Twin Brook scheduled Souper weekend

As I mentioned last week, January seems to be soups and wines month. Here's another event that just got on the schedule at Twin Brook Winery in The Gap, Pa.

Souper Saturday/Sunday
Jan. 24 & 25
Football playoffs are over & you need to reenergize before the Super Bowl!

Take a break from your busy schedule. We’ll have tempting soups & stew in fresh bread bowls available for sale. Taste our wines. Enjoy a glass of wine with you soup or stew.
Pick up your favorite wines for the Super Bowl.

Eyes turn to Md. legislature later this month

We reported already on some of the news that appeared in the January e-letter of the
Maryland Wine Association. Here are a couple of other items that were included.

Budgets. Maryland wine/grape industry suffered a blow in late 2008 when funds in the Wine & Grape Promotion Fund were eliminated due to State budget cuts. The funds were to be granted to farmers to plant vineyards throughout the state.

The Maryland General Assembly's 2009 legislative session begins on January 14. Each year, the two committees that hear alcohol bills are asked by industry groups and citizens to revise Maryland's antiquated alcohol laws. We'll keep you updated on the issues that affect the Maryland wine industry and how you can help support Maryland's growing vineyards and wineries.

Chien: A lot of progress, a ways to go

Mark Chien might laugh reading the suggestion that he's the rock star of the regional wine industry.

Still, it's not far from the truth. He's well known. Respected. And his audience continues to grow as the membership expands and seeks out his advice. These days Chien carries a wine barrel's size cachet as he continues his work as the wine grape extension agent for Penn State Cooperative Extension, a job he has held since 1999. Of all the names that pop up during chats with winemakers across the central and eastern part of the state, none matches the frequency that his spills into the conversation.

I probably should have called him months ago, but the attention has been spent primarily on the individual wineries and wine trails rather than those who are part of the bigger picture. Appropriately, Chien will be the primary speaker when the Pennsylvania Wine Society holds its Wine Excellence Awards on Sunday, Jan. 18, at the Harrisburg Hilton on 2nd Street. That mid-afternoon event, which is $40 for non-members, will include tastings of the state's top 10 wines and a chance to meet and hear those winemakers.

You talk to someone as knowledgeable as Chien and try to figure out where to begin the questioning. With a limited amount of time, and much of that spent on introductions, I tossed one question his way: How good can this region be?

"There are only now people who are starting to press the region for quality," he said, "and I would say that I usually approach it from a viticultural standpoint, so viticulturally I think it can probably be the best region in the eastern North America just because we're sort of, how should I say it, we’re not as cold as the Finger Lakes and we’re not as warm as Charlottesville [Va.].

"It's just a matter of finding the best sites, which I think are down in Adams and York County. I don't pretend to hide the fact that I think those are the best areas to grow grapes. Hauser Estate will be probably the first example of what that area can do. Allegro certainly has demonstated that York County has great potential. And we have some new places like Galer, like Karamoor Estate. I think we have great potential if we find out where the best sites are and we apply the viticulture technology that produces great wines elsewhere. It’s jst no big secret that all the knowledge and ideas are out there, we just have to find the best places to apply them. So I think all those south slopes that are currently covered unfortunately with apples and peaches . . . and that’s to take nothing away from the Finger Lakes. We’ll never grow Riesling as well as the Finger Lakes. I think we can probably grow Bordeaux varieties better than Long Island. But we haven't put it to the test yet.

"It’s been 10 years since I’ve been here and we’ve made tremendous progress, but we’re still nowhere near. It will be another 10 years at least before the best wines pop out. I think Black Ankle, is right now, as far as the eastern United States, is probably the best example outside of Long Island of serious wine growing, of trying to test where the outer limits are of quality. And they’re so new that it’s impossible to use them as an example."

Sugarloaf celebrating tasting room, inauguration

A lot of folks will be toasting Brack Obama and his new administration over the coming days, including several wineries in Maryland. Saw an e-letter come out from Sugarloaf Mountain Vineyard in southern Maryland yesterday promoting its planned activities around the event.

Next weekend, Jan. 17-20, it's planning a tasting room grand-opening dedication and presidential inauguration from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. During that celebration, they’ll feature wine tastings and tours of the winery, sales on selected wines, hot soup, cheese platters, hors d'oeuvres, bottle engraving and entertainment.

Visitors are invited Tuesday, Jan. 20, to watch the presidential inauguration on the winery's big-screen TV while enjoying a glass of wine. Commemorative inauguration flags will be available for sale.

Here's a scoop: Md. wine ice cream out by spring

One event that got lost in the holiday and my job change was a press invitation to sample Maryland wine ice cream. Hey, if they had held the event on sundae ... ha ha, I would have been there, too. Samples were given out on Monday, Dec. 15, at the Maryland Department of Agriculture building in Annapolis.

Winery association executive director Kevin Atticks said yesterday that the event drew a big crowd, mostly from those curious what this wine ice cream was all about.

Kilby Cream, located in Cecil County, has developed a line of Maryland wine ice cream to be available this spring. This innovation is a culmination of Maryland's diverse forms of agriculture, as both the dairy products as well as the grapes are exclusively from Maryland, according to a mid-December release.

"We've developed four flavors, all made from our ice cream and Maryland wines," said Phyllis Kilby of Kilby Cream. "We think they're delicious!" Kilby Cream is using Traminette, Vidal Blanc, as well as Chambourcin, in addition to other flavors.

Karen Fedor, agricultural marketing specialist at the Maryland Department of Agriculture, added, "It's exciting to see two of our state's value-added agricultures joining together to develop a new product."

'Down time' for winemaker is short-lived

Sent a note to winemaker Jason Price at Twin Brook Winery in Gap, Pa., asking how he'll spend the next month to month and a half and whether it's too soon to get out into the vineyard. I also asked the importance of getting any type of a snow cover.

Price: Yes, too soon for the vineyard as far as pruning is concerned. Weather depending, we will start concentrating on the vineyard in late Feb/March. Until then, I’m in the cellar doing everything from QCs to blending as well as other wine processing steps. It is true that winter months offer a “down time,” but aside from allowing the winemaker a much needed 2 week vacation away from the farm there is no extended time off. Winemaking and viticulture are as much a full time all year around job here in Pennsylvania as in other grape growing regions. As far as snow … bring it. If [there is going to be precipitation], it might as well be now when the vineyard is dormant . . . Putting Chard and Grigio in bottle this month as well as Vignoles."

Clover Mill Farm closes until May

One quick note regarding Clover Mill Farm Vineyards & Winery in Chester Springs, Pa., one of a number of family-owned operations that exist across the region. This one has gone into its annual hibernation and will remained closed until May.

Once called Fox Meadow Farm, the winery has been operated by the Denny family since 1998. It grows, produces and bottles all the grapes for the eight wines that it sells when the winery is open, which is Sundays from 1 to 5 p.m. begnning in May and ending in December.

Thought I'd copy and paste what appears on the winery Web site about Gay Denny, the Mom of the Mom & Pop business, who died last year.

"She was the co-owner and was in charge of the Wine Cottage tastings and sales. Always interested in decorating, she made a career of creating bright and cheerful spaces for family and friends in her home and for customers in the various gift shops where she worked and managed. She was also an avid gardener and helped with all the vineyard and winery chores. She is dearly missed by her family."

She is survived by husband William and daughters Ellen, Nancy, Linda and their families. Ellen dropped me a note in response to my e-mail about why they close for several months, saying that they've always shut down during the winter and early spring. It was a way, she said, for her folks "to get a bit of a vacation from having to be tied to the house every weekend."