunar eclipse.)

2003 Lemon Creek Vineyards, Vineyard Select White (Vignole)

2004 Domain Berrien Cellars, Marsanne

2003 Domain Berrien Cellars, Cabernet Franc

2004 Karma Vista Vineyards & Winery, Sauvignon Blanc

2004 Fenn Valley, Dry Riesling (the wines of this property were of an overall higher quality.)

2003 Fenn Valley, Chardonel

2003 Fenn Valley, Pinot Noir (light and almost bubble gum sweet in the nose, but the most "typical" Pinot I tasted in the area.)

Feel free to let me know if you want any more details on any of these wines or wineries.

As always, I save the regular wine reviews for the readers of my newsletter.

The Wine Road- Iowa

The first thing a wine writer notices on the way to the wineries of Amana is the complete lack of vineyards.

Since I knew most of the wines were made from fruit, this was somewhat expected, but I had read about Riesling and even Zinfandel being made here, and I was curious where the grapes (much less the fruit) were hiding.

It turns out that almost none of the fruit, and absolutely none of the grapes are grown here. Zinfandel and Riesling from California, and fruit from the local grocery freezer seem to be the basis for these wines. All told, any decent home winemaker could do as well or better than most of the wines I tasted.

Rhubarb and Dandelion wines are the exception. With a long tradition of making these wines at home, the wineries of Amana have carved out a niche, no matter how unusual it may be. These wines were actually fun, and differed from winery to winery.

I wouldn't expect anyone to drive out of their way to try rhubarb wine, but the Amana Colonies are a tourist destination with more to offer than wine (they have a brewery too).

The name Amana may be written on a piece of equipment in your kitchen, and indeed this is the origin of those familiar appliances. Formed in 1855 as a communal society, this tight-knit group still practices their own brand of Christianity, even if the communal life style ended in the 1930s.

The towns (there are several of them that make up the Amana Colonies) are cute and quaint, and draw tourists from far and wide. I was disappointed to see that the gift shops were full of schlock from around the world, instead of the hand crafts that they were once known for.

A careful look around will yield some incredible crafts still being offered, but they are few and far between. Especially check out the unique Garden Critters, hand made copper yard ornaments.

There are better than a half dozen wineries in walking distance from each other, but bring your sweet tooth. The better wines (and I use the terms better and wine loosely) are very sweet and they will wear out your palate quickly.

When the wines and gift shopping have tired you out, be sure to visit the Millstream Brewing Company for good beer (and even better root beer).

The Wine Road - Nebraska

Nebraska seems an unlikely place to find wine, and indeed we didn't.

There are only a few wineries here, and they seem to mostly be open on the weekends, which of course is not when we were there.

We did get to stop by Mac's Creek Vineyard & Winery in Lexington, NE. We wandered the grounds, took a hand full of pictures, and even met the proprietor. What we didn't get to do was to taste any wine. We were a few minutes after closing and they had an event going on.

They were nice as could be, but our timing was wrong, as it would turn out to be for the rest of Nebraska as well.

Mac's Creek offers wines made from actual grapes, while most of the rest of Nebraska seems to use other fruits and berries. Mac's is well prepared for visitors, with ample parking, and a spacious and bright tasting room.

They are not exactly on the beaten path, in the western half of the state, but if you are passing by on I-80, make a point of stopping in.

Our travel plans took us next to the Lincoln area, and we found 3 wineries in close proximity. All of which are only open on the weekends, so I have no detais about them.

Next stop is Iowa and the Amana Colonies area, where I promise a more complete report.