Gretchen Neuman
VinoVerve Editor

Tuesday as it turns out, is a much better day for trying to find an open winery. At least it is in Ohio.

Tuesday morning, bright and early I pulled into the Firelands Winery parking (please note if using GPS to find this location, there is construction in the area and you will be rerouted).

I was excited to visit this winery as I had actually tasted the wine from here before. Back in 2007, when VinoVerve was young, Rory, Kevin and I had dinner at Salpicon in Chicago and drank wine and chatted with Henry Bishop. During that dinner, while eating great Mexican food, we drank wine from all over the world. This included wine from Missouri, Quebec and Ohio. This is one of the reasons that I have become so passionate about local wine. The Ohio wine was the 2005 Firelands Winery Gewurztraminer, Isle St. George, Sandusky, Ohio.

I have to admit that I was curious about the locations listed for the wine. Isle Saint George is on an island (duh) in Lake Erie but is the name of a community, not the name of the island, itself. It is located on North Bass Island and is part of the Put-in-Bay Township in Ottawa County, Ohio. The township consists of 7 of the 31 Lake Erie Islands (some of which are now just reefs) that are shared between the States of Michigan and Ohio and the Province of Ontario. Several of the Lake Erie Islands, including North Bass Island are known for producing wine grapes. In many cases these wineries declined after prohibition but have resurfaced since the 1980s.

In the case of Isle Saint George, the community was designated an AVA in 1982. By law, the AVA must be listed “St.” instead of “Saint” George (government often confuses me to the point of creating a headache). The weather in the area is milder than the surrounding mainlands as the waters of Lake Erie are the warmest of all the Great Lakes. As a result, vitis vinifera grape varietals are able to thrive. The island is famous for producing Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Gewürztraminer, Pinot Gris, Pinot Noir and Riesling far more north than usual.

However, the Firelands Winery wines also list Sandusky, Ohio (home to Cedar Point) on their labels. This is because the grapes are grown in Isle St. George but are produced at the winery in Sandusky.

Confused yet? Wait until you hear about the rest of the history of the winery.

I will give you a hint: It has something to do with Marguerite’s VinoVerve posts! The first person to most fully explain the connection (correctly, obviously) will win a Locapour T-shirt. Entries must be received before Thursday, October 22th at midnight CDT (yes, we are on Daylight Time).

Firelands Winery
917 Bardshar Rd.
Sandusky, OH 44870
(419) 625-5474

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Gretchen Neuman
VinoVerve Editor

That is the only conclusion that I can come to.  An extremely bad week for wine.  Particularly if the wine isn’t nearby.

Maryland’s efforts to reform their wine laws has failed for this year when HB 1262 died in committee.  They are gearing up for next year’s fight already and if you want to help you can contact Adam Borden here.

Consumers in New York lost their effort to be able to purchase wine in grocery stores even though you can already buy beer there.  This makes NO sense to me as we in Illinois can buy beer, wine and liquor in grocery stores and yet we still appear to have healthy number of liquor stores.  (maybe I should take a survey of my neighborhood vs. one in NYC to show difference…)

and as finally, as Kevin pointed out yesterday, Michigan’s new, ridiculous law regarding wine shipping went into effect.

Over all?  Not a good week for wine.  Illinois’ proposed new law is still waiting to come back out of the rules committee and to progress.  If you are interested in working to opening the Illinois wine market to  outside retailers, please come join us at the Illinois Wine Consumer Coaltion (www. illinoiswineconsumers.org).  Let’s make sure that consumers SOMEWHERE in the United States is free to buy the wine of their choice legally.

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