Meet Michelle Oakes, Hauser Estate winemaker

Michelle Oakes grew up in Seattle, where she admits she knew little about Eastern wines. But an education at Cornell and several stints at a wine shop and wineries in New York State slowly, well, that love of winemaking grew on her.

Soon she’ll be a walking encyclopedia on at least one Pennsylvania wine: Hauser Estate Winery, located west of Gettysburg. Oakes is the winemaker at the winery owned and soon to be operating by the Jon A. Hauser family. Hauser was president of the Musselman Co. (Apple Processors). He died in 1983, but his legacy continues with funds and land he left.

While the grapes already are planted, the official opening of the tasting room will come sometime next month. That will cap a whirlwind few months for Oakes, who left the Finger Lakes region the first week of March for Gettysburg. It’s an new area for her that she’s been too busy to really explore. Yet.

“We actually didn’t really get started in the winery until April,” she said the other day by phone, “because of . . . getting all of our licensing through and the construction on the building and [figuring out] whether or not things were workable. Actually, we’re still finishing the constructions of the tasting room, but it’s under roof and going to be finished quite soon.” It promises to be one of the lures to the winery. The view, Oakes said, “from all sides, it’s really amazing. They’ve really showcased it well. There’s glass all throughout and they have a green roof that you can look out on, which will be used for events.”

Oakes certainly didn’t see this coming when she headed east to Cornell. Originally settling in with plans to steer her career toward forensic science, she found other interests tug at her. That steered her down a path that included plant biology and a job working in research for the United States Department of Agriculture. It all finally clicked after she spent some time working in a wine shop, and wound up just completing her master’s in horticulture and vineyard management, with a minor in food science/enology/winemaking. During that time she worked for Damiani Wine Cellars, the Thirsty Owl Wine Company – winner of the 2006 New York Governors Cup for its 2006 dry Riesling – and the Hermann J. Wiemer Vineyard.

Asked by e-mail what he liked about Oakes, winery president Jonathan Patrono replied quickly and succinctly. “Her education, her confidence, and recommendations from those she worked with and for [multiple people commented on her palate and how that leads to good winemaking],” he wrote.

Oakes and Hauser Estate will offer a mix of wines when the doors open in July:
a table red, a table white, Chambourcin and Chardonnay, apple wine and 3 hard ciders.

She was articulate and thoughtful during the 15-minute interview, covering a number of subjects. It seemed -- rather than simply post the entire podcast -- wiser to give you snippets of one or two minutes in length to listen to. For those who can’t listen to long bits of audio, these should be more to your liking. The sequence is as follows:

On how she got into winemaking.

On the reds that get her palate juiced.

On a couple of her favorite white grapes.

On sweet wine, which has such a big role in winemaking and sales here.