Podcasts about muscadine

Can hybrid grapes revolutionize the wine world? Adam Huss — Host of the Beyond Organic podcast and Co-owner of Centralas Cellars breaks down what a hybrid truly is, explaining how traditional breeding — and nature itself — has long crossed grape species. With over 70 grape species worldwide, today's modern hybrids are the result of generations of crossing, backcrossing, and innovation. We explore the impact of WWII on agriculture, France's ban on hybrids in appellation wines, and why developing new hybrids is critical for disease resistance, flavor discovery, and more sustainable farming. Plus, Adam shares insights into trialing the “married vine” system — a potential game-changer for soil health, pest management, and flavor expression. Resources:         135: Cold Hardiness of Grapevines 217: Combating Climate Chaos with Adaptive Winegrape Varieties 227: Andy Walkers' Pierces Disease-Resistant Grapes are a Success at Ojai Vineyard Adam Huss – LinkedIn Centralas Organic Wine Podcast South Central Los Angeles Couple Opens New Winery Dedicated to Organic Values, Transparency, Inclusion Wine's F- Word Vineyard Team Programs: Juan Nevarez Memorial Scholarship - Donate SIP Certified – Show your care for the people and planet   Sustainable Ag Expo – The premiere winegrowing event of the year Vineyard Team – Become a Member Get More Subscribe wherever you listen so you never miss an episode on the latest science and research with the Sustainable Winegrowing Podcast. Since 1994, Vineyard Team has been your resource for workshops and field demonstrations, research, and events dedicated to the stewardship of our natural resources. Learn more at www.vineyardteam.org.   Transcript [00:00:03] Beth Vukmanic: Welcome to Sustainable Wine Growing with Vineyard Team, where we bring you the latest in science and research for the wine industry. I'm Beth Vukmanic, Executive Director [00:00:13] In today's podcast, Craig Macmillan, critical resource manager at Niner Wine Estates with longtime SIP Certified Vineyard in the first ever. SIP Certified Winery speaks with Adam Huss, host of the Beyond Organic Podcast and co-owner of Centralis Cellars. [00:00:32] Adam breaks down what a hybrid truly is, explaining how traditional breeding and nature itself has long crossed grape species with over 70 grape species worldwide. Today's modern hybrids are the result of generations of crossing, backcrossing, and innovation. [00:00:50] We explore the impact of World War II on agriculture, France's ban on hybrids and Appalachian wines, and why developing new hybrids is critical for disease resistance, flavor discovery, and more sustainable farming. [00:01:03] Plus, Adam shares insights into trialing the married vine system, a potential game changer for soil health, pest management, and flavor expression. [00:01:12] When Lizbeth didn't get into nursing school on her first try, she could have given up. Instead, she partnered with her mentor Alex, to make a new plan, attend classes part-time, build up her resume and get hands-on hospital work experience. Now Lizbeth has been accepted into Cuesta College's nursing program and her dream of becoming a nurse is back on track. [00:01:36] Lizbeth is a Vineyard Team, Juan Nevarez Memorial Scholar. You can help more students like her who are the children of Vineyard and winery workers reach their dreams of earning a degree by donating to the Juan Nevarez Memorial Scholarship. Just go to vineyardteam.org/donate. [00:01:53] Now let's listen in. [00:01:58] Craig Macmillan: Our guest today is Adam Huss. He is the host of the Beyond Organic Podcast and also co-owner of Centralis Winery in Los Angeles, California. And today we're gonna talk about hybrid grape varieties. Welcome to the podcast, Adam. [00:02:11] Adam Huss: Thanks, Craig. I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me. [00:02:17] Craig Macmillan: So let's just start with the basics. What are hybrid grape varieties? [00:02:22] Adam Huss: I should also say I'm a fan of your podcast as well, so it's really fun to be here. [00:02:26] Craig Macmillan: Thank you. Thank you. [00:02:28] Adam Huss: Been listening for a while. So hybrids, I mean, it's really simple. It's funny, I see stuff on Instagram sometimes where people just are so misinformed and they think that, you know, hybrid means like GMO or something like that. [00:02:41] A hybrid simply is just, you take pollen from grape X, you put it on flowers from grape y, and if those two grapes are from different species, you have a hybrid. If they're from the same species, you just have a cross, and this is something that has been part of traditional breeding since forever. It's also what happens naturally in the wild. [00:03:00] Or I hate, I actually just use two words I try not to use at all, which is like natural and wild, but in forests and streams forests and backyards without human intervention, these pollen get exchanged by wind and everything else and have led to, you know, some of the more. Old popular varieties of grapes that are, considered hybrids that we know of now, like Norton and Isabella and Kaaba. [00:03:23] Nobody actually crossed them. They just happened. So yeah, that's, that's a hybrid. It's very simple. [00:03:29] Craig Macmillan: That's what they are, what aren't they and what are some of the myths surrounding them? [00:03:33] Adam Huss: yeah, great question. You can't generalize about hybrids. Generally speaking. So that's really important thing for people to wrap their heads around, which is because. You know, we'll get into this, but so much, so many hybrids are, and just hybrids in general, are wrapped up in prejudice because we live in this sort of viniferous centric wine world. [00:03:56] You know, , those of us who are in wine, but there, you just can't generalize. The qualities of hybrids are just like humans. Like it depends on what your parents are. You know, you, you get different things every time you mix 'em up and you're not like your brother or sister. If you have a sibling, you know you're gonna be different from them even though you have the same parents. [00:04:13] So that's the same thing happens with grapes. There's genetic diversity and mutation happens and. For hybrids, , the possibilities, the potentials are literally infinite. It's pretty incredible to know that possibility exists. There are over 70 species of grapes on earth besides vitus vara, and if you cross any of those two varieties, yeah, you'll get a genetic cross that's 50 50 of, of two different species. [00:04:40] But that. Within that you could do that cross again and get a different variety of grape, even with the same cross. So it's just amazing. [00:04:51] The modern hybrids that are now out there are. Often multi-species crosses and have been crossed. Generationally again and again and back crossed and recrossed. And so, you know, I was just looking at a hybrid grape that had five species of grapes in its family tree. I mean, there are family trees that would make the royals blush, honestly, in some of these hybrids. [00:05:11] So it's not, it's not something that is just, can be just said. You can say one thing about it or that. And, and the idea of hybridizing doesn't imply anything at all, really, like it is just this process that happens that we've been doing for a long time. This might be a good thing to dispel some of the prejudices. [00:05:34] You know, something like the word foxy often gets thrown around when we start talking about hybrids. I did a whole podcast about this what's really interesting, I just brought this word up to a, a young couple here in LA who are growing grapes and they, they had no idea what I was talking about. [00:05:49] So that's kind of encouraging. Like in, in the younger generations, these prejudices and some of these words that we inherited from the last century , are dying out truly. Which is great, but it still persists and you still hear it a lot and. If anybody goes online and researches some of these grapes, so much of the information available online is actually still misinformation and prejudiced because it comes from this vinifirous centric culture. [00:06:15] And so it's really important for people to understand that like foxy is not what it sounds like. It sounds like it would be this animalistic, musky, maybe scent gland tinged aroma, flavor thing, but. If you taste the grapes that are known as foxy and you go, you know, start researching this by tasting, you'll find that it's actually kind of delicious. [00:06:37] It's usually fruity and you know, candy like strawberry raspberry flavors. And for those of us in the US. It's often something we associate with Grapiness because of Welchs. And the flavors of Welchs, which come from the Concord grape, which is a Foxy grape, are these grapey flavors that we grew up with. [00:06:57] This sense of like grape candy and stuff like that. And that's a lot of times what you find in these, but again, it depends a lot on. The level of the compounds that are in that specific hybrid. Again, you can't, you can't generalize. And just like with anything, if you mix different compounds together, you'll get these nuances and you might have some of that flavor or aroma, but it'll be blended with other things. [00:07:17] And so it takes on new characteristics. So it's way more complex than just thinking like a. All grapes that are hybridized are foxy. That's absolutely not true. Or that foxy is this monolithic thing or that foxy is bad. None of those are true. And then really the other thing to realize is in. Grapes in the native North American varieties of species of grapes. [00:07:41] There's really only one that has been used traditionally in grape breeding and hybridization that has these flavors. And that's Vitus labrusca. It just happened to be used quite a bit because it's endemic to the East coast where a lot of the Europeans who started all this breeding were living and, and it was, you know, very readily apparent in the forest of the East coast. [00:07:59] So that. Got used a lot and it's also got a lot of great qualities of fungal resistance and stuff like that. Muscadine is the other grape that has it, but it's got a different genetic structure so it doesn't get crossed a lot or hybridized a lot. [00:08:11] Craig Macmillan: So like, what are the advantages of hybrids where you take vinifira and you cross it with a Native American indigenous grape? What are the benefits? [00:08:21] Adam Huss: Yeah. Another great question. Just , the historical perspective on this is really important. I think. So, you know, Europeans came here a couple hundred years ago, and eventually they brought some of their favorite plants over, one of which were their grapes. And what they noticed right away is that their grapes, I. [00:08:38] Suffered and died without exception, just across the board. Anything they brought over grape wise just kept dying, kept dying. You know, many people tried for a century at least, you know, including people like Thomas Jefferson, people with enormous amounts of resources, and they just failed. They failed to grow these grapes. [00:08:56] Meanwhile, you know, these things like. Norton, this, these hybridized grapes started developing and people noticed like, oh, this grape, it's crossing with some of , the local varieties and it's doing really well. So they began to realize, like they didn't know then that part of, one of the benefits that you get is phylloxera resistance, for example. [00:09:16] But that was a big one and came to save, you know, Europe's wine industry at the end of the 19th century. But also you have these grapes that . Evolved with the fungal pathogens of this, of these climates of North America and other places around the planet. So they've developed resistance and tolerance for all these things. [00:09:38] And so when you cross them with vinifira, you get some of the desirable characteristics that you might like from Vera, and hopefully you'll get some of that, you know, hardiness and fungal resistance and some of the other, just. General benefits of having hybridized interesting new flavors and characteristics [00:09:56] Craig Macmillan: have you seen some examples of this in your, in your travels? [00:10:01] Adam Huss: the fungal resistance and things like [00:10:03] Craig Macmillan: resistance or Pierces disease resistance or anything like that. [00:10:07] Adam Huss: Oh yeah. I mean, I. Whew, so many. I mean, the fact that people can grow grapes organically in Vermont for example, relies almost entirely on hybrids. You know, first of all, they have extremely cold winters there. They have extremely wet, hot, humid summers there. And if you try to grow vinifera there the only way to do it is with chemicals and, and a lot of heartache and, and high risk agriculture. [00:10:35] But here we have somebody like Matt Niess, who's working entirely with hybrids, with his winery, north American Press, and basically he's not using any sprays in any of his vineyards in here in California because these. These grapes have genetics that developed for resistance to the fungal pathogens of the East Coast. [00:10:55] And so you bring them to this nice dry, you know, Mediterranean climate, they're just like, they're crazy. They're like you know, they're, you can basically spray free now. I mean, some people have a problem with zero sprays because they don't want things to develop, but he has a 70-year-old baco noir vineyard, for example, that's in like a wet region in Sonoma that. [00:11:18] He has never sprayed and it's pumping out grapes and looking beautiful every year. And the really interesting thing about it's, there are some inter plantations of vinfiera in that like somebody. Planted something. Maybe it was Pinot Noir in with the Baco. It's like one every, you know, like there's only a few, a handful of these scattered throughout the acre of the Baco noir, and you can tell which ones those are every year because they're just decimated by mildew by the end of the year, whereas the Baco is just spotless and beautiful. [00:11:46] So that's a really like obvious, [00:11:49] Craig Macmillan: What are the wines like? The bako noir? I've never had a bako noir. [00:11:53] Adam Huss: Oh, his wines. Well, so Baco is nice. It's, I mean, it's higher acid. It's almost like a high acid. Gosh, I don't know what, it's hard. I, I, I hate to go down the rabbit hole of like trying to compare it to a vinifira, but it is unique. But it's a deep red almost interior, like with deep purple, higher acid flavors, but pretty balanced, really luscious. Dark fruited flavors maybe a little. Like Syrah, like meatiness, there may be a touch. You might find that it depends on the year. He's had a couple different vintages, so it's been really interesting to see. I'm, I'm kinda like loving following that year by year, seeing the vintage variation and what. [00:12:35] Different things come out because nobody's really doing this. Nobody's, nobody's experimenting with these. So we don't really know how they'll do in, in California other than what he's doing. And just a couple other growers. But he also this year introduced awba for the first time back into California. [00:12:50] The last catawba Vines were ripped out of California in like the sixties, and he, planted some and finally was able to harvest a crop this year and released what was once. California, I mean, the America's most popular wine from the Ohio River Valley is sparkling catawba, and it's like pink and just delicious, beautiful, beautiful stuff. [00:13:10] If I can step back, I think a lot of the discussion of hybrids, again, comes from this perspective of vinifira culture and how do we. Help vinifera become better. How do we use these hybrids as a tool to help, you know, this sort of vinifira centric culture? But I, I would, I'd like to reframe it. [00:13:31] I think a better way to look at this is hybridization is kind of just what we always do with agriculture. It's how you evolve and adapt your agriculture. Ecologically in the absence of modern chemistry that we have. So like before World War ii, and part of, and this is part of the history, France's history too, is like, you know, we had RA decimating their, their vineyards as well as. , we didn't just bring phylloxera back from North America, we brought BlackRock, Downey mildew, powdery mildew. So , their vines were just like dying. Like they were just dying. And so there was this urgent need and a lot of the hybridization, a lot of, some of our, you know, hybrids like Save El Blanc and things like that. [00:14:15] Came from French breeders who were just trying to save the French wine industry. Like they just wanted to have wine, let alone vinifira. You know, it was that. It was pretty bad at the end of that set, you know? And so they developed these new things and then we, you know, things like Isabella and catawba and things like that were coming over from North America, some of our hybrids that came from here, and pretty soon they had these really productive, really hardy vines with new, interesting flavors that. [00:14:41] People kinda liked 'cause they are like fruity and delicious and interesting and new and, and if you're a farmer and you have less inputs and you get a more productive, like higher yields on your vine, like, it's just kind of a no-brainer. And so people were just planting these things. They really were taking off. [00:14:59] And in 1934, the French were like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like our, our, first of all, our. Ancient vinifera cultures are going to be completely diluted, but second of all, we're gonna devalue the market 'cause we're gonna have all this like, it's too abundant, you know? So they made, in 1934, they made hybrids illegal in the French Appalachians. [00:15:17] And so that legacy is something that still sticks with us. Of course then World War II happened and we. Didn't really pay much attention to wine at all 'cause we were just trying to survive. But once World War II was over and the the war machine transferred into the pesticide and industrial agricultural machine, the French realized they could keep Vera alive on root stocks of American hybrids or American native varieties by spraying them with these new novel chemistry chemicals. [00:15:49] And so then they started enforcing the ban on hybrids because they could, and they knew they could have the, this alternative. And so that's when you saw like they had their own sort of version of reefer madness where you, you saw a lot of misinformation and hyperbole and outright propaganda and lies about these, these grapes because they were trying to get them out of French vineyards. [00:16:10] It's important to realize that Ban the EU just lifted the ban on hybrids in Appalachian wine in 2021. So it's kind of not surprising that some of these prejudices and misinformation still persist today. We're not too far away from that. I. [00:16:26] Craig Macmillan: And, and why was the band lifted? Do you know? [00:16:30] Adam Huss: That's a great question. It's, it was lifted for ecological reasons because they're realizing these are really important to dealing with climate change. This is like, if you want a sustainable industry, you need to be able to adapt. When you're inside this, this world of vinifira, what I call the vinifira culture, which is, you know, very centered on Vera. [00:16:50] You don't realize how strange it is. You know, it's kind of like growing up with a, a weird family, you know? It's all you know, so you don't know how strange they are until you start seeing the rest of the world. But to think that, you know, 50 years ago we just decided that maybe like. 10 grapes were the pinnacle of viticultural achievement for all time, and we've basically invested all of our energies into, you know, propagating those around the planet and preserving them at all costs is kind of strange when you think about the whole history of agriculture. [00:17:20] And it's really only possible because of cheep fossil fuels and the novel chemistry that we. Have put into our systems. And so if you take those out, if you start thinking ecologically about how do you develop a wine system, I mean the question is like, does it make sense when farming in a world where the only constant is change and we just live in a dynamic world, does it make sense to try to do everything you can to prevent change? [00:17:45] Like is prevention of change like a good strategy? And so I think, you know, diversity and adaptation are. What have always worked, you know, historically through agriculture, and that's kind of the future. I mean, in a real sense, vinifera culture is the past and hybrids are the future. If we want to have a future, there's my enthusiastic, [00:18:09] Craig Macmillan: Well, I'd like you to expand a little bit more on that. 'cause we we have a group of hybrids that are well known or are commonly used. I've, I've been hearing about Marquette a lot more, um, As having a lot of potential WW. What does that future potentially look like and what are some things that would have to happen for that potential to be realized? [00:18:31] Adam Huss: So we have invested, you know, millions of dollars in time and energy and even policy into developing, , the chemicals that we now use to support our, viticulture. And to make it possible in places like Virginia, where, you know, they're developing a whole wine industry there around vinifira in a climate that is, you know, like I said, that was the climate that like Thomas Jefferson failed for and everyone else for hundreds of years failed to grow it there. [00:18:59] If we invested that same amount of time and energy and money into breeding programs and into. Research for the kinds of things that we're now discovering, like DNA markers so that we can have DNA marker assisted breeding. So you're, you're speeding up the breeding process by sometimes two, three years. [00:19:19] Which is, which is significant in a process that can take, you know, 10 to 20 years that any, any little bit helps. So that kinda stuff and just more of it, more private breeders, making it more valuable for private breeders. I always think it's really interesting that like billionaires would rather just do another sort of like cult. [00:19:39] Ego, Napa cab investment, you know, rather than like breed their own personal variety of grape that nobody else could have. I mean, I'm not recommending that, but like, to me that seems really interesting as an idea. You could just have your own proprietary grape variety if you wanted to, you know, but nobody's thinking that way. [00:19:58] But I would say breeding, putting our, our time and energy into breeding not new varieties is, . Really important and, and working with the ones that are already there, I mean. The only reason California's so such strangers to them is because it's so easy to grow here. You know, we're relatively speaking and I get that. [00:20:15] I mean, you know, people like what they like and, and change is hard and market conditions are what they are. But I think we're at a point where. Marking conditions are changed. Like I said, you know, this young couple I was just talking to don't, don't have never even heard the word foxy. And so I think there's a lot more openness to just what's in the glass. Now. [00:20:35] Craig Macmillan: So some. Of it's messaging. If we can have wines that people can taste and do it in a context that's new to them. So there may be an opportunity here with newer wine drinkers or younger wine drinkers potentially, is what it sounds like to me. [00:20:48] Adam Huss: Yeah, and I. I mean, some of this is also realizing all the different ways that hybrids are already being used and could be used. Like, you know, we know you mentioned Pierce's disease. Pierce's disease is this disease that's endemic to California and is heading north. I mean, it's really on the threshold of all of the major wine regions of, of California. [00:21:11] And the only ways . To stop it without hybrids, without resistant hybrids are, are pretty intense. You know, it's like eliminating habitat through, , basically creating a sterile medium of your vineyard and then spraying with insecticides, you know some, sometimes pretty intense insecticides. [00:21:29] The alternative though is there are now multiple varieties of grapes that are. Resistant to them that are tolerant to it so they, they can carry the bacteria, but it won't affect the health of the vine. Those were bred, some of them here, right here in California at uc Davis. And yet if you go to the University of California Agricultural Network Resources page that, you know, kind of handles all the IPM for California, sort of like the resource. [00:21:56] And if you read about Pierce's disease, it makes zero mention of using tolerant. Varieties as a management strategy. And it makes no mention that there are even are tolerant varieties to Pierce's disease as a management strategy. So just that kind of stuff is the shift that has to happen. 'cause it just shows how vinifera centric our entire industry is, like from the top down, even when there are these great strategies that you can use and start implementing to combat these things, ecologically versus chemically. [00:22:25] They're not there, you know, they're not being mentioned. So just little things like that would go a long way. Also, you know, I mean, one of my fun little facts is like. There are already hybrids being used significantly, like probably everybody on who's listening to this has, if you've bought a bottle of wine at a grocery store that was under 20 bucks, you've probably drunk hybrids because 10,000 acres of ruby red is grown in California to make mega purple and mega purples. Pretty much in every, like, you know, mass produced under $20 bottle of wine and it's got esra, Vitus, esra in it. So you've probably been drinking hybrids and not even known about it. [00:23:04] In terms of these Andy Walker hybrids, I do have a little that which were bred for Pierce's disease resistance. I also have kind of a fun story in that I, as you know, like we've, we've both talked to Adam Tolmach, who replanted a whole block that he lost to Pierce's disease with these hybrid varieties, and these are designed specifically to retain a lot of vinifira characteristics. They're like 97% back crossed to be. vinifira and 3% with Vitus, Arizona to have that Pierce's disease resistant specifically. So they don't have a lot of the other benefits that like a higher percentage of North American native varieties would have. Like they, they're still susceptible to powdery mildew and other mildew pretty, pretty intensely, [00:23:44] but just in terms of flavor for anybody who's out there. So I've, I've barrel tasted with Adam. Tasted each of those varieties individually out a barrel. And then we went to his tasting room and tried all of his wines and, and got to, and then he, instead of keeping, he has two red hybrid varieties, two white hybrid varieties, and he blends them and makes a, you know, a, a red blend and a white blend that he calls a state red and state white. [00:24:09] And we went to his tasting room and he makes beautiful wine. All of his wines are great, but no joke. Everybody in my party. Preferred the hybrids to like all of his pinots or raw chardonnay, I mean, I have no idea why. I mean, but, and that's just anecdotal, obviously nothing scientific, but the very least I can say the, the flavors are exciting and delicious. [00:24:29] Right. [00:24:30] Craig Macmillan: If you can get them in front of the consumer, [00:24:33] Adam Huss: Yeah. [00:24:33] Craig Macmillan: the key. That's really the key. [00:24:35] Adam Huss: Right, right, [00:24:36] Craig Macmillan: And for, your own wine making. Are you making wine from hybrids for yourself? [00:24:40] Adam Huss: Not yet just 'cause there are, there just aren't any in California very much, you know, I mean, it's like little patches here and little patches there. And the people that have them are using them for themself, you know, for their own growing. They've grown them specifically you know, Camus has planted some of these Andy Walker hybrids along their riparian corridors to prevent Pierce's disease. [00:24:58] Those varieties specifically are being used. I don't know if they're blending those in. With like their cab or whatever. I honestly think they could, but I don't know if they are. They're probably, I dunno what they're doing with them, but I do grow them here in Los Angeles and I'm, but they're, you know, it's like I'm trying out a bunch of different things, partly just to see how they do, because, you know, they haven't been grown here. [00:25:21] They were developed for colder, wetter climates and so, you know what, how will they grow here in Los Angeles? There's a lot of unanswered questions for some of these. [00:25:30] Craig Macmillan: You and I were chatting before the interview and you have a, a new project that you're very. Excited about tell us a little bit about that, because I thought that was pretty cool. [00:25:39] Adam Huss: Yeah. Thanks. So this past summer, my wife and I finalized the acquisition of this farm in upstate New York that I'm going to develop into a. Married Vine Vida Forestry Demonstration and Research Project. And, and married vines, essentially vines growing with living trees. [00:26:02] But the best way to think about it is if you know the three Sisters of Agriculture, the corn, beans and squash idea, where you plant these. This guild of, of a Polyculture guild, and they have these symbiotic stacking benefits and productivity. This is what a married vine polyculture is for perennial agriculture. And so I don't just see it as vine and tree, but also vine and tree, and then a ground cover and or small shrubs or things like that that are also perennials planted in a guild together to create these stacking benefits and productivity. [00:26:35] Multiple productivity layers as well as making it a grable system because the vines will be up in trees and and we're gonna call it the Beyond Organic Wine Forest Farm. [00:26:47] Craig Macmillan: So gimme some more detail on this. So like, what are the other plants that are in the forest and how are the vines, what's the spacing like? How, how many trees per vine or vine per tree? [00:27:01] How is the vine trellis? Um, I just, I'm really curious about this idea because this goes back to very, very ancient times. [00:27:09] Adam Huss: Yes. Yeah, yeah, [00:27:09] Craig Macmillan: Uh, that I've read about. I've never seen evidence of it, but I have been told that going back to like Roman times, they would plant grapevines, interplant with things like olives, [00:27:18] Adam Huss: yeah, yeah. Yeah. And [00:27:20] Craig Macmillan: use the olive as a trails. [00:27:22] I mean, is this the, is this the same kind of concept? [00:27:24] Adam Huss: You can see some of this still in Italy. So even pre roam the Etruscan times is what the oldest versions of this that are still visible in Campania, just north of Napoli, I think is the largest married vine system that is still in production. And I think it's about, it might be about 34 hectares of this variety where they have elm trees. That are really tall, full sized elm trees. [00:27:51] And then between them they sort of have wires or ropes between the trees and the vines grow up like up 15 meters. Like it's crazy. Like the guys that harvest this, they have like specially designed ladders that are built for their stance so that they can like lock into these 18 meter ladders and be up there like with a little pulley and a bucket, and they're lowering grapes down from way up in the end. [00:28:14] And you get. So many cool things about that, you know, the, the ripeness and the PHS of the grapes change, the higher you go up in that system. , the thinking is they might have even been used to like. Just inhibit invading armies because , it's like a wall of vines and trees that create like almost a perimeter thing. [00:28:33] That that's also how they're being used in Portugal, they are sort of like if you have a little parcel of land, you use trees and vines to create like a living fence keep your domestic animals inside. And animals that might eat them outside and protect, you know, from theft and things like that. [00:28:51] Keep all your crops in a little clo, like a little controlled area. There are old systems where. They're more like feto systems where they were using maple trees and just pollarding them at, at about head height. And every year, every year or two, they would come in and clip off all the new growth and feed it to the livestock. [00:29:10] And meanwhile, the vines were festooned between the, the maple trees is like, you know, just like a garland of, of grapevine. So there's a lot of different things. And what I wanna do is trial several of them. One of the most. Interesting ones that I just saw in whales uses living willows, where you literally just stick a willow slip in the ground, bend it over to the next one that's about a meter and a half away and attach it. [00:29:35] And so you have these arched willow branches that grow once you stick 'em in the ground. They start growing roots and they create like a head high trellis, like a elevated trellis system, and you plant vines in them. And, and it literally looks just like. Like a row of grapevines that you would find here, except the, the trellis is alive and there's no wires and, and you prune the tree when you prune the vine in the winter, you know? [00:29:58] And Willow, I, I don't know if you know, but the, the other interesting thing about that is like willow has been used historically that the salicylic acid is known. Obviously that's aspirin and stuff like that. That's where we get, you know, one of our oldest like pain relievers and things like that. [00:30:12] But. It's used in biodynamic preps as well as an antifungal. And so there's some thought that like this system could be really beneficial to the vines growing with those. Specifically for that, like for antifungal properties or just creating a, you know, showering the vines with this, this salicylic acid thing that will help them grow and have health throughout the season without, with, again, reduced need for sprays of anything. [00:30:37] Craig Macmillan: Yeah, and that was why I brought it up is because there's the idea of working with the natural ecology of what's in the germ plasm of native plants. I. Mixing with an import plant. [00:30:51] And then there's the other way of looking at it and saying, well, what, what about recreating the conditions under which this plant that has evolved in the first place? And I, I just think that there's really fascinating concept. It's really intriguing to me. [00:31:05] yeah. And there's so many different ways you could do it, and that's why it's interested in what you're planning on doing, because there's obviously a lot of ways you could do it. [00:31:11] Adam Huss: Yeah, I wanna experiment with several. Like you said, the, the soil benefits are incredible potentials. And then when you're also thinking about what do I do besides just vines and trees, and I mean, the other thing is like. How does it make the wine taste? Like if you plant a vine with an apple tree or a, a black locust tree, or a honey locust tree, or a, or a mulberry tree, like, does, is the vine happier with one of those trees? [00:31:35] You know what I mean? Does it, does it, you know, and if it is, does that make the wine taste better at the end of the day? All these are really fun questions for me. That's why I'm really excited to do it. But also like what are the benefits in terms of, you know, the health of the vine, the health of the tree? [00:31:50] Do they are, is there symbiotic elements? It seems like they would, I, I think a lot about what kind of mycorrhizal connections and associations the trees have, because we vines have our Arbuscular connections. And so if you plant them with a tree that has similar connections, they might actually have a symbiotic benefit. [00:32:07] They might increase that soil network even further. And then if you're planting shrubs like blueberries or flowers, you know, perennial flowers or Forbes and things like that, that could either be grazed or could be gathered or could be another crop even for you, or it could be a protective thing. [00:32:22] There are things like indigo that you might plant because. Deer don't like it. So you might want that growing around the base of your vine tree thing while it's young, because it will prevent the deer from grazing down your baby vines and trees, you know? And so there's just a, a myriad ways of thinking about these guilds that you can do. [00:32:39] Obviously these are, I. Yeah, they're, they're different. If I was doing it in California, if I was in California, I would be thinking more about olives and pomegranates and figs and things like that, you know, like there's a lot less water for growing trees here, so depending on where you are, unless you're on the coast. [00:32:55] Craig Macmillan: Are you planning on using hybrids in your project? [00:32:59] Adam Huss: Yeah. I don't know how I would do it any other way. Yeah, it's, definitely a climate that. If you try to grow ra, like you're just asking for trouble. And, and just, you know, because of my approach is so ecological, like I will attempt to be as minimal inputs as possible is the other way I look at it. [00:33:20] You know, try to just imitate what's happening around to, to see what that landscape wants to do and then how it. Maintains its health and resilience and maybe, and, and I mean, my, my ideal is to spray not at all. But you know, with not a dogma about that. If I see an issue or if I think like I'm building up these pathogen loads in the vineyard, maybe I'll spray once a year, even if they seem like they're doing okay. [00:33:47] You know, I'm not like dogmatic about nose spray, but I, it's a, it's a fun ideal to reach for. And I, you know, I think potentially with. Some of the symbiotic benefits of these systems that could be achievable with with the right hybrids. You know, I mean, again, I don't wanna generalize about hybrids because you have the Andy Walker hybrids on the one end, which you have to treat just like vinifira in terms of the spray program. [00:34:10] And then on the other hand, you have something like Petite Pearl or Norton, which is like in many cases is almost like a bulletproof. Grape, you know, and in California specifically, it would be like insanely. And then you have things right down the middle. Things like tranet that you know, is basically like, I could blind taste you on Tranet and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference between it and gewurztraminer . [00:34:31] But it's more cold, hearty, it has a little more disease resistance. Gives you a just a little bit, a little bit more of a benefit while still getting flavors that are familiar to you. If you like those flavors. [00:34:43] Craig Macmillan: Is there one thing that you would tell growers on this topic? One takeaway. [00:34:48] Adam Huss: Great question. I think give hybrids the same allowance that you give Vinifera. I. We all know there's a huge diversity of Vin Nira from Petite Ough to Riesling. And not everyone is right for every wine drinker and not all of them per perform the same in the vineyard. And, and you know, and we tolerate a lot of. [00:35:12] Frailty and a lot of feebleness in our veneer vines. We, we do a lot of care. We do a lot of like, you know, handholding for our veneer vines when necessary. If we extended the same courtesy to hybrids in terms of understanding and willingness to work with them. I think like that would just go a really long way too. [00:35:33] And I think we'd be surprised to find , they're a lot less handholding than, than Venire generally speaking. I. But also just try some. I think a lot of the prejudice comes from just not being exposed to them right now. You know, if you, if you think, if you're thinking negative thoughts about hybrids, get out there and drink some, you probably just haven't had enough yet. [00:35:51] And if you don't like the first one, you know, how many bad Cabernets have you had? I mean, if, if I had stopped drinking vinifira, I [00:35:59] Craig Macmillan: Yeah, that's, that's a really good point. If I judged every wine by the first wine that I tasted, that's probably not a very, [00:36:06] Adam Huss: right. [00:36:07] Craig Macmillan: good education there, [00:36:08] Adam Huss: Prevented me from exploring further, I would've missed out on some of the more profound taste experiences of my life if I'd let that, you know, guide my, you know, my thinking about it. So yeah, I think it's like anything with prejudice, once you get beyond it, it kind of, you see how silly it is, man. [00:36:25] It's, it's like so freeing and, and there's a whole world to explore out there. And like I said, I really think they're the future. Like if we wanna have a future, . We can only cling to the past for so long until it just becomes untenable. [00:36:38] Craig Macmillan: Right. Where can people find out more about you? [00:36:42] Adam Huss: So beyondorganicwine.com is the, the website for me. The email associate with that is connect@organicwinepodcast.com. [00:36:53] Craig Macmillan: Our guest today has been Adam Huss. He is the host of the Beyond Organic Podcast and is the co-owner of Centralas Wines in Los Angeles. [00:37:01] Thank you so much. This has been a really fascinating conversation and I'd love to connect with you at some point, talk more about. Out this, thanks for being on the podcast [00:37:08] Adam Huss: Thank you so much, Craig. Appreciate it. [00:37:13] Beth Vukmanic: Thank you for listening. Today's podcast was brought to you by VineQuest. A Viticultural consulting firm based in Paso Robles, California, offering expert services in sustainable farming, vineyard development, and pest management. With over 30 years of experience, they provide tailored solutions to enhance vineyard productivity and sustainability for wineries and agribusinesses across California. [00:37:38] Make sure you check out the show notes for links to Adam. His wine, brand, Centralis plus sustainable wine growing podcast episodes on this topic, 135 Cold hardiness of grapes 217. Combating climate chaos with adaptive wine, grape varieties, and 227. Andy Walker's Pierce's Disease resistant grapes are a success at Ojai Vineyard. [00:38:04] If you liked the show, do us a big favor by sharing it with a friend, subscribing and leaving us a review. You can find all of the podcasts at vineyardteam.org/podcast and you can reach us at podcast@vineyardteam.org. [00:38:19] Until next time, this is Sustainable Wine Growing with Vineyard Team.   Nearly perfect transcription by Descript

Send us a textIt's sometimes funny when I can't help but make connections between the ordinary stuff of life and the valuable lessons of life. This is yet another example I though about as I pruned my overgrown grape vine.   I think it might be a helpful reminder, especially if you feel stuck making a decision or pivot right now.  So, grab a beverage, have a seat at my table, and let's chat on this episode of the Pivot to Prosper podcast.PS...don't forget to grab yourself a Towardations Flash Card Deck. These $5 purchases support this podcast. Link below.Pivot to Prosper Individual Coaching-In this powerful 6-week coaching program, you and I will work one-on-one to not only tackle you current pivot need, but I will also teach you a framework and methodology that has served many of my clients, as well as myself, in our pivots. Isn't it time to get unstuck and start pivoting to your next?Click Here to learn more and apply.

In today's episode, host Kendra Winchester talks to debut authors Monic Ductan and Laura Leigh Morris.Things MentionedDebutifulBooks MentionedDaughters of Muscadine by Monic DuctanThe Stone Catchers by Laura Leigh MorrisMama Said by Kristen GentryDeep Ruts by Julie Rae PowersThe Sound of Holding Your Breath by Natalie SypoltHorsepower by Joy PriestThe Prettiest Star by Carter SickelsNo Son of Mine by Jonathan CorcoranAnother Appalachia by Neema AvashiaDirt Songs by Karie Hunter-SeymourGuest InfoMonic Ductan: Website | Instagram | XLaura Leigh Morris: Website | X | Instagram---Show Your Love for Read Appalachia! You can support Read Appalachia by heading over to our merch store, tipping us over on Ko-fi, or by sharing the podcast with a friend! For more ways to support the show, head over to our Support page. Follow Read Appalachia Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | TikTok ContactFor feedback or to just say “hi,” you can reach us at readappalachia[at]gmail.comMusic by Olexy from Pixabay

Our guests are Rick Riddle of the Winery at Seven Springs Farm, and JD Dalton, Vineyard Manager of Tsali Notch Vineyard, in Monroe County, TN. They will let us know of the history, taste, and the nutritional properties of this ingegenous grape to the South East and both Rick Riddle and JD Dalton will both speak on the topic of Muscadine wine.

Let's get to know a native American wine grape Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the special episode of the podcast, Kendra Winchester is joined by Adam Vitcavage, the founder of Debutiful.Books MentionedHousemates by Emma Copley EisenbergDaughters of Muscadine by Monic DuctanHijab Butch Blues by Lamya HTemple Folk by Aaliyah BilalGood Women by Halle HillMouth by Puloma GhoshThere is a Rio Grande in Heaven by Ruben Reyes JrCompany by Shannon SandersEvery Drop is a Man's Nightmare by Megan Kamalei KakimotoGUEST INFODebutiful: Website | Podcast| Instagram | X | FacebookAdam Vitcavage: X  | Instagram---Show Your Love for Read Appalachia! You can support Read Appalachia by heading over to our merch store, tipping us over on Ko-fi, or by sharing the podcast with a friend! For more ways to support the show, head over to our Support page. Follow Read Appalachia Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | TikTok ContactFor feedback or to just say “hi,” you can reach us at readappalachia[at]gmail.comMusic by Olexy from Pixabay

Peter, Perry and Alyssa of Spinning wheels wine rejoin John to talk about the wine Overton window, the collapse of consensus, air out sulfur disagreements, and discuss conspiracy theories. A great episode to Muscadine pill someone, and I know we all need that. Lord knows they are all on Instagram, bug them to sell you wine.  //// LIST////Claire Naudin, Bourgogne Aligote, 'Clou 34,' 2021//Julian Haart, Mosel Kabinett Riesling, 'J.J.' 2023//Pleb Wines, North Carolina Muscadine, 'Noble Carlos,' 2021//Spinning Wheel Wines, Virginia Muscadine, 'Wolf Sisters,' 2023 ////Support the Show.

Join us as we dive into the captivating story of Nadia Hetzel, a winemaker with a rich tapestry of experiences from Germany to the United States. From her beginnings as she studied winemaking in Germany to her position as winemaker at  Grovedale Winery in Pennsylvania, Nadia's narrative is a testament to passion, perseverance, and the artistry of winemaking.  Get ready to be transported into the world of vineyards, hybrids, and the intricate dance of flavors as we explore Nadia's remarkable adventure in the world of wine. In this episode you will be able to:  Learn about the challenges and rewards of working with different grape varieties, including non-self-pollinating ones like St. Pepin. Discover the impact of a popular wine called "Shit Show" at Nadia's winery and how it gained fame after a celebrity chef's endorsement. Find out why Nadia would choose Austria as her dream winemaking destination and her love for the wines from the Burgenland region. Gain tips into the evolving wine industry trends, including the shift towards drier wines and the influence of famous personalities on wine sales. Explore the team-oriented and supportive atmosphere at Nadia's winery, emphasizing the importance of collaboration in winemaking. Nadia Hetzel is a passionate winemaker with a diverse background that spans across the United States and Germany. With a strong foundation in winemaking from Geisenheim University, Nadia brings a unique perspective to her role as the winemaker at Grovedale Winery in Pennsylvania. Her experience working with a variety of grape varieties, including hybrids and traditional grape varieties, showcases her versatility and dedication to the craft. Her commitment to producing high-quality wines is evident in her work with unique grape varieties like St. Pepin and the newly planted Clarion. Nadia's collaborative approach to winemaking is reflected in her team-oriented work environment at the winery, where everyone pitches in to create exceptional wines. Her passion for the industry and willingness to embrace challenges, such as changing perceptions of Muscadine wines, highlight her innovative spirit and determination. Nadia's aspiration to explore new terroirs and grape varieties underscores her adventurous and forward-thinking approach to winemaking. As a dedicated winemaker with a deep appreciation for the art and science of winemaking, Nadia's story in the wine industry continues to inspire those around her. Contact Nadia Hetzel here:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nadia-hetzel-607846ba/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nadia.hetzel.3 Website: https://grovedalewinery.com/

Step into the enchanting world of Southern winemaking with host David Zelski as he uncorks the rich history and vibrant flavors of muscadine wine, Georgia's hidden gem. From the lush vineyards of Nashville to the bustling tasting room along I-75, discover the passion and dedication behind each bottle of muscadine wine. Meet the farmers, vintners, and storytellers who are preserving Georgia's agricultural heritage while crafting award-winning wines. Whether you're a wine connoisseur or an adventurous spirit, this podcast invites you to savor the taste of the South and raise a glass to the magic of Muscadine wine. 

We're celebrating North Carolina Wine Month with an episode featuring Ashley Nicholas from Hinnant Family Vineyards in Pine Level, NC! Hinnant Family Vineyards started in 1972 as contract grape growers specifically for the muscadine varieties. After several years of growing fruit, they transitioned into the you-pick and fresh market industry. It was only natural thatContinue reading →

Florida is well known for its citrus groves, but the next superfood sensation could be found right here in the Sunshine state. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Florida is well known for its citrus groves, but the next superfood sensation could be found right here in the Sunshine state. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vitis rotundifolia, commonly known as muscadine, is species of grape native to the southeastern United States.

Muscadine shows great promise in improving aging skin. Show 1149 AUG 2023 Researchers measured participants' skin conditions and markers of inflammation and oxidative stress at the start of the study and at the end of each six-week period. They found that drinking muscadine wine significantly improved skin elasticity (a loss of elasticity is what causes skin to sag more as we age). In addition, the wine was associated with a decrease in water loss at the skin surface, a measurement that indicates the skin is providing a more effective barrier against damage. #skin #skinhealth #skinage (P23-018-23) Dealcoholized Muscadine Wine Improved Skin Health, Reduced Oxidative Stress and Inflammation in Women in a Randomized Controlled Trial Skin, muscadine, skin elasticity, viscoelasticity, anti wrinkle, skin moisture, polyphenols, inflammation. Oxidative stress, anti aging, youthing, healthy skin, --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ralph-turchiano/support

Muscadine shows great promise in improving aging skin. Show 1149 AUG 2023 Researchers measured participants' skin conditions and markers of inflammation and oxidative stress at the start of the study and at the end of each six-week period. They found that drinking muscadine wine significantly improved skin elasticity (a loss of elasticity is what causes skin to sag more as we age). In addition, the wine was associated with a decrease in water loss at the skin surface, a measurement that indicates the skin is providing a more effective barrier against damage. #skin #skinhealth #skinage (P23-018-23) Dealcoholized Muscadine Wine Improved Skin Health, Reduced Oxidative Stress and Inflammation in Women in a Randomized Controlled Trial Skin, muscadine, skin elasticity, viscoelasticity, anti wrinkle, skin moisture, polyphenols, inflammation. Oxidative stress, anti aging, youthing, healthy skin, --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ralph-turchiano/support

We look at a psoriasis molecule that may also cause aging, how brands have widely adopted Dermatologist recommended ingredients, and whether that is actually a good thing. Also, the skin benefits from muscadine wine, even alcohol-free, and the trend of LED masks and why they have staying power. Disclaimer: This podcast is not intended to provide diagnosis, treatment, or medical advice. Content provided in this podcast is for educational purposes only. Please consult with a physician regarding any health-related diagnosis or treatment.

The muscadine grape is native to the Southeastern United States, and often described as a “super fruit” thanks to its high levels of polyphenols and ellagic acid. Now, new research reveals that wine produced with muscadine grapes may also help improve aging skin.

Muscadine and Scuppernong grapes!  The best tasting grapes most people have never tried, and I don't know why!  There are both red and white/bronze varieties. They run a short season here in Florida so I get them when I can!  I believe, much like my show…an acquired taste! The Music Authority Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat…heard daily on Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Mixcloud, Player FM, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes!  Follow the show on TWITTER JimPrell@TMusicAuthority!  Please, are you listening? Please, are you sharing the podcast?  Please, has a podcast mention been placed into your social media?  How does and can one listen in? Let me list the ways...*Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/   The Music Authority Podcast!  Special Recorded Network Shows, too!  Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT!  *The Sole Of Indie  https://soleofindie.rocks/  Monday Through Friday 6-7PM EST!July 19, 2023, Wednesday, page two…Orbis 2.0 - Selling The VanThe Cocktail Slippers - Good Love (Wicked Cool Records)KEELEY - Arrive AliveChristopher Thomas- Lemon Cream PieRooney - If It Were Up To Me [Rooney]The Heartdrops - 01 Lesson Learned [East Side Drive] (Rum Bar Records)Badass Mother Fuzzers - 152  - No, No, No [Ice Creams & Daydreams] (Ice Cream Man Power Pop and More)@Kitty May - It's ImpossibleSkinny Lister - 12 Alister McAllister [The Story Is...]@Summon Luke ft. @Lucy Oaks - Without YouEmperor of Ice Cream - 07 Sunflower [William]JEAN CABBIE & THE SECRET ADMIRER SOCIETY - Paper DollThe Well Wishers - 05 Love Lies Last [Comes And Goes]Tommy Sistak - Take Me AlongPsychotic Youth - 04 - Take Him For A Ride [New Wonders 1996-2021] (koolkatmusik.com)FAZ WALTZ - 04 She's Mine [On The Ball]65MPH - The Queen of LiesFallon Cush - 06 Tempo Over Time [Stranger Things Have Happened]

HEALTH NEWS   ·         New study using human fibroid cells supports use of green tea compound as treatment for uterine fibroids ·         TMG supplementation associated with improved testosterone levels, exercise performance ·         Research shows even moderate levels of physical activity can protect against depression among older adults ·         Metal pollution in everything we eat and breathe triggering strokes and heart attacks ·         Muscadine grape seed oil may help reduce obesity ·         Student of Neuroscience Shows How Meditation may Vanquish Mental Disorders

Help produce Basic Folk by contributing at https://basicfolk.com/donate/Amy Ray is best known for being one half of Indigo Girls with Emily Sailers, a band that's been going strong since the late 80's. She's also known for her activism and love for all types of music. On her latest solo album, If It All Goes South, Amy's bringing us songs of comfort and healing. Recorded live to tape in Nashville, this album features an incredible lineup of guests like Brandi Carlile, I'm With Her, Allison Russell, Phil Cook and Alison Brown. She's confronting racism, homophobia, religion and mortality in her songs and we go deep into those topics.Aside from exploring gender identity and being comfortable in your own body, I had an agenda in our interview. I've talked about this a little on the podcast, but recently our dog Willis suddenly and unexpectedly died. Amy's new album features the song “Muscadine,” which was written when her oldest dog passed away. The song's about “learning to love and receive love in the purest way, and to not be picky about life, but to stay the course with curiosity and gratitude.” I was grateful for Amy's words of wisdom about the loss of a dog and am happy to share them with you. Actually, Amy's full of wisdom and is always so open to whatever questions come her way. Enjoy this conversation with a very very good person.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Muscadine grapes have a long history growing the southeast and North Carolina. For everything from whole grapes, health supplements and wine the demand for this thick-skinned product is constantly growing. We chat with Dr. Hoffman to learn more about this special grape, and why everyone is buzzing about it

On the 6-year anniversary of the release of his award-winning tome "American Wino: A Tale of Reds, Whites and One Man's Blues," Dan takes a stroll down memory lane. In addition to offering up everything you could ever want or need to know about Muscadine wine, he reads an excerpt from the book, reveals its origin and drops a few hints about a potential upcoming film adaptation.

It's easy to see why Matt has been a long time friend of Raised Rowdy. He took a passion for country music and radio, put the pedal to the floor and made his own way in Nashville. On top of serving as Tour Manager for Trey Lewis (he's another descendent of the Muscadine merch mafia), […]

This week the guys bring on country duo Muscadine Bloodline, who are big Auburn fans so of course it kicks off with sports, specifically basketball. The day this was taped, was a few hours before Arkansas upset #1 Auburn!   The Muscadine boys tell a funny story about Kip Moore saying he can beat Justin in basketball, to which Justin disagrees. They wrap up the rest of the show with sharing their great come-up story, and how they've remained independent and only focus on what they can control.   The Justin Moore Podcast is sponsored by: Bobcat Company. This episode is brought to you by Wrangler, Bangtail Whiskey and This Little Piggy.   Spread the word! #JustinMoorePodcast _________ Listen to Justin's sports radio show Morning Mayhem on The Buzz. All episodes are available to watch on YouTube. Also follow along on social media for teasers and updates throughout the week.   The Justin Moore Podcast on Instagram   Follow Justin: On Tour Instagram Twitter Facebook Spotify Apple Music   Follow JR the Handler and get some merch: Instagram Twitter www.jrthehandler.com Produced by: Cody Villalobos  Rafter V Ranch    

Travelogue Series: I start a multi-episode travelogue exposition in 2022, by visiting North Carolina and the Yadkin Valley. In this multi-part series on North Carolina, we’ll explore the Yadkin Valley, meet with producers, and feature several interviews for the YouTube portion of the show with those producers. We will feature Finger Lakes producers in between, and ultimately also explore The Hill Country in Texas, and the wine-growing regions of Idaho. Please excuse errors in the text, this was dictated and gently edited.North CarolinaWhen I moved to the Finger Lakes a decade ago, I was hungry to find as much information as possible about the region. I wanted to find books magazine articles, podcasts, and nearly anything that would shed light on the history of the region that I was moving to. At that time, there really weren’t very many publications. At the very least, I couldn’t seem to find a short history of how the finger Lakes and become one of the most discussed emerging regions in the United States. There was of course the wonderful book, Summer in a Glass, by Evan Dawson, in which he follows a number of different winemakers through the growing season 2009 in the Finger Lakes. In the absence of such a book, I set out to write one of my own, with much more of an eye towards content marketing for our new winery, and dug into all of the old journals, periodicals, and textbooks on American wine I could find. I published A Sense of Place in 2014, and have been able to use it as a great tool to help educate customers and even tasting room associates. I wasn’t able to find anything quite like that on North Carolina, and realized a lot of the lessons I would learn would have to be done on the ground.The Yadkin Valley is vast, covering more than 1,300,000 acres. With such a large span of land, I knew that there was going to have to be variation in the topography, and even the climate to a certain extent, within the AVA. I was a bit surprised flying from my layover in Atlanta into Greensboro, to see a dusting of snow covering the ground. For the cold climate winemaker, I just assumed that North Carolina would be significantly warmer than the finger Lakes I had left behind. I was surprised at the temperature spread on the ground that morning was only about 10°, with a balmy 31°F when I landed. Setting out from the airport, and passing through Winston Salem, more than anything else I just wanted to get a feel for the lay of the land. Whenever I arrive in a new place, in order to get my bearings in a sense for what the place looks and feels like, I’d like to just go for a drive. It gives me a better understanding of where the towns are that get referenced in conversation, what some of the local historical landmarks are, and even where the politics of a place takes place. Knowing that I was in the Yadkin Valley, and heading west from Winston Salem towards Yadkin County, and the Yadkin River, I figured why not plug Yadkinville into my GPS.I had broken up my trip into visiting the southern portion of the EVA for the first day and a half, and the northern portion of the AVA on the second and third days. Highway 218 seems to cut the AVA in half so it was a good working point to begin to discover some of the different wineries I had a particular interest in tasty.To choose just a few wineries in an emerging wine region is an extraordinarily difficult job. In a sense it’s kind of a gamble, you rely on reputation, customer reviews, and references from people who are much more expertise in the region and then yourself, but so much of wine still comes down to personal taste, and aesthetics. What I had decided I wanted to do, in pursuing a slightly deeper understanding of the AVA, was to look at oneThat was an anchor in terms of the history of the region, to look at a winery that was relatively new, but small and focused on extraordinary quality, and to look at one of the biggest producers in the AVA with an extraordinary offering of a variety of different ones. I figured I would have a chance to taste several other wineries along the way and include them in this report.Because in so many ways this was a last minute trip many of the people I reached out to likely hadn’t even opened their inbox by the time I was heading out of town. It was the period just after New Year’s, and often times it’s pretty slow start in the new year in the wine industry. I had however, gotten replies from Shelton, that winery that I referenced as a pioneer in the AVA, and really one of the reasons why there is a Yadkin Valley a View today. I had received word back from Childress, the the winery name and founded by Richard Childress, of NASCAR fame. North Carolina is NASCAR country, and Richard Childress has built one of the largest brands, in fact one of the few I had heard of before traveling to North Carolina, while making wine in New York. I also received word from Diana Jones, of Jones Von Drehle, one of the wineries at the northern end of the AVA, and one that had come extremely highly recommended.  Some of the wineries on my shortlist included Ray Lyn, Raffaldino, Shadow Springs, and a handful of others. I guess from the perspective of somebody who is trying to discover a new wine region, one of my only frustrations was not having more direct links to members of winery staff where I could email or contact them directly. I realize this is a problem on my own website, and after experiencing this, something I’ll be change. Sometimes the ease of having an inbox that serves as a catch-all becomes a crutch for us small business owners, but as someone who is seeking some very specific answers to some very specific questions, it can make sense to ensure that those individuals with deeper questions can reach winemakers directly.In any event, I arrived in Yadkinville, crossing the Yadkin River, and decided to head to town where I could pick up some bottled water and a couple snacks and see what the town offered. Yadkinville is a small town, there doesn’t seem to be much of a culinary scene, and it really is just the county seat. It’s where you go to get permits, and like we have your county planning board meetings. There wasn’t much by way of a presence of wine in the town, but I did notice when I stopped in to the local grocery store, Food Lion, and realized this was a state that sells wine in grocery stores, and they had a small selection of some of the local producers, with Childress being one of them. The wines on offer were very basic, emphasizing the muscadine production of sweet wines from local producers, but there were a few dry reds and whites included on the shelf. Since Yadkinville marked in the center of the AVA, and it was getting to be towards the middle of the afternoon, I figured I would enter wineries into my GPS to see if any were open, and get back on the road. Leaving the main highway I drove beautiful winding roads and very gentle hills in what was largely agricultural countryside. I drove by a winery called Bradford Hills, which was a very small tasting room and an out-building, a small but well manicured vineyard, and it look like a fantastic place to visit on a beautiful summer day. It didn’t look like it would be open until after my flight was departing on Friday, and I quickly realized that I likely would not have a chance to taste many of the wineries that I hadn’t made contact with, during the middle of the week. This meant that a lot of the small producers, wineries about my own winery’s size and smaller, would have to wait for another trip.After taking some pictures I set back out onto the road, looking at my GPS and seeing what wineries I would be passing on my way to Lexington, where Childress is located and where my hotel room was booked. I noticed that RayLyn could be reached with a small detour. From my research it was a winery that I really wanted to taste at, and I noticed they were open, so I made my way. Even though it is winter, there’s still more sun and warmth then we get in the finger Lakes. The grass was still green, though the trees were bare, and the bare trees opened up the countryside even more so that you could see the hills and buildings, that were off in the distance. Making my way from Bradford Hill winery, the landscape became less dramatic, slightly flatter, but retaining the same intrinsic quality. Passing fields that had recently been ploughed, the deep tones of brick and garnet that marked the clay that is found all throughout this region, was everywhere. My GPS led me to RaeLyn Vineyards, and upon entering I was impressed. The site was easily accessible from many of the main highways, and from that perspective, it seems to be ideally situated to attract a steady flow of customers. One of the things I’ve learned as a producer, especially one in an emerging region, is how important it is to be able to attract customers in as convenient of a location as possible. When so much of your business depends on people knocking on that cellar door, you want that door to be easily accessible. RayLyn was marked with a beautiful gate as an entrance, and a a gentle drive through the vineyards towards the tasting room in winery. I passed a small new planting of strawberries and several young rows of blueberries. I particularly like when wine wineries are able to integrate other forms of agriculture into their farms. Whether they are used for any sort of wine production, I think it encapsulates this idea of our responsibility to the soil and to the earth. It also reminds us of the other forms of agriculture that we can be excited about. I’ve begun integrating more produce at our winery, planting cucumbers and tomatoes, peppers and squash, and hope to grow this out in the future.Approaching the parking lot at Ray Lynn, there’s a very nice outdoor tent that they seem to be able to use for banquets or weddings, and likely overflow for the tasting room if the weather is inclement. At this point in the afternoon the temperature had risen to about 41°, but with that southern sun shining bright, the fresh air combined with the warmth felt wonderful on my skin. And it wasn’t just me, there were a couple folks sitting out enjoying the day on some picnic tables outside the tasting room with a glass of wine. They were polite and smiled and gave me a small raise of the glass as I walked by. I entered the tasting room was read it immediately. People in North Carolina are friendly. I spoke with the tasting room staff, explained I was a winemaker and operated podcast, and had wanted to feature RayLyn on the shelf. This was one of the emails that had gotten lost in my expedited travel plan, and so without an appointment I took a gamble. It was a great choice. The tasting room staff was excited, informed me that her husband was from Watkins Glen, and eagerly brought up the names of some of my favorite producers in the Finger Lakes, folks that they have close personal relationships with. Being from Watkins Glen, of course the Stamp family at Lakewood, received some of the highest praise. She offered to taste me through the portfolio and I happily agreed, this would be my first taste of North Carolina wine In North Carolina.This winery offers a full suite of different wines, emphasizing dry veneer for a red and white wines, they also offer a beautiful Charmat style rosé, of course some of the sweet wines that have built this region made from the Muscadine grapes, and canned wine as well. We worked our way through the Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, and the dry rosé. Review my notes to include some of the specifics about each wine here. Fortunately, the tasting room also had available detailed notes on the chemistry of the wines, the harvest date, and the components that were in most of the blinds. It’s interesting in the finger Lakes, our growing season doesn’t really kick off until May, and that means that most varietals won’t begin harvest until September. Of course there are some hybrid grapes that are harvested much sooner, but those don’t tend to be any of the bridals that I work with. With harvest starting in September, there have been vintages where we are harvesting all the way through early November, and that doesn’t include wines that we are making as light harvest wines, where we can be harvesting all the way to Thanksgiving, or ice wines which may be picked in January or February of the next year. It seems to me, that much of harvest will begin in August here in North Carolina and be ramping up by the end of September. It also struck me that that works very well for those people who enjoy wine country visits in October, during the fall when the air begins to cool and the excitement of all the dressings of fall are in the air. As a wine maker in the finger Lakes, Columbus Day marks our busiest weekend of the year. It also marks one of those weekends where we are fully in mashed in all of the seller activities, and that means I rarely get a chance to spend time with customers during harvest. It would be great to have the opportunity to spend more time as a wine maker with customers just as harvest is wrapping up and tourism is peeking. Though I love both red and white wines, my desert island wine will generally consist of a white. For me white wines offer a transparency into Vineyard practice and seller practice that edge out reds. Consequently I spend a lot more time thinking about white wine, I spend a whole lot more time making white wine in the finger Lakes, and I find that I drink or white wine. All of the whites offered at RayLyn were wonderful, some with a small component of Muscat Canelli, which added some wonderful aromatics.  Add a little bit of the history from the website of RaeLyn here. While tasting Rachel, one of the owners and daughter of the founder, and the ray of RaeLyn stop by to say hi. She made sure that I was enjoying my tasting, and trying to help me make contact with Steve, their winemaker. He had been in Asheville that day and wouldn’t be arriving until later in the week. She gave me his email address and I hope to have him on in the future in a long distance long-form interview. From everything I’ve heard, he’s one of these towering pioneering figures in the Yadkin Valley and someone who is clearly taking their wines to great heights. The Reds were equally as compelling as the whites, and in someways perhaps even more so. You can get the sense when you’re at a winery, what is the family who makes these wines prefer to drink, and I did get that sense here. One of the bottlings, had what I assumed with some modern art on it, but upon looking closer and receiving the explanation understood That it was actually the Doppler radar of a hurricane. Yes one of my questions has been immediately answered, hurricanes can be a factor here in the Yadkin Valley, though they are nowhere near the factor that people who live closer to the coast have to deal with.  Discuss this wine.After a really wonderful visit at RaeLyn, I ordered a case of wine, had it shipped back to our winery in New York, and set off for Lexington. Again with no familiarity of any of these towns or cities, I chose Lexington because it is the closest town to Childress vineyards. Lexington is nestled in the far south eastern portion of the AVA and most of the city isn’t included in the AVA itself. The town itself is it fairly nice downtown area, and it does feel like there is a small foodie movement emerging, with some local cafés and a Piedmont cheese shop. But in many ways it remains in agricultural and industrial, southern town that I can picture with time and investment has the potential to grow itself into a hub of Wine and food centrality.Just outside the fenced in property for Childress Vineyards was the Holiday Inn and adjoining plaza.  There weren’t really any shops in the small but nice strip mall that is next to the Holiday Inn, but it is all designed in a very similar fashion to Childress itself. The hotel has one side that looks out at the vineyards which I imagine would be a wonderful way to wake up. I was booked on the highway facing side, but the room is quiet and clean and a nice place to eat my takeout Mexican dinner for the night.So much of my philosophy is based on the specifics and the importance of place, and tied up with that philosophy is the notion that small is often better. Most of the time, most of the restaurant and dining options I observed, or chains that work cute in to specializing in any notion of local cuisine. Out here it wasn’t even real common to find a lot of barbecue joints, which I half expected to see almost everywhere. Again maybe I wasn’t looking in the right places, but I do have the sense that restaurant and food entrepreneurs will likely have a huge market to tap into if that’s the direction they would like to go in partnering with this growing wine country.My appointment with Mark Friszolowski was at nine the next morning, and so after getting a good nights sleep and waking up fairly early, I headed over to Childress Vineyards. I was said to meet him in the lobby and as a military man, who retired as a colonel and between his active and reserve duty spent 37 years in the army, I knew that on time was to be 10 minutes early. Driving into Childress which was literally just around the corner from the parking lot of the hotel in through the gates, you pass through a wonderfully manicured vineyard.  The varietals are all identified by signs with the trademark Richard Childress logo, and varietals like Maulbeck and Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, and multiple Ciano I’ll stand out. There were signs marking planned plantings of Chardonnay and Pinot noir, which I’m particularly interested to see how they do with the North Carolina heat. The tasting room and winery set a top of hill which can be seen from almost any point of the drive into the wineries grounds. It is a beautiful Modern take with an Italian 18. It is the sort of Tuscany inspired building but you’ll find Americans like to build. It sets the tone for the romantic visions that we have of European, and especially Italian, winemaking culture. I know that there are some people who don’t like this form of architecture, they don’t like the sense that it calls out and emotive response that she would find somewhere else in the world but with modern building materials and aesthetics. I’ll be honest, I liked it. I think that they put a lot of effort into creating a beautiful building and grounds with a nice setting that makes you feel like that The winery you’re entering is making some special wines, they put in a lot of effort to set a tone and that tone carries through from the heat and painted murals on the wall of scenes of grape harvest, to the indoor fountain, to the seated tasting room with string lights and doors. This is not the Olive Garden experience, this is something much nicer and with such warm staff, more personal too. The entire tasting room experience was wonderful, The seller tour, The tour of the grounds in the bonded warehouse, explanations on infrastructure projects, a peek inside the restaurant and banquet facility, were all greatly appreciated. Mark was a wonderful host, who poured some great wines. We focused on their vinifera wines,tasting Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay, as well as Montepulciano, and some red blends. Mark’s personal history, from his time helping out at Dry Creek Vineyards in California, managing operations at Pindar on Long Island, and ultimately moving to North Carolina to help found Childress. Mark is one of the first winemakers in the country to collaborate on creating the Meritage Alliance, and therefore creating Bordeaux based blends.  The specific vintage of Meritage we tried, the 2015, is a well aged current release. It carried many of the things I love about older Bordeaux, the hints of cedar, the forest floor. It was it both times bolder than what you’ll find in many offerings in the Finger Lakes, but leaner than what you would find in California. And struck a nice middle ground, and was a sort of sweet spot of bold but not overly dramatic red blends that I personally like, and that I think complement food quite well. I’ll be spending an entire feature in an episode with Mark on Childress, so for now we’re going to continue with our travelogue and look at the rest of us the experience here in the Yadkin Valley._____ In crafting the short travel log, I wanted to make sure that it wasn’t strictly about wine. Most of the time when we travel, there are other things on our quotation mark to do quotation mark list. There are a couple of really interesting tourist activities here in the Yadkin Valley, but deal both with history, pop-culture, and the wonderful natural surroundings. Mark was so generous with his time, but I found myself leaving the winery later than I had expected. I certainly wasn’t disappointed and I had made sure to leave a good window of time to spend at this landmark property. I figured I would spend the rest of the afternoon exploring some of those other offerings, and found my way to highway, and I headed up for the town of Mount Airy.Mount Airy sits on the North Carolina Virginia border. It is like so many other hill and mountain towns in America, a quintessential snapshot of life in both modern and past American societies. Mountains and hills can I think we people to be a bit more hearty sometimes a bit tougher but always genuinely very nice. The town itself is built around its historic Main Street. And coming in to Mount airy do you understand what that history is all about.  The name of the highway even changes and becomes the Andy Griffith Parkway, and that of course is named after the famous television show an actor that for seven seasons captured the aspirational qualities of American small-town life. With its classic whistling introduction, it’s sensitive skipping Stones and safety and security, of good old fashion morals and values and being raised in small-town life, Mount Airy was the inspiration for the Andy Griffith show fictional town of Mayberry. Mayberry is the corner stone upon which so much of the towns character now rests. You see signs for Aunt Bee’s café, you see the Mayberry antique shops, the Mayberry museum, ice cream shops meant to look like they were preserved from the 1930s, and a sense of pride that their town was once the basis for this dreamscape of Americana. Some of that dreamscape feels a little rough around the edges now, who knows if it was then if that’s what it’s always been, or if the changing times or loss of industrial base, of structural changes to our economy, and even the opioid epidemic that we face in this country, have added a touch of tarnish to the shine. In all, it’s a great place to be, a wonderful old historic town and I’m happy I made a detour.As you leave Mount Airy and head south on the highway back towards a more central location of the AVA you pass a geological wonder, an outcropping called Pine Mountain. It dominates the skyline and can be seen from many many miles away when you’re on top of hills. Driving past it, and without enough time to drive to the park and visit the mountain personally, I realize that this will be on the top of my list when I have a chance to return with my family and my children. I used to love walks through areas like this when I was a child and I can’t wait for Andrew And Audrey to have that experience with me. I found out, it isn’t the only fascinating geological wonder to explore, as there’s also Stone Mountain, which figured prominently in my second visit on my third day on the ground in the Yadkin Valley.For that evening I had made reservations in a small town called Elkin, or rather just outside of it, in the adjoining town of Jonesville. Jonesville is the classic sort of truckstop town, that offers some heavy industry, but largely consists of some gas stations, hotels, a Cracker Barrel, fast food restaurants, and a grocery store that serves the locals. It did have a Mexican restaurant, this one called Margaritas, which I took advantage of both nights of my stay in the Hampton Inn.Arriving at the hotel, it was a little older, but the staff was exceptionally accommodative, the room was perfectly clean, and the setting itself was quiet. When you were on the road there are very few other things that you actually need. Warm cookies were waiting for us as we checked in, and I unloaded my bags and all of our equipment in my room before I set out for the town to see what was available. Before I set my sights on dinner, I wanted to see Elkin itself. For my own personal aesthetic tastes, this portion of the AVA felt like it matched my desires more closely than the south eastern portion of the AVA. Elkin was quaint but beautiful. As the sun was coming down, the Yadkin River roared not too far away, the train tracks cross run adjacent to the main street, and the town itself seems well put together. Large murals adorn some of the older brick buildings, many featuring grapevines, and the town features a wonderfully restored old theater. Elkin felt nicer than Mount Airy in someways, not to denigrate Mount Airy at all, but it struck me that Elkin is the sort of town that could deal with in Oakville grocers type of concept, some interesting fine dining that features many of the local wineries strongest efforts, and some other cultural activities. Again it’s the off-season and perhaps there is that sort of activity that is going on that I’m simply not aware of, but I feel like the future for Elkin is bright. There aren’t a lot of accommodations right around downtown, but with all of the hotel options in Jonesville, Elkin will be able to maximize the heads in beds that is so important for wine country tourism. Interestingly Elkin and Jonesville, where you reach Jonesville by crossing the Yadkin River, are in different counties. I’m not sure if any of the development has anything to do with that, but in my own experience, especially when you’re dealing with the county and town level, so many of the decisions on what can happen and how well a town or region grows, are based on the local politics and the bureaucratic decisions that are made. I’d have to be there for a lot longer to know if any of this is in play.I picked up some carnitas and pollo asado street tacos, and headed back to my room for another great night sleep. The next morning I had appointments with two different wineries, Shelton Vineyards, and Johns Von Drehle.I woke up early the next morning, spent some time on my computer making sure that I had transferred all of my photos and videos, refreshing some of my notes from my previous day’s visit, and set out for Shelton Vineyards. Any of my initial skepticism‘s on the beauty of the countryside, how this wine region will grow and what its potential is, we’re set aside as I visited Shelton. Shelton is located in the town of Dobson.The exit from the highway for Shelton Vineyards also leads you to Surrey Community College. Surrey Community College was constantly a subject of discussion with most of the people in the wine industry that I met. It is a community college with a vineyard and enology program, and one that was largely initiated and funded by the Shelton Brothers the founders a Shelton Vineyards.  Similar to my emphasis in the finger Lakes on the finger Lakes community college Viticulture program, the Surrey community College program helps to introduce and train up the next generation of viticulture lists knickers. The college itself has a program and a 10 acre Vineyard where students can learn. Against that backdrop of both philanthropy and history, I was excited to have the chance to meet with Ethan Brown, winemaker in Shelton in Vineyards. Ethan had been there for four years, and in a way that completes the circle of the importance of programs like the one at Surrey community college, he attended the program many years ago. Ethan was a young organized dynamic guy, and he wasted no time in showing me around the winery tasting room, and providing a little bit of context for the history of the place. Currently the largest vinifera vineyard in the state of North Carolina, Shelton farms 80 acres of grapes with plans to plant a lot more. Exceptionally manicured, with beautiful old fashion light posts lining the long driveway from the highway to the winery, Shelton truly transports you to a different world. The gentle rolling hills adorn with a backdrop of the mountains, which on clear warm days, I can imagine, inspires you to find your own piece of beautiful grass, and enjoy a glass and some cheese with someone you laugh. For those wine club members who want the best of views, you can climb up to the gazebo that rests surrounding vineyards and truly has the best features of the entire valley.Built in 1999, Shelton Vineyards really isn’t showing it’s age that much. It speaks to the efforts of the staff to ensure maintenance is done regularly and things are taken care of. The cellar itself is built into a hillside which means most of it is underground. The barrel rooms are probably 20 feet high but at least 2/3 of that being underground meaning temperature control from both cold and heat is a lot easier and done with much less energy.  Producing around 25,000 cases a year, this is a Winery that has seen the baton passed from the founding Shelton brothers to the next generation. With that transition is an intention to grow their programs and initiate new ones. With the recent purchase of a break tank and a small hand bottling counter pressure system the winery seeking to do more charmat style sparklings. Ethan also talked about expanding cock and re-instituting their traditional methods Sparkling Wine program. I tasted a Sauvignon Blanc, a dry rosé based on Merlot, Petit Verdot, and a Petit Verdot/Cabernet Sauvignon blend.. All of the wines were exceptionally crafted, showing what I had begun to discern as something that speaks to the North Carolina fine wines that I tried. The whites and the reds are both fuller bodied than what we find in the Finger Lakes, they have generous acid ,but lower than what we have in truly cool climate winemaking; and the reds weren’t overly extracted. They spoke of great fruit, they were well balanced, and their alcohols were generally about 13%. I also tasted a great Tannat. My wife and I have visited Madiran in southern France, I’ve had a lot of experience with the French version of the varietal. We visited a number of producers large and small in Madiran, and I love those wines, there just aren’t that many American Tannat’s that I have fallen in love with. Of course the wines of Jenny McCloud of Chrysalis have been wonderful, and I’ve been lucky enough to cellar those for many years. This North Carolina Tannat, my first experience with a varietal in the terroir, makes sense for the region. There are some very strong Virginia Tannats that are growing, and with this particular vineyard in North Carolina, I renewed my love of the varietal. As with Childress, and the winery I’ll be talking about next, Jones Von Drehle, Shelton will have its own feature in the podcast, as I sat down with Ethan Brown to discuss his own experience, Shelton Vineyards, and where the region and the winery is going. As Ethan and I wrapped up, and he was generous enough to spend several hours and taste a lot of wines with me, I headed off for my last visit of the day to Jones Von Drehle. The roads grew less crowded, the bends and winds and hills became more dramatic, and I started to wonder where in the heck was this place. I arrived early, about an hour or so, and took advantage of the opportunity to do just a little bit of driving and perhaps find something to eat. I typed in food nearby and the nearest place was the Stone Mountain General store. It wasn’t too far from the Stone Mountain State Park entrance, and so I figured I’d head over there and see what was available. The general store itself feels plucked from time. An old rustic wooden building, but offers inside a few knickknacks, necessities for campers such as para chord, fire starters, and offers a few small food items for the weary traveler camper. Simple offerings like a hamburger or cheeseburger, or a housemaid turkey or ham sandwich were available. The turkey sandwich tasted like home, although it was on white bread. Turkey, American cheese, lettuce, tomato: all for $2.95. It wasn’t the most glamorous meal I’ve ever had in wine country, but it filled me up, tasted just fine, and was certainly marked as my cheapest option I’ve ever had on the road. I took advantage and drove around the park a bit, didn’t have a chance to see Stone Mountain itself but just like Pine Mountain, this will be on my itinerary for the next visit, one I hope to take with the family.Heading back down the hill I arrived at my appointment just on time at Jones Von Drehle, and boy was I impressed. The Vineyard itself has two entrances, a service entrance and a guest entrance. I can tell it was an extremely quiet day but I wanted to have the standard customer experience, and so I entered the other guest entrance. Driving down the crusher run you are snaked through the vineyards, pass the retention ponds, as the tasting room and winery, and brand new amphitheater open up before you. It is an impressive and beautiful experience. The slope of the hills hug you to your right as you wind your way around the vineyards on one side nature on the other and approach your final destination. The hills jumped in different directions the vines bear open up the view to see row after row in this well-kept vineyard. The amphitheater itself is gorgeous. Recently finished it’s part of the philosophy of the owners to incorporate wine music in food into living a good life. The tasting room is not extraordinarily elaborate in it’s design, but it’s well thought out and well appointed inside. The most impressive feature, is the immersive feeling you get when you walk in turn to your right and look out the windows in the back of what is the tasting room. The slopes feel even more dramatic here from the vineyards, and with the trees bare of their foliage you can peer through the trunks to see the steep incline of the Granache and the Malbec and other varietals.  Well lit, and open, without any sense of clutter, the tasting room invite you to a horse shoe shaped bar in the middle were the tasting room attendant who was very nice and gracious, and the new to the wine industry expressed an amazing thirst for knowledge, that is extremely inviting. Diana Jones was waiting for me, and informed me that her husband Chuck was on his way back from Charlotte where they had been delivering some wine. This 6000 case winery is centered around 30 acres of a estate vineyard. They do not have a distributor, and unfortunately don’t ship to New York state right now, but when they get that license, I can assure you I’ll be ordering more wines. Everything was wonderful and unique. From their Grenache rosé, to their Chardonnay - both stainless steel and barrel fermented, to the real interesting Petit Manseng, which carries a fairly heavy alcohol, but is it so well balanced on the pallet that it is neither distracting nor over the top. It is well balanced and full bodied, and a wine that they described as being extremely popular at restaurants who have received James Beard‘s nominees and nods, as a “buy the glass” pour. Tasting through their Grenache rosé, this dry rosé echoed Provence with its own North Carolina flair. It was a wonderful wine and one I decided I had to take one home. Their red offerings were equally as compelling. Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Petit Verdot and Cabernet Sauvignon blend - all were well-crafted, clearly brilliantly grown, and offered everything I could hope for. Their winemaker, cut his teeth in California, spending decades in the industry until he finally decided he wanted to have a small farm himself and, with land prices in California being what they are, realized the East Coast offered his best opportunity to become a farmer himself. He took over the reins at Château Morissette in Virginia, and this large production oriented winery did well for him for sometime. As he sought to become more ingrained in a small production oriented facility, he had heard about the efforts of these two crazy couples from Atlanta Georgia with original roots in North Carolina, that had planted an estate vineyard in the middle of the hills just south of Stone Mountain. It’s been a match made in heaven and with Dan’s experience, and the attention to detail in Vineyard, the wines are truly top-notch. The way the Vineyard is set up, many of the worst things that you deal with in the Yadkin Valley AVA, are ameliorated naturally. Water naturally runs down the clay hill slopes, with the help of some drain tile. The intense humidity and moisture that you deal with in North Carolina, is marginalized by the fact that the steep hills along with the fact that the mountains are in the distance, create an almost constant airflow which helps to dry the canopy and the fruit during crucial periods of the year. Additional measures such as the first cordon being 42 inches high instead of 36 inches from the ground help reduce ground moisture from impacting the fruit. The whole property is fenced to keep our critters. The wind also helps to protect the vines from early-season frosts, which often compromise buds, particularly the primary buds where the majority of the fruit is located, and get them through very treacherous periods where the temperatures will impact that year‘s harvest. And overall just the amount of effort that the team here puts into their vineyards, the philosophy that fine wine comes from extraordinary vineyards rings true. We go even deeper into Jones Von Drehle in our long-form interview, which is slightly shorter than the long form interviews I do from the studio, but nonetheless will give you a much deeper picture of this winery it’s history and it’s increasingly prominent role in the North Carolina wine industry.Returning to Elkin for the evening, I had wished I brought an extra bottle to enjoy that evening. Instead I did what we winemakers often do and grabbed some local beers, picked up another to go order of Mexican food from Margaritas, and spent some time recapping the visits with my wife, enjoying the shrimp chipotle that I filled into some fresh corn tortillas, and then headed to bed. The next morning I would be leaving the Yadkin Valley, and any initial apprehension that I had as to where this wine region was, was disappearing. When it came to food, Diana Jones had mentioned that Asheville and Raleigh were truly astounding foodie towns. With that as a basis, it won’t take long for some enterprising young chef or cook who wants to do their own project, to find their way to one of the small towns and make it work during the busy tourist seasons.Yet again, I woke up early worked on my computer for a bit, and double checked my itinerary checking in to my Delta flight. I realized at this pace, I may not have time to taste at any other wineries, but I could at least take a peek at the landscapes in the settings that the region had to offer. I took a drive out to a winery that I had really wanted to visit, but in this trip just couldn’t make it work.  Raffaldini is widely regarded as not just an important landmark in North Carolina wines, but a house that is making some truly stellar North Carolina wines.  From all my research, it is the sort of aspirational wine story that is bred in a man who worked hard and made a great deal of money in another field. Using those resources, he has poured them in to building a truly astounding estate. You can look at pictures on the Internet, you can watch videos on YouTube, but with some properties you don’t understand just how special they are until you actually visit them. And so setting Raffaldini in my iPhone map, I headed in the direction of the winery.  Driving down the highway, North Carolina has done such an excellent job in featuring the different wineries throughout the state with these large highway adjacent signs, that I quickly realized this was a pocket of the AVA I should’ve explored right away. Instead of one or two wineries indicated there were multiple. And not only were there multiple, they were all wineries that in my research into the region, come vaguely familiar with. Wineries like Laurel Gray, Shadow Springs, Raffaldini Vineyards, Piccione, and several others. That last winery was one that I heard mentioned multiple times when I was tasting in different tasting rooms and talking with local proprietors of every sort.  If there is a small pocket of fine wines, with multiple wineries working towards the same goal, emerging in North Carolina, this may be the place. There are of course a lot of people doing a lot of great work throughout the entire region. But one thing I have understood in my research of, particularly American wine, is that like the person who wants to start a gas station, the very best place you can locate a new gas station is across the street from an existing gas station. The logic may seem counterintuitive, but if people start to think of that intersection as a place to get gas, then that is where they will get gas. Likewise in wine, tourists often don’t take the extraordinary measures of researching soil types, property histories, winemakers, and all of the other factors that lead to a specific winery making great wines. They look for the clusters where numerous proprietors are working on their own, sometimes in concert with their community, to pull the best fruit from their land and produce the best wines from their grapes. If there is an early nucleus that we can expect the North Carolina wine country in the Yadkin Valley to flourish from, my sense was, this might be it. With that said, I did not have an opportunity to taste any of these wines.For those listening who are interested in exploring North Carolina wines, I would certainly say that visiting any of the wineries I have mentioned is a prerequisite. But I think that in my next visit, I will certainly start in this particular part of the AVA. I will likely visit Raffaldini, Piccione ,and many of the other surrounding wineries. I would not miss out on visiting either Shelton or on Jones Von Drehle Vineyards Winery or Childress. But I think that this particular corner of the AVA is fostering a sort of spirit that seems to be building upon itself. There are no restaurants nearby, there are no hotels within a 1 mile drive most of these places. For the entrepreneurs listening, I would expect that to change, because this seems to be where some of the energy for the AVA seems to be admitting from.I guess as a closing retrospective, there is an immense amount of differentiation within the Yadkin Valley AVA. From topography, to culture, to wine styles produced by the different wineries. When I landed, and first began to explore the very core of this viticultural area, I will admit to feeling a little underwhelmed. That feeling began to dissipate upon visiting RayLyn, and after tasting at Childress I was excited. The entire focal point of the trip changed as a ventured outside of the south east quadrant and moved into areas that, admittedly, felt a little bit more familiar. Call it a personal bias, call it a personal preference. My conclusion is this… The Yadkin Valley AVA is vast, it includes so many different specific tear wars, that it’s difficult to call it one region. From the wind and hills at Jones Von Drehle, to the gentle slope‘s just south west of the northern reaches of the AVA, to the flatter more populated areas in the south east corner of the viticultural area.  What I can say is this, each producer I visited produced all level of quality that far surpassed any of my expectations. Too many regions I visit , Or rather have visited in my life, think of themselves as Napa in the 1970s. This is not Napa in the 1970s, because this is not America in the 1970s. This is North Carolina in 2022, and it is full of surprises, and beauty, and wines that will surprise at every turn. Is this a region worth visiting question?  If you are an American who loves wine, this is a region you must visit. You will fall in love with many of these wines. I don’t know what your personal preferences, I don’t know if you like red or white, or lean or bold, or salty whites or tannic reds, but you will love it. You will find wines you love and you will want to taste these wines the rest of your life. In vino Veritas, and in North Carolina, there is indeed, great wine.________Visit our website at www.VitiCulturePodcast.com, and don’t forget to share with your friends via all major social media platforms @VitiCULTUREPodVisit Bellangelo Winery and Missick Cellars at www.Bellangelo.com and www.MissickCellars.com.You can watch the interview on our YouTube channel here: Get full access to The Viti+Culture Podcast Newsletter at viticulturepodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Welcome to this edition of Wine and Dime!  We're so pleased that you've taken the time to join us today. This particular podcast is all about setting New Year's resolutions for financial peace.  I'm all about the journey that we're on in life. Whether it's finding that next good wine or finding that financial peace that we all want and of course, reducing our stress in the new year.  It's incredible that it's that time of year already!  We here at Wine and Dime and Rooted Planning Group wish you a Happy Holiday season and a great New Year! Also included below are the documents that we talked about. Just click the provided links to download! Thanks for listening and be sure to like, rate, subscribe and share. If you have any questions that you would like answered on the show, feel free to email us at info@rootedpg.com Or visit us at https://my.captivate.fm/www.rootedpg.com/podcasts (www.rootedpg.com/podcasts) for full show notes and links! https://tj-meehan-rs4z.squarespace.com/s/Sample-Budget-2022.xlsx (SAMPLE BUDGET - 2022) https://tj-meehan-rs4z.squarespace.com/s/2-Choices-to-Prioritize-2022.docx (CHOICES TO PRIORITIZE 2022) https://tj-meehan-rs4z.squarespace.com/s/2-New-Years-Resolutions.docx (NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS - FINANCE 2022) https://hinnantvineyards.com/ (About Hinnant Family Vineyards)THE HINNANT FAMILY VINEYARDS & WINERY STORYIt all started in 1971 when the Hinnant siblings Jacqueline, Freddie, Douglas and Willard had a dream to start a vineyard in Johnston County. Freddie's husband, Glen, had the honor of being the original vineyard manager that watched over the vineyard while the others maintained their jobs as a teacher, dentist, book keeper and carpenter. In the early years, grapes were sold to fresh markets, other vineyards, & to the public. At the turn of the century, Williard & his son, Bob started their own quest to create wine from the family vineyard. Starting with just a few varieties of wine, the doors opened and in 2003 the first bottle was sold. The father & son pair enjoyed working side by side fine tuning their award winning wines until 2013, when Williard passed away. Bob, with his family's reassurance, support (and secret recipe,) now operates Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery. Over the years, Willard & Bob acquired all of the land and holdings from Williard's siblings. Building upon the original acreage growing to a 100 acres of grapes, the Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery is the oldest and largest commercial Muscadine vineyard in the state of North Carolina.  The Hinnant Family has also become experts on other native grapes. From Virginia; the Norton grape takes up approximately 2 acres and is handcrafted to produce their driest, most complex red, offering oak, vanilla and spice notes! From Texas; they have a couple acres of an American hybrid Blanc du Bois. The fruit offers intense grapefruit, pineapple, and passion fruit flavors. From the very beginning, there has been long standing tradition to open the Vineyard to the public during the harvest season. Every September Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery encourages the public to come out and pick their own Muscadine grapes. A large white tent marks the start of the Harvest season & stands at the front of the business to welcome customers. There you can purchase pre-picked grapes, or pick up a bucket & head out into the vineyard. We invite you to come take part in this annual Hinnant Family Tradition. Regardless of the season, the Hinnant Family invites you to visit the vineyard to see how their dream has developed. SNOW'D INNThis is a winter seasonal. A dry white wine infused with cranberry. Crisp & tart, and with just a hint of sweetness from the cranberries. 2016 PINOT GRISWA - Columbia Valley Light, crisp dry white with subtle lemon & apple flavors & a well balance acidity. THIS EPISODE...

In this episode, we sit down with four of our blogger friends to bring you a special Holiday Episode! In this episode, we feature Pam from Food and Wine Chronicles, Jessica from the Wine Mouths, Arthur from Merlot 2 Muscadine, and Dave from Vino-Sphere! We talk about the things you should look for in aContinue reading →

Welcome back Wine and Dime listeners. This week and this month's topic will be all about reducing stress, especially as we head into the holidays. One of the things that we know contributes to that stress is finances. Stay tuned for the rest of this podcast to where we dig into this a little bit more. Also included below are the documents that we talked about. Just click the provided links to download! Thanks for listening and be sure to like, rate, subscribe and share. If you have any questions that you would like answered on the show, feel free to email us at info@rootedpg.com Or visit us at www.rootedpg.com/podcasts for full show notes and links! https://hinnantvineyards.com/ (About Hinnant Family Vineyards)The Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery StoryIt all started in 1971 when the Hinnant siblings Jacqueline, Freddie, Douglas and Willard had a dream to start a vineyard in Johnston County. Freddie's husband, Glen, had the honor of being the original vineyard manager that watched over the vineyard while the others maintained their jobs as a teacher, dentist, book keeper and carpenter. In the early years, grapes were sold to fresh markets, other vineyards, & to the public. At the turn of the century, Williard & his son, Bob started their own quest to create wine from the family vineyard. Starting with just a few varieties of wine, the doors opened and in 2003 the first bottle was sold. The father & son pair enjoyed working side by side fine tuning their award winning wines until 2013, when Williard passed away. Bob, with his family's reassurance, support (and secret recipe,) now operates Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery. Over the years, Willard & Bob acquired all of the land and holdings from Williard's siblings. Building upon the original acreage growing to a 100 acres of grapes, the Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery is the oldest and largest commercial Muscadine vineyard in the state of North Carolina.  The Hinnant Family has also become experts on other native grapes. From Virginia; the Norton grape takes up approximately 2 acres and is handcrafted to produce their driest, most complex red, offering oak, vanilla and spice notes! From Texas; they have a couple acres of an American hybrid Blanc du Bois. The fruit offers intense grapefruit, pineapple, and passion fruit flavors. From the very beginning, there has been long standing tradition to open the Vineyard to the public during the harvest season. Every September Hinnant Family Vineyards & Winery encourages the public to come out and pick their own Muscadine grapes. A large white tent marks the start of the Harvest season & stands at the front of the business to welcome customers. There you can purchase pre-picked grapes, or pick up a bucket & head out into the vineyard. We invite you to come take part in this annual Hinnant Family Tradition. Regardless of the season, the Hinnant Family invites you to visit the vineyard to see how their dream has developed. 2016 Cabernet SauvignonWA - Horse Heavens Hills This Washington State Cabernet Sauvignon has bold complex flavors layered with tannins. Dry & smooth with dark chocolate & berry flavors. 2016 Pinot NoirWA - Columbia Valley A medium to full bodied Red with rich berry flavors and subtle tannin on the finish. THIS EPISODE WAS PRESENTED BY AMY IRVINE AND IN COLLABORATION WITH https://senecalakewine.com/ (THE SENECA LAKE WINE TRAIL )ROOTED PLANNING GROUP 10 EAST MARKET STREET CORNING NY 14830 https://www.rootedpg.com/ (WWW.ROOTEDPG.COM) EMAIL: AMY@ROOTEDPG.COM

Muscadine, we know this will elicit lots of feelings and opinions but the truth is, lots of folks like and buy these wines. Let's dive into why Muscadine sells. Hinnant Vineyards is one of the top producers of Muscadine wines in North Carolina! Muscadine is sweet yes. Muscadine is a group of grapes that is very comfortable in the humid summers of the south. Muscadine grows very well in North Carolina. Muscadine provides the capital for North Carolina's burgeoning wine industry to make all types of wine! Now lets talk turkey, what are you drinking for for Turkey Day? Max is drinking Blackberry wine, Matt is drinking some bugey Grand Gru Champagne out of magnum.  Support our Sponsors: The official Vodka of the NC F&B Podcast: , all the taste without the bite! Drink !  Think Differently About Dessert Use promo code 'NCFB' at checkout! The NC F&B Podcast is Produced and Engineered by Max Trujillo of Trujillo Media For booking or questions about the show, contact:  or  

Our guests are Rick Riddle of the Winery at Seven Springs Farm, and JD Dalton, Vineyard Manager of Tsali Notch Vineyard, in Monroe County, TN. They will let us know of the history, taste, and the nutritional properties of this ingegenous grape to the SouthEast and both Rick Riddle and JD Dalton will both speak on the topic of Muscadine wine.

Native to the southern United States, muscadine grapes love the heat and grow wild all over. They can be eaten whole, used in jams, jellies, smoothies, or fermented into sweet wine.    We visited a muscadine winery just outside of Centerville, Tennessee.. Grinder's Switch Winery which we are excited to tell y'all all about. They ship their wines to most of the United States: https://gswinery.com   A few resources mentioned:  Recipe for "Drunken Chicken with Muscadine Grapes and White Wine” - https://ediblepiedmont.ediblecommunities.com/recipes/drunken-chicken-muscadine-grapes-and-white-wine   To buy muscadine juice (not fermented) check out MightyMuscadine.com ******************************************* If you'd like to join our Patreon Community to support us monthly for perks and exclusive content check out https://www.patreon.com/steelmagnolias   Places to Connect: Sign up for mailing list HERE  https://mailchi.mp/e3cef217a5e7/sweetnews Instagram: @SteelMagnoliasPodcast Private Facebook Group: https://bit.ly/32Kna4T

We close out our conversation with Barry Hus of Lakeridge Winery and Vineyards, Florida's largest winery. I can imagine that staffing can be a bit of a challenge. I went to New York and recruited a vineyard manager that was highly experienced, and he's done wonders for our vineyards. I went to Sarasota. I recruited this top mechanic that had been in the industry for 45 years can fix any kind of bottling line equipment or anything that you have. And he's been the same thing. He's just he's helped us fix so much and saved us so much money with his expertise. So it's that kind of thing, that kind of recruitment that lends itself to providing a successful business, no matter what you're doing, you know, people make the difference. Having a winery the size of Lakeridge Winery & Vineyards, you've got a vast selection of wines. What are some that stand out that are your biggest sellers? Our most popular wines are our southern red and southern white. We also cross-label those as vintners, red, and vintners white at our other location. They're the exact same wines. That's 60 percent of our business. Those two are the main Muscadine wines that we produce one white, one red. After that, we make a bold blush. It's called Sunblush, and it's also Muscadine. And then we make a Chablis. We make a Chablis out of our white grapes. That's the driest of the Muscadine wines. They're both good sellers, the Chablis is great for cooking the sunblush. We call it the Goldilocks wine. It's a little red. It's a little wide, it's a little sweet, it's a little dry. You know, it's you don't know what to take to a party that's a great wine to take with you. And then becoming more and more popular are the specialty wines, and we're just getting to where we're having to ramp up our production of our sparkling. We do our own https://store.lakeridgewinery.com/pink-crescendo.html (sparkling wine). We do two of them a white and pink. And we do. We still do them in the old champagne method. So we're doing the double fermentation on those. We make a port that's 100 percent Musk, nine, with a wonderful port. So those specialty wines are great. We also produce a Sherry. The https://store.lakeridgewinery.com/cream-sherry.html (Sherry is about 25 percent Muscadine). It doesn't lend itself to a great sherry. The white grape doesn't. So we're bringing that in and then blending it in with about 25 percent of the Muscadine. And then it produces a great, great Sherry after that. And then we have some kind of blends we do at what we call a https://store.lakeridgewinery.com/proprietor-39-s-reserve.html (proprietor's reserve). It's kind of a dessert-style wine. Again, it's a sweet wine. It's got a higher alcohol level than our standard table wine does. But it's not quite a port. It's gone over very well. Again, it's one of those sweet wines served chilled. Those are the main ones. Those are what we produce. Our main focus is on our Muscadine wines and our southern reds, southern wine by far our top sellers. It's been a pleasure talking with you and learning so much about Florida wine. If our podcast listeners are in the area or planning a Florida trip, what's the best place to go to get all the information we need? The best place to go to start is at our website, which is https://www.lakeridgewinery.com/ (Lakeridgewinery.com) And from there, you can get our hours and information about the weekends at the winery. Who's what bands are playing, what foods are being served, all that kind of stuff. If you want to call in, you can certainly do that. We have an 800 number. It's 800.768.9463. Be happy to answer any of the questions that you might have. Thank you for listening. I'm Forrest Kelly. This episode of The Best Five Minute Wine Podcast was produced by IHYSM. If you like the show, please tell your friends and pets and subscribe. Until next time pour the wine and ponder your next adventure. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:...

Native to the Southeastern U.S., muscadines have a rich history and are packed with antioxidants and health benefits. This is the only grape native to America, while all others were imported. Its wine has a bad reputation as being overly sweet, but there is a resurgence in winemaking that honors its history as well as its overall health benefits.

https://www.myflorida.com/ (Florida )started in the wine industry back in the early days when the settlers came over here. They discovered that these Muscadine grapes were here in https://www.myflorida.com/ (Florida), so they tried to make wine out of them didn't particularly like the flavor of it. They went ahead and brought over their own varieties from Europe. At one time, there were thousands of acres of grapes here in Florida. But they discovered that in this climate, they wouldn't grow. There's actually a bacteria. It gets in the vines, and it leads to what's now called https://piercesdisease.cdfa.ca.gov/ (Pierce Disease). And so, when all the vines died out after a couple of years, they eventually moved everything out to the West Coast. The wine industry kind of fell off here, of course, and it wasn't until, I don't know, the eighties early 80s when families like the Cox family started Lakeridge Winery they decided that they were going to reinvigorate the wine industry here, and they were going to make wine out of the native Muscadine grapes that grow here naturally. They failed at first, and then they kept trying and eventually got the formula right and the recipe right. And we're here today as https://www.lakeridgewinery.com/ (Florida's largest winery). Now when you say the largest winery, does that mean just visitors, or is that production? Yeah, we're Florida's largest by both visitorship and production. We are about one hundred and fifty hundred and sixty thousand case a year winery, which is by far the largest here in the state that's selling grape wines. There are a lot of other wineries here. There's only; I don't know, twenty to twenty-four wineries in the state. It's not a big industry here, and many of those are fruit wines, mostly blueberry wines because that's blueberries grow well here. There are a few like us that do grape wines, but we're by far the largest. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy Podcorn - https://podcorn.com/privacyhttps://www.patreon.com/thebestwinepodcast (Support The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/thebestwinepodcast) See https://omnystudio.com/listener (omnystudio.com/listener) for privacy information.

Bruce McLean gives the 2021 Muscadine Crop Update and Muscadine Insect Talk for South Carolina, as part of the CUltivate SC Grower Series.

A wine industry professional and CEO of Wine Spies--Agent Cru aka Addison Rex, who has a mission to secure special, top-secret deals on the world's best wines, takes you to a perceptive discussion of sharing his experiences as a veteran entrepreneur. Learn all and more now! On the Finally, Marketing That Works Podcast. Highlights of This Episode [01:16] Wine country Sonoma [02:05] So many wineries. It's insane [02:31] Muscadine grapevines [03:16] Wine Connoisseur [04:06] People's attitude towards wine [06:03] Differentiates a $3 bottle wine to a $1000 or $25 [06:20] Scale of the production [08:11] Literally added some basic flavoring [08:33] Wine Spies, internet flash sales [10:53] "We kiss a lot of frogs to find the prince on your behalf" [11:27] "42 hundred licensed wineries in Napa and Sonoma alone" [12:30] "A warehouse just for wines" [13:17] Interesting marketing case study [16:58] Creating excellent sales funnels [17:56] "Badass!" [18:30] August 2, next-generation launch party [19:31] "Whenever anyone asked me about getting into the wine industry, my very first advice is don't!" [24:27] Cross-market and pollen [25:18] Large fortune [28:10] Secrets of our success YouTube Vidoe Podcast Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JV6J7046sew

We're back again with Tina Smith and Nadia Hetzel of Cypress Bend Vineyards! Located in Wagram, NC, Cypress Bend is in a unique location in North Carolina where the Muscadine grape grows well and produces an outstanding wine. Tina and Nadia talk through their abundant wine list. They tell us about the differences between eachContinue reading → The post Elevating Muscadine Part 2 appeared first on NC Wine Guys.

In this episode, we sit down with Tina Smith and Nadia Hetzel of Cypress Bend Vineyards! Located in Wagram, NC, Cypress Bend is in a unique location in North Carolina where the Muscadine grape grows well and produces an outstanding wine. Tina Smith and her husband, Dan, decided to plant grapes on Dan's family landContinue reading → The post Elevating Muscadine Part 1 appeared first on NC Wine Guys.

Meagen and Crystal travel to Tsali Notch Vineyard in Monroe County TN and talk to JD Dalton about TN's largest commercial muscadine vineyard. A longer episode that is worth the listen as we discuss the agriculture industry and the work that goes into great Appalachian products.

Meagen and Crystal travel to Tsali Notch Vineyard in Monroe County TN and talk to JD Dalton about TN's largest commercial muscadine vineyard. A longer episode that is worth the listen as we discuss the agriculture industry and the work that goes into great Appalachian products.

Meagen and Crystal travel to Tsali Notch Vineyard in Monroe County TN and talk to JD Dalton about TN's largest commercial muscadine vineyard. A longer episode that is worth the listen as we discuss the agriculture industry and the work that goes into great Appalachian products.

Gainin’ Fast on Memphis: The Podcast | Show NotesEpisode 83: The road dog, Matt Burrill joins the show. This guy must be one of the hardest working guys in Nashville. Hosting a weekly Writers Round, A Podcast, and acting tour manager for Trey Lewis. Oh, and if you’re a Muscadine fan I'm sure you have met Matt before. We will talk about his journey to Nashville, what still drives and motivates him to keep going in the music business.Show Links: https://flow.page/gaininfastonmemphishttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gainin-fast-on-memphis/id1489564658https://www.facebook.com/GAININFASTONMEMPHIShttps://www.youtube.com/c/GaininFastOnMemphishttps://www.instagram.com/fastonmemphis_podcast/Sponsor Links:https://www.arlorevolution.com/https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCxvVcUtdBCgLMUdip7P3Hghttps://www.facebook.com/ArtOnAHigherWire/ Guest Links:https://www.facebook.com/intheroundpodcast615https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/in-the-round/id1455058487https://www.instagram.com/intheroundpodcast/https://www.instagram.com/mattburrilll/Help support the show, our Patreon is what keeps the show going, we have tiers starting as low as $1, going all the way up to Show Sponsorships. Find your tier today! https://www.patreon.com/GaininFastOnMemphisSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/GaininFastOnMemphis)

Some of life's greatest lessons come when you least expect them.

A new poll shows voters support measures that would fight election fraud, even though critics label those measures as examples of voter suppression. Brooke Medina and Mitch Kokai discuss the polling data, along with early childhood literacy, dubious tax credits, and a Muscadine grape juice mandate.

We are closing out not only March but the first quarter and I don't think there could have been a better ending/beginning to it all. I had the absolute pleasure of chatting with this young lady who is Haitian Born, but Brookyln Raised. I seem to always connect with the ones that have a tie to the East the most and this was no different. She is the owner of Smily's Corner (www.smilyscorner.com) in Orlando, FL, a Le Cordon Bleu Grad and all around dope, black woman. This was a great one ya'll....enjoy!! Find her on the socials at: IG: @smilyscorner TikTok: @smilyscorner --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/stitchthefabric/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/stitchthefabric/support

On Episode 25 of The Grapevine Podcast the boys jump on Skype to record during the nasty winter weather in Nashville. Everyone shares their thoughts on the snowstorm that has left Nashville in a standstill. Gary and Charlie recap the Couch to Couch show and talk about the release of the 'Burn It at Both Ends' Vinyl's.Gary and Charlie dive into a deep discussion on 'Songwriting 101'. How they got started, what the early steps for co-writing were and how they've evolved as writers over the years of being Muscadine. Topics also include publishing deals, writing for hits and the direction everyone feels Country is going. For tickets and information on upcoming shows visit muscadinebloodline.com!Big thanks to our media partners at Whale Tale Media. They've got you covered on everything from weddings and media to branding and more. Find them at https://www.whale-tale.com/Use the promo code 'GRAPEVINE' for 15% off your order when buying merch at muscadinebloodline.comRemember to like, rate, review and subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen and to leave your IG or Twitter handle for a chance to score some free merch!For all things MB be sure to check out muscadinebloodline.com. You can also follow along on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube! 

On Episode 24 of The Grapevine Podcast the gang chats with BJ Barham of American Aquarium about life, music, touring and more! We also have Gary's Good News of the Week and a new segment 'Muscadine Healthline'! Gary and Charlie talk meal prep and how they've been eating clean and staying the course for a healthy 2021. Suggestions on how to get started, balling on a budget, staying consistent and more!BJ Barham has been in the music game for a long time! He shares some of his experiences from the road, lessons he's learned from the industry and why he has stayed independent and self run since the beginning. BJ also opens up about his sobriety, growing up in Reidsville, North Carolina and offers advice to anyone getting started on the roller coaster that is the music industry. We also have a roundtable discussion on the importance of owning the rights of your masters, being the CEO of your business and creating albums. For more on BJ Barham and American Aquarium be sure to check out the IG, Facebook and Twitter along with the streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music PLUS their website, americanaquarium.comThis week's Viner of The week is Christina Zimmerman from Morris, IL! Wanna be considered for 'Viner of The Week'? Go get in The Vines group on Facebook for your shot be hand selected and featured as our Viner of The Week!For tickets and information on upcoming shows including the Couch to Couch Livestream on 2/11 visit muscadinebloodline.com!Big thanks to our media partners at Whale Tale Media. They've got you covered on everything from weddings and media to branding and more. Find them at https://www.whale-tale.com/Use the promo code 'GRAPEVINE' for 15% off your order when buying merch at muscadinebloodline.comRemember to like, rate, review and subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen and to leave your IG or Twitter handle for a chance to score some free merch!For all things MB be sure to check out muscadinebloodline.com. You can also follow along on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube! 

*Airdate 11/15/2018 Chris is a 3rd generation member of his family agribusiness located in Wray, Georgia. Started by Chris' grandfather, Jacob Paulk, Muscadine Products Corporation is an agribusiness enterprise based in the middle of the world's largest muscadine vineyards. In today's episode, I will ask Chris to share: How his grandfather invited Chris to start a new venture on the family farm after he graduated from college. Paulk family values Chris learned from his Grandfather and Dad that have been successfully transferred from generation to generation? How Chris and his family deal with disagreements on business issue. Things he learned about working in the family business that might be helpful if you are considering joining your family business. What has been the greatest challenge to the Paulk family business since his grandfather died in 2017. To learn more about Chris Paulk and Muscadine Products Corporation, visit their website at: http://www.muscadineproducts.com Are you interested in learning more about growing your family business and planning for a successful transition? Check out www.tncfb.com/ Podcast made with help provided by Visual Media Co. https://www.visualmediaco.com/

Poem by Johnny Cash from his book Forever Words The Unknown Poems --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/kelly-a-berry/support

This past month I had the opportunity to meet Pam and Lauren Miles of The Barn at Bennett Flats in Heflin, Alabama. This incredible #wedding and special #events venue in central #Alabama is unforgettable. The picturesque barn with white drapes that frame this historical and beautiful space is a perfect place to create family memories. The main house is open and warm and makes you want to plan all your family functions here.The Miles Family has thought of everyone, the bride, the groom, and the family. Details that can seem overwhelming when you are planning a wedding or special event fade away because they have already created a space for you. Find out how Mim and Lauren met, and their shared passion and vision for creating a family business all about the family.⏱TIMESTAMP⏱1:00 History and vision of the Barn2:12 Early beginnings4:03 Visions (present and future)5:13 How Mim and Lauren met?6:08 Busy, busy seasons, when to book, special themes, CHICKENS

On this episode of the GameKeeper Podcast the crew discusses: remembering where we were on 9/11/01; opening day youth dove hunt, the excitement of the hunt that causes the fire, ready, aim reflex; Dove Necropsy – what is it and why it is important to know; Preview of GameKeepers Fall magazine issue on wildlife bridges and rifle silencers; The amazing muscadine and Bobby brings a surprise snack; Ask Dudley on planting persimmons, early season hunting spots, and dove lifespans; PLUS everything in between. · Remembering 9/11· Youth Dove Hunt· Dove Necropsy· GameKeepers Magazine Fall issue preview – funnels, wildlife bridges, using a silencer· The amazing muscadine · Ask Dudley – Tips on planting persimmons, early season hunting spots, and dove lifespans. Other ways to listen to the GameKeeper Podcast:GameKeeper App | Apple Podcast | Spotify | Sticher | Google Podcast Stay Informed: http://www.gamekeepersclub.comStay connected: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTubeSupport the show (https://subscribe.gamekeepersclub.com/)

Michael Muscadine was born and raised in East Oakland's Fruitvale neighborhood, where his family goes back several generations. Muscadine says that's where his grandfather, John Melendrez, instilled in him the idea of community oriented social activism.  Now Muscadine works as a life coach at the Fruitvale-based nonprofit, CURYJ, which stands for Communities United For Restorative Youth Justice. Muscadine works directly with young folks-- many of whom have had run-ins with the justice system-- to assure that they have resources like food and housing. Muscadine also works at a community garden in the same neighborhood where he works and lives. Through gardening, and his work at CURYJ, he's literally planting seeds in the same place he has deep roots.

Today we're going to look at grapes. Now I know this is a common food. Everyone enjoys them, but did you know there's actually one grape specifically that has had numerous research done on it in the last 10, 15 years because it actually helps to prevent and remove the plaque in your arteries. It also helps to prevent DNA damage. Do you know which grape it is? It's Muscadine. The muscadine grape has amazing benefits. In fact, it's where a lot of products are getting the resveratrol from to put into a supplement because of its DNA reversing effects. Now you may ask, well, what's so important about reversing DNA? DNA can contribute to aging. DNA damage means you're going to age faster, so this means by reversing DNA damage, you will actually look younger and feel younger. Now, how many of you are going to admit you want to look younger than your friends? Okay, I don't mind admitting that. That would be fine. So that's what the muscadine grape can do. So today I just have a bowl of white grapes. It's important to know that grapes need to be bought locally and in season. This is very important if you want to get the best nutritional benefit from this food, we don't want to buy them from other countries just because some of the ingredients, some of the pesticides that are used in other countries are actually banned here in America, so by local and buy in season. Children love grape juice because of the high sugar content, which is actually what they should not be drinking and everyone loves a good fresh grape, but there are other ways to enjoy it as well. If you were to take these grapes and clean and with a good organic cleaner and then separate them, put them on a cookie sheet and do a real quick freeze. Probably within 15 minutes they will be frozen well and not that you could then take them and throw them into a Baggie and then keep that in the freezer. That way the cookie sheet will be not consuming all of your freezer space, but there is another tip, you can take these grapes after you wash them and then dip them in some yogurt and then into some chia seeds and then freeze them on a cookie tree on a cookie sheet. When your children or your grandchildren are looking for a sweet treat and you show them these yogurt dip grapes, they will surely love them! So anyway, these are some great ways to enjoy grapes, to learn more about grapes and More, additional health benefits that come with grades. Check out my book Treasures of Healthy Living Nutrition Manual, and then go to the Healthy Treasures Cookbook for some really tasty recipes. Thank you for tuning in this podcast episode. To learn more about how to achieve transformation both physically and spiritually, please visit our website https://thebiblicalnutritionist.com/ and get your FREE biblical health plan https://thebiblicalnutritionist.com/free-biblical-health-roadmap/  today!   God is doing amazing things through The Biblical Nutritionist.  If you LOVE the YouTube content If you LOVE knowing there is a dependable resource.  If you LOVE sharing God's love through food. Please consider helping us continue this ministry with a $3 month donation! https://give.cornerstone.cc/give3   We serve together as we share the love of God through His amazing creation. Please help us do this!

In this episode we are joined by Ervin Lineberger, owner of Kildeer Farms in Kings Mountain, North Carolina. Ervin has been farming since the 1980s in western North Carolina, between Charlotte and Asheville, where he has grown muscadines, blackberries, peaches, strawberries and vegetables. Currently Ervin grows muscadines and blackberries for wholesale markets. Ervin shares with us his experience with blackberries and muscadines, provides insight in to the future of muscadines as a commodity, and offers advice for growers who are looking to tap into the small fruit market.

Apologies for the long delay in uploading; life has again been rather rough of late.  If you want to help out, you can toss a coin to the Wine Monk over at our Patreon page. Anyway, onto the show! We've visited Florida once already for something rather strange, Avocado Wine, but it's time we return, and try something equally strange and wonderful: the Blanc De Fleur from San Sebastian Winery. This is something truly unique and astonishing: a sparkling wine made from muscadine varietals, and one with very low residual sugar at that! The gang found this wine to be a fabulous summer sparkler, and we quickly tried to figure out just which Florida Man article to pair this wine with... or even, if this wine was a Florida Man headline, what would it be? The Blanc de Fleur was made in the Traditional Method, which we discussed in our episode featuring the RJR Brut Cuvée. However, this wine is not quite as dry as the Brut; we never really sat down to figure out where this wine would sit on the scale of sweetness vs. dryness... because this wine was that tasty.

Join me today as I interview Janie and John Coppey of Wills Creek Winery in Attala, Alabama. From their beginnings to a successful story, partnership and marriage they share how they got started, muscadine wines, crop challenges, and all the events they organize all year-round.Janie shares her passion for creating different wines that are great to use in cooking, Jahn shares the health benefits of the muscadine and much more.Coming up is their annual Valentines Day EVENT and they also offer wine-making classes! Maybe you have a wedding or celebration coming up, with the setting at the base of the hills and a beautiful lake (beaver made) in the backdrop it is a perfect setting for making memories.Wills Creek Winery is also a part of the North Alabama Wine Trail! Janie and Jahn share about this wonderful group of vintners too.Wills Creek Winery Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/travelwithwendy)

Episode 5 - join us as we try four wines that Nina purchased while in North Georgia enjoying the wineries. There's something for everyone - sweet, white, dry, red! While these wines were above our $10 budget, sometimes you do have to splurge! Cheers!

In this episode we had the pleasure of speaking with Victoria Robinson of Topaz Vineyards.  In this episode we speak to Victoria about:  Family!!!!! Buying her first Tractor Growing Grapes in Florida And so much more…………… Victoria's Bio  Topaz Vineyards intends to build a corporation whereby skilled consultants will match performance expectations to industry realities. Our company will initially span 28+ acres of rich agriculture including but not limited to: Muscadine grapes, cultivated into a rich, sweet Moscato and a Prosecco; various fruit trees that will be infused to create Vix Sangria and our signature fruit wines; a hybrid Tempranillo blend conducive to the changing climate and similar soil conditions to its native Spain;  a 3.5 acre natural fishing pond for clients who desire to fish and will be created as a Pay-Pond; a commercial kitchen/restaurant that will house “Isabel Kitchens”, which will be used to conduct cooking classes including but not limited to: catering to dining clientele, making vinegar, jelly and creating generational recipes passed down from familial generations, from earth to table. A Tasting Room & Store that will boast the finest wines from Minority and Diverse Vintners across the country (The Minority Room) and wine-related products from local and various vendors.  A wellness spa: will boast various steaming rooms, massage parlor and facial room with signature Angel Hill Wellness Spa products such as the Merlot Facial Mask made from red wine, mineral clay and honey, Sangria Sugar Body Scrubs and Signature Perfumes. A Cigar Bar. On additional 50 acres, a 9-hole executive golf course.  Finally, the last structure in plans are building condo-style timeshare properties to give individuals the opportunity to stay and enjoy the property at extended amounts of time while renting their time out to others when not utilized.  For more information:  https://www.topazvineyards.com/  Social Media: Instagram: @topazvineyards and @vlcenterprises Facebook: @topazvineyards Twitter: @topazvineyards

All you can EAT!! Learn about the healing power of Muscadine grapes: Anti-aging, Antioxidant & Anti-inflammatory and much more. Listen now to find out more! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Hello, and welcome to another splendid episode of the Make America Grape Again Podcast, centered around the Magnolia State: Mississippi. In this episode, we drink the 2018 Delta Dry mead from Queen's Reward Meadery, located in Tupelo, Mississippi. Now, there's a fair bit of argument in the drinking community on whether or not mead truly counts as a style of wine, but I'm going to err on the side of the TTB on this one, which defines mead and honey wine as being the same thing. And even if you are a purist, and feel mead should truly be its own entity, the fact of the matter is that the 2018 Delta Dry is technically what is known as a pyment; a mead (or if you want to be super pedantic, a melomel) made from honey and grapes. In this case, the Riesling in the Delta Dry was sourced from Oregon, while the honey was local wildflower honey sourced from just down the road.  The grapes and honey were fermented together to produce this beverage. So... what do these terms all mean, anyway?  Before we cover the history of the industry in Mississippi, let's clear some mead terminology up. Mead, which etymologically comes from the Old English meodu, is an alcoholic beverage created by fermenting honey with water, often with the additions of various fruits, spices, grains, or even hops.  The key defining characteristic of mead is that the majority of the beverage's fermentable sugar is derived from honey.  That all being said, there are different styles of mead under that umbrella. Cyser, for example, is a mead made with honey and apples or pears. A mead that uses spices or herbs (or both) is often referred to as a metheglin. As mentioned above, meads made with fruits other than apples and pears can be referred to as a melomel, and a mead specifically made with grapes can often be known as a pyment. As if that wasn't enough, Wikipedia has an even bigger list... suffice to say, Mead is rather more complicated than it seems at first glance.  Anyway, I digress: onto history. At one point in time, Mississippi ranked rather high in terms of American viticultural production. Muscadine grapes were grown in many locations throughout the state, but the dramatic loss of life from the Civil War, combined with a statute enacted in 1907 which banned the manufacture and sale of Mississippi Wine, meant that the industry went into a nosedive. Due to the long-lasting effect prohibition created in the deep south, Mississippi was the last state to repeal the Volstead Act in 1966, and many counties in the state remain dry through present day.  This means the wine industry in Mississippi still has yet to recover. Along with Queen's Reward Meadery, the state has only three other wineries: Almarla Vineyards, Gulf Coast Winery, and Old South Winery. The State does have one AVA: The Mississippi Delta AVA, formed in 1984, is shared with Mississippi's border states of Tennessee and Louisiana. However, this AVA has not attracted any large-scale viticultural endeavors as of yet. This is due to an additional factor along with the long history of Prohibition in the region: climate. Mississippi's location, between 30 degrees N and 35 degrees N in latitude, produces a sub-tropical climate with long, humid summers and short, mild winters. This means that Fungal diseases like mildew and Pierce disease are often widespread. In addition, unpredictable weather patterns stemming from the proximity of the state to the Gulf of Mexico also present a large risk for growers. The unpredictable Mississippi climate makes it difficult to grow most varieties of grapes, other than those within the Muscadine family--which are often not associated with "fine" wine production. I acquired this bottle online through the meadery's website, specifically for this podcast.  In addition, we were lucky enough to catch Geoff Carter, the mead-maker and co-owner on the phone for this episode, to answer a few of our questions.

Welcome to Episode 38 of the Make America Grape Again Podcast, where we explore the wine scene of Florida. While the Sunshine State is known for citrus, beaches, and marshes, it is not widely known for its strong wine culture. Indeed, there is a lot of difficulty growing grapes in this humid, hot climate, meaning that most grapes which are grown in the state are Muscadine varietals. However, this has lead to a lot of winemaking experimentation with other sorts of fruits grown in Florida's tropical climate; including the fruit used for our wines du jour: avocado. Yes, Avocado. In this episode, Gary returns and hangs out with Megan, James, and myself as we explore both the Sweet Avocado and AvoVino made by Schnebly Redlands Winery, which is located in Homestead, Florida. The history of winemaking in Florida begins early on with the colonization of Florida by both the Spanish and Huguenot refugees from France in the 16th century, for use as the sacrament in the Catholic Mass. Because of the dank tropical climate and various grapevine diseases and parasites, these plantings did not fare well, and eventually, plantings of Muscadine became more popular... until Prohibition, of course, collapsed the local industry. The commercial wineries of today came about as a result of the Florida Farm Winery Law in 1979, primarily due to efforts from the Florida Grape Grower's Association.  This law reduced the winery license fee from $1000 to a mere $50.  In addition, researches in Florida began to develop new bunch grape varietals such as Stover, Lake Emerald, and Suwanee which were more resistant to Pierce's Disease, and there was also intensive development of new muscadine varietals such as Magnolia, Noble, and Welder. Today there are approximately 20 wineries in the state of Florida. Some of these wineries are making wines from local fruits, or grapes imported from California, but others are using locally-grown muscadine varietals. The state of Florida has no American Viticultural Areas at this time. These two bottles were purchased by Megan and myself directly from the winery website, and shipped directly for me for this podcast.  I'm sad that I didn't bring up my favorite avocado fact in the podcast; that these trees were originally the food of giant ground sloths and would have gone extinct if it were not for human interaction with this plant.  Womp-womp. Lastly, just a reminder that the podcast has a Patreon account, (https://www.patreon.com/TheMakeAmericaGrapeAgainPodcast) so if you like what we're doing here, a few bucks extra for wine acquisition goes a long way!

Carly Pearce, Rick Huckaby, Josh Miller, Cameron Bedell, Muscadine Bloodline, Kelleigh Bannen

Welcome to our 31st episode, featuring Louisiana!  In this episode, we will be drinking the Redneck Red, from Landry Vineyards.  The Redneck Red is a non-vintage Muscadine wine (a species we met the last episode), made specifically from a Muscadine varietal known as Noble. Noble, I've noticed, is also often spelled as 'nobel' by many wineries in the deep south, but the two seem to be interchangeable. The history of Louisiana wine began in the mid-eighteenth century, when wines were made by Jesuit priests for use in the Eucharist.  No records survive of what these wines were made of, or how good they were.  The main focus of the wine industry in the area seems to have been around orange wine--that is, wine made from oranges, rather than grapes, in Plaquemines Parish.  The last of these wineries, Les Orangers Louisianais, closed in 1987.  This winery closed due to a combination of a hard freeze killing their orange trees,  the end of a $1000 exemption in State licensing fees, and the passing of a law that forbade wineries from selling their products at the wholesale and retail markets: state-sponsored prohibition in action.  Three years later, this prohibition was ended through the passing of the 1990 Native Wines act, which once again allowed wine sales at retail and off-licensed premises.  Today, thanks to this law, there are four commercial wineries in Louisiana that collectively produce about 20,000 gallons (75,000 liters) of wine per year. The climate of Louisiana is extremely hot and humid, and viticulturists in the state face Pierce's disease, powdery mildew, and various other grapevine diseases.  Many of these maladies strongly affect vinifera wines more than other varietals, which is why most varietals grown in the state of Louisiana are Muscadine or French-American Hybrid strains; most vinifera wines are made from juice or grapes imported from out of state.  Both of these aspects will be discussed further in later episodes focusing on Louisiana. I acquired this bottle online through the winery website.

Welcome to Episode 30 of the Make America Grape Again Podcast, where we explore North Carolina through the lens of one of the most unique indigenous grape species in the US: Muscadine!  Specifically, we drink the Hinnant Family Vineyards Scuppernong, made and grown near Pine Level, North Carolina.  The Scuppernong grape, as it turns out, is also the state fruit of North Carolina. Muscadine grapes consist of various varietals within a unique genus of grape known as Muscadinia rotundifolia (although some botanists disagree that it should be a separate genus... but I'm going to trust whatever Gary, our resident botanist says on the subject.)  Native to the American Southeast, Muscadines have been cultivated extensively for fruit, juice, and wine production for hundreds of years.  Indeed, the oldest cultivated grapevine in the world is a Scuppernong vine in Roanoke, Virginia, known as the Mother Vine. It should also be noted that Scuppernong is one of the most abundant Muscadine varietals used for winemaking. North Carolina has a vibrant winemaking history.  In the mid-19th Century, there were some 25 wineries in North Carolina, with extensive independent vineyards, to such an extent that North Carolina dominated the national market for American wines at the time. The American Civil War ended that market dominance, via damage to the industry through the loss of manpower and scarce capital, alongside various revocation of winemaking licenses due to regulatory retribution following the war.  Prohibition killed the final bits of the wine industry in North Carolina until the industry was born again in the 1950's. This revitalization began with the Scuppernong grape itself; when ten farmers in Onslow County planted twenty-five acres of this historic grape as the result of a promise made by an out-of-state winery.  This winery canceled the agreement when the grapevines started to produce, and so Raymond A. Harsfield opened a winery, called Onslow Wine Cellars, located at Holly Ridge. Scuppernong lead the charge in the rebirth of the wine industry in North Carolina, with French-American hybrid varietals following in their wake.  The first Vinifera grapevines were planted in North Carolina in 1980. Today, the North Carolina wine industry is booming, with four American Viticultural Areas (Haw River Valley AVA, Swan Creek AVA, Upper Hiwassee Highlands AVA, and the Yadkin Valley AVA), over 400 vineyards, and around 200 separate wineries.  Indeed, today North Carolina ranks tenth in both grape and wine production in the United States. This bottle was acquired from Total Wine in Phoenix by yours truly, and there is an amusing anecdote associated with this bottle--find out more in the podcast!

Chris is a 3rd generation member of his family agribusiness located in Wray, Georgia. Started by Chris’ grandfather, Jacob Paulk, Muscadine Products Corporation is an agribusiness enterprise based in the middle of the world’s largest muscadine vineyards. In today’s episode, I will ask Chris to share:  How his grandfather invited Chris to start a new venture on the family farm after he graduated from college. Paulk family values Chris learned from his Grandfather and Dad that have been successfully transferred from generation to generation? How Chris and his family deal with disagreements on business issue. Things he learned about working in the family business that might be helpful if you are considering joining your family business. What has been the greatest challenge to the Paulk family business since his grandfather died in 2017. To learn more about Chris Paulk and Muscadine Products Corporation, visit their website at: http://www.muscadineproducts.com Are you interested in learning more about growing your family business and planning for a successful transition? You may be interested in joining a virtual family business roundtable. To learn more, check it out at www.tncfb.com/family-business-roundtables/ or call Greg directly at 615-513-9028.

It is said that Georgia is a state of mind, but in actuality, wine in Georgia can be considered a state of confusion! The reason for this, is, of course, the American state of Georgia shares a name with the Republic of Georgia in the Caucasus Mountains, which has a very long history of winemaking going back an absolute minimum of 6,000 years. The history of winemaking in the State of Georgia, on the other hand, is decidedly recent by this timescale.  While Georgia was an important winegrowing region of the United States in the 19th century, ranked sixth in production among U.S. states by 1900, this state suffered very early on from Prohibition.  The prohibition movement in Georgia took hold in 1907, derailing the industry here until, like so many states, the early 1980's.  Today, Georgia is the leading producer of wines made from the various Muscadine grape varietals--a type of grape we will eventually meet on this podcast, I promise.  Georgia is also home to two AVAs, the Upper Hiwassee Highlands AVA, a bi-state appellation which covers parts of Cherokee and Clay counties in the southwestern North Carolina; along with Towns, Union and Fannin Counties in northwestern Georgia, and the Dahlonega Plateau AVA, (established in 2018) which covers most of Lumpkin, Dawson, White, Pickens, and Cherokee Counties. This AVA is about 133 square miles in size and includes (at last count) 7 wineries and 8 commercial vineyards totaling just over 110 acres of planted vines. The wine we are looking at today, the 2011 Propaganda from Frogtown Cellars, comes from the Dahlonega Plateau AVA itself.  This wine is a blend of 57% Merlot, 17% Cabernet Sauvignon, 13% Petit Verdot, and 13% Malbec.  This, as we discussed in the Idaho episode, makes this wine a Bordeaux-style blend, which are often called Meritage blends in the USA--though that's a subject for a later episode. (As a tangent, I found myself rather impressed with the list of varietals they're growing as a whole, incidentally: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Sangiovese, Tannat, Touriga National, Malbec, Petit Verdot, Nebbiolo, Chambourcin, Teroldego, Norton, Chardonnay, Viognier, Marsanne, Roussanne, Sauvignon Blanc, Sauvignon Gris, Seyval Blanc, Petit Manseng, Vidal Blanc, Greco di Tufo and Muscato.  Dang.  Some of these are grapes we will visit in future podcasts, but I digress.) This bottle of the 2011 Propaganda was kindly provided by friends Aileen and John, who also form my drinking cohorts for this episode, alongside an appearance from Mark Beres, the CEO of Flying Leap Vineyards.

Facts about the native American grape, the Muscadine. A visit with JD Dalton, Vinyard Manager at Tsali Notch Vineyard, Monroe County, TN - News about the 2018 Annual National Muscadine Festival (held the last full weekend of September)

Ocilla Mayor and Small Town Podcast host Matt Seale continues a conversation with Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black about how big the industry is. He also sits down with Irwin County farmer Gary Paulk to discuss the Paulk Family legacy and how they got into growing muscadines, starting from 5 acres to what is now the largest muscadine vineyard in the world. For more info, visit www.smalltownpodcast.com

Presented by Nancie McDermott, Cookbook Author, Cooking Teacher, and confirmed Southern Belle According to acclaimed cookbook author Nancie McDermott, there are a dozen iconic fruits which hold an historic and enduring place on the Southern table. A Southerner herself, Nancie is in Chicago to spread the gospel of these beloved fruits and share the delicious rituals that surround them so that we Northerners can bring them across the Mason-Dixon line to our tables. To further whet our appetites, Nancie has just published Fruit: A Savor The South Cookbook. With equal parts enthusiasm for history and gusto for easy-to-make recipes, the collection considers six wild and six cultivated fruits that thrive in the region’s long, hot growing season. They include: Blackberries, Cantaloupes, Damson Plums, Figs, Mayhaws, Muscadine and Scuppernong Grapes, Pawpaws, Peaches, Wild Persimmons, Quince, Strawberries, and Watermelon. Nancie will provide a tasting of several recipes along with tips on making the most of fresh fruit all year long. Copies of Nancie’s book will be available for purchase and signing with profits used to fund the Culinary Historians of Chicago. BIO: Nancie McDermott is a native North Carolinian who headed off to Thailand as a Peace Corps volunteer in the late 1970’s, where she taught English as a Second Language. She returned to North Carolina and taught middle school English and social studies. Marriage took her to Southern California where a notice for “Food Writing #101” in UCLA’s extension program catalog caught her eye. It’s been food and stories ever since, with free lancing for newspapers and magazines, teaching cooking classes, and writing cookbooks. Fruit: A Savor the South Cookbook is book #14. Nancie’s early work, focusing on Thai cuisine, reflects her time as a Peace Corps volunteer. More recently, she has explored iconic Southern dishes, including critically acclaimed books on “Southern Soups and Stews, “Southern Pies” and “Southern Cakes.” Her husband’s job brought her family home to North Carolina in 1999, where she continues doing all the above plus blogging about food, creating online cooking classes for Craftsy.com, and working on food and travel videos. Her website and blog are at nanciemcdermott.com Recorded at Imperial Towers, Chicago, IL on November 4, 2017. http://culinaryhistorians.org/souths-fruity-history/

Muscadine Bloodline calls in and the guys talk about their upcoming show in Delaware, how they formed Muscadine Bloodline and how they picked their unique name!

On this episode I’m out in the garden preparing for and conducting my first pruning of a two-year-old muscadine hybrid grapevine. I give some backstory on why I began the garden, how it was constructed and arranged, and how I began growing grapes in my Central Florida backyard. Hopefully this is good practice for when I retire to own and operate a beautiful, sprawling vineyard. To spend my days in hours of deep, meditative care of my vines, before pulling corks that evening. In preparation I learn about spur vs. cane pruning styles, and that grapes are a tough and tenacious plant. Ever grow any grapes?  Thanks for downloading!

This week, Lindsay reflects on the events in Las Vegas (where she used to live), talks about meeting up with her mother and going to a wedding, meets up with some friends she made on the trip west, and she and Cynthiana the dog get used to traveling by bike. Also, Jake gets to give his bleeper a nice little workout!

Great Escape Podcast is an audio version of the blog posts from Great Escape Farms, Specializing in Unique Edible Plants, Permaculture Gardens, and Homesteading. Great Escape Farms is now on Patreon! If you enjoy our work and want to help support us, please check out our Patreon page at: https://www.patreon.com/gef You can support us for as little as $1.  The blog posts can be viewed at GreatEscapeFarms.com.  This week we cover Food Forest Garden Update, Companion Planting and Fruit Tree Fair Workshop Notes, Sustainable Homesteading in WV, Pruning Muscadine Grape Vines, and The Week in Review.

Rick Riddle on the history of the wild muscadine, the wine his family creates, and tales of bootlegging

In our yearly moment of clearheadedness after the Festival of Barrel-Aged Beers, we take on four non-alcoholic beers for the sake of science. To take our minds off of these near beers, we go over all of our FoBAB beer highlights. But you’ll learn a lot about how non-alcoholic beer is made, why there are no NA-IPAs, and what might be the worst beer-like drink we’ve had on the show. We also find out what Craig is doing in a Petsmart (Petco?), what happens when Ryan pours his own beer, and how to elevate High Life beyond reproach. NA Beers: Buckler Non-Alcoholic Beer (Heineken) Krombacher Weizen Alkoholfrei Kaliber (Guiness) Clausthaler Dry-Hopped Ryan’s FoBAB Top 5 List: 5. Horse Thief Hollow - Margarita Gose (Gose w/ black limes, orange peel, and sea salt aged in tequilla barrels) 4. Mikerphone - Dynamite with a Laser Beam (Saison w/ blueberries, raspberries, and tart cherries aged in wine puncheons) 3. Weldwerks - Peach Climacteric (Sour blend w/ peaches aged in bourbon barrels) 2. Goose Island Clybourn - Big Lazy Joe (Imperial brown ale aged in bourbon barrels and blended with coffee) 1. Trinity - President’s Club (Sour pale ale w/ tangerine zest, coriander, peaches, and apricots aged on French oak) Craig’s FoBAB Top 5 List: 5. Off Color - Market Rate (Wild ale aged in red wine barrels with green strawberries) 4. Jester King - 2016 Spon 3 (or 4?) (Gueuze-style blended sour aged in wine puncheons) 3. Goose Island Clybourn - Impervious (Imperial stout aged in Woodford Reserve barrels) 2. Weldwerks - Peach Climacteric (Sour blend w/ peaches aged in bourbon barrels) 1. Wicked Weed - White Angel (Sour ale w/ Muscadine grapes aged in wine puncheons)

Great Escape Podcast is an audio version of the blog posts from Great Escape Farms, Specializing in Unique Edible Plants, Permaculture Gardens, and Homesteading. The blog posts can be viewed at com.  This week we cover; The Week in Review, Red Wiggler Worm Compost Bin, Backyard Nursery Propagation Bed Winterization, Harvesting Latefry Muscadine.

Great Escape Podcast is an audio version of the blog posts from Great Escape Farms, Specializing in Unique Edible Plants, Permaculture Gardens, and Homesteading. The blog posts can be viewed at GreatEscapeFarms.com.  This week we cover; The Week in Review, Harvesting Ison Muscadine, Making Homemade Sloppy Joe for a Group, and Propagating Comfrey.

Great Escape Podcast is an audio version of the blog posts from Great Escape Farms, Specializing in Unique Edible Plants, Permaculture Gardens, and Homesteading. The blog posts can be viewed at GreatEscapeFarms.com.  This week we cover; Sweet Scarlet Goumi Plant Information, Unique Plants for Sale at Great Escape Nursery, Muscadine Plant Information, Asparagus Plant Information, and Great Escape Nursery Grand Opening

NC Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Martin talks about improving the state court system. Researchers are studying acorns to test the health of the forest ecosystem. Muscadine & Scuppernong grapes are boosting the health of both people & our state's economy.

When Paige Logan and Heather Looney say that life begins at North Forty…they really believe it.  They take the stage as the new high-energy duo North Forty, their music is a creation of their collective experiences, which is meant to inspire and empower others.  Their debut single “Hey Girl Hey” was released last summer, and their full-length album just hit stores.  We caught up with the duo at a special listening party to celebrate.

Today's episode is all about the Druids!  Alright, so it's an introduction to modern Druidry, with an interview in “The Pagan Corner”.  Plus, a bodice-ripping good time that has the occasional Druid and Immortal thrown in for good measure.ShownotesHousekeeping:- winner of the Miso Crafty Knits project bag and a skein of yarn is: Anjanette (explodingpinecone on Ravelry)- new contest for April - see photos/details below. Eyes and Ears:Karen Marie Moning's Highlander Romance novels (the "bodice-rippers"!) (Wiki page) The Pagan Corner:An interview with modern-day Druid Teo Bishop.   Books & Authors recommended by Teo: Issac BonewitsBonewits's Essential Guide to DruidismJohn Michael Greer (not recommended directly on the podcast, but a great read)The Druidry Handbook: Spiritual Practice Rooted in the Living EarthPhillip Carr-Gomm (Chosen Chief Druid of OBOD)Druid Mysteries: Ancient Wisdom for the 21st CenturyLinks to Druid OrganizationsOBOD (Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids) ADF (Ár nDraíocht Féin: A Druid Fellowship) Bits I mentioned during/after the interview:- Knitted Morse code - a CBC radio interview with Kristin Haring on the show "Spark" (scroll down the the section called "The Beauty of Binary".- DJ Conway's book "Magick of the Gods & Goddesses"- Joseph Campbell, writer of books on myth, religion and archetype. Music:Green Druid, "Dignity", from MusicAlley.com Yarn to win this month - Springtree Road, Emeline sock (50% Merino/50% Silk, 434yards per 100grams) in "Anenome" colourway.Muscadine sock (75% SW Merino/25% Nylon, 460yards per 100grams) in "Bramble" colourway. To enter to win one of these lovely skeins, please leave a comment in the shownotes with a Ravelry ID or another way to contact you.  Deadline is Monday, April 30th, around 9pm Pacific, midnight Eastern time.

It will be time soon enough to prune our fruit trees. Right now we’re focused on planting. The big fruit initiative for 2012 is blueberries. Also, our plans for strawberries, olives, pomegranates, figs, peaches, a muscadine, and a persimmon

Looking forward to enjoying the Super Sweet Scuppernong Wine from the Butterducks Winery. Lady Sweet Tea explores Muscadine grape history while learning more about this wonderful grape. Lady Sweet Tea invites you to be a part of the journey where life and good food meet. Join the conversation about great cheese, good wine, and locally produced food.