Burgundy’s most famous idea about wine is now taking root in New York's Finger Lakes
Just 60-plus years after planting vinifera vines, standout vineyards across New York’s Finger Lakes wine region are proving that soil and site matters.
One thousand years.
That’s how long it took growers in Burgundy, led by monks hell-bent to find the best terroir to showcase God’s glory, to establish and agree on the most auspicious patches of soil for growing certain grapes.
The effort started in the Middle Ages. Over multiple centuries of observation, experimentation, and rigorous testing, the climat system began to take hold in the 13th and 14th centuries.
Sixty-eight years.
New York’s Finger Lakes growers, meanwhile, planted their first Vitis vinifera in the late 1950s. Growers and vintners admit that they’re in the early days of establishing which sites offer ideal conditions for the successful cultivation of Riesling, Cabernet Franc, Chardonnay, and other grapes. However, a hierarchy of vineyards based on soil, elevation, and relative proximity to key lakes has begun to emerge.
“I woke up in the middle of the night last February, and the hierarchy of our vineyard sites became completely clear to me,” says Rick Rainey, managing partner at Forge Cellars. “I’d known it for a long time, but I hadn’t openly talked about it.
“That morning, I spoke to Léana [Godard, Forge’s winemaker] about the concept, and she instantly named all of the best sites we work with that show their terroir year after year,” he says. “It was the same list I had in my head. The Cistercian monks were the first to recognize that terroir is so powerful it eclipses vintage variation.”
The idea that wines from the Finger Lakes can offer world-class transcendence, especially from certain sites, is just taking shape. And yet, as Rainey and others openly admit, there is still much to discover and learn.
The untapped potential of the Finger Lakes
The Finger Lakes region is home to upwards of 140 wineries and more than 10,000 acres of grapes under vine. About 90% of the Empire State’s wine is produced in the cool-climate region. There are 11 long, narrow glacial lakes throughout the region, but production is largely centralized around Seneca, Cayuga, Keuka, and Canandaigua lakes.
“We are only scratching the surface understanding what’s possible here in the Finger Lakes,” says Fred Merwarth, head winemaker and co-owner of Hermann J. Wiemer Vineyard and Standing Stone Vineyards. “But it is clear that the intense cold of the winter here in upstate New York is a limiting factor, and that the vineyards around these lakes can consistently produce excellent wines.”
The lakes are deep, large, and surrounded by steeply pitched shores. Their size moderates temperatures in the vineyards planted on sloped shores, which makes the production of Vitis vinifera feasible.
A range of hybrid, native, and vinifera grapes are grown in the Finger Lakes. Still and sparkling productions of Riesling, Cabernet Franc, Pinot Noir, and Chardonnay generally garner the greatest critical acclaim.
Each lake provides its own microclimate, shaped by its volume, depth, and soil type.
“There is so much diversity in the soils here,” says Frederick Frank, president of Dr. Konstantin Frank Winery. “That’s partially due to the different soil types created when the glaciers were receding. There are certain generalities. Our Keuka Lake site, for example, offers rockier soils with shale, and steeper slopes. This creates a more mineral character, especially in our dry Rieslings.”
Creating world-class viticulture
In 1958, Konstantin Frank, Frederick’s grandfather, changed history when he became the first person to dare plant Vitis vinifera for commercial production in the Finger Lakes.
The grapes were considered more delicate and less likely to survive the harsh winters of upstate New York than their French-American hybrid and native grape brethren. Frank’s vineyard on the west side of Keuka Lake showed that it was possible to grow a range of classic grapes in the shallow, well-draining, sloped vineyards that surround the larger lakes.
“It took decades for people to accept his teachings,” says Frank, of his grandfather. “Hybrids and native grapes are less delicate and easier to grow. Planting more delicate varieties, especially when consumers were happy to drink hybrid grapes, just wasn’t a motivating factor in planting decisions.”
Merwarth says that other major commercial vinifera experiments weren’t launched until the 1960s and ’70s. Trailblazers included Bully Hill Vineyards’ sites established on Keuka Lake in 1970, Standing Stone Vineyards on Seneca Lake in 1972, and Hermann J. Wiemer’s plantings on Seneca Lake in 1973.
“At that point, there was nothing planted on Cayuga, but there were a lot of sites popping up on Seneca and Keuka,” says Merwarth. “Hermann was familiar with areas in Germany that grew Riesling and experienced the kind of cold we have here. He didn’t have any data though.”
What has become a revolution began with a series of educated guesses and gambles. Lucky for everyone, wine lovers among them, it paid off.
“Meaningful plantings continued throughout the 1970s, with a ‘throw it at the wall and see what sticks’ approach,” says Merwarth. “The shift was seismic, and after a few years of experimentation, everyone started making better decisions.”
The viability of Riesling, Pinot Noir, and other vinifera varieties were broadly accepted in the 1980s and ’90s. Frank says that plantings focused on Seneca and Keuka lakes because their soils were “more or less perfect” for growing vinifera.
“Today, we are seeing a true renaissance after a decades-long uphill battle trying to convince members of the industry that vinifera grapes could thrive in certain places here,” says Frank. “Now, we’re starting to talk more about single vineyards, and the ways certain sites consistently express greatness over multiple generations. This has been going on in Napa for decades, but it is really just taking hold here now.”
Digging into the greatest terroirs and discovering more
A new group of pioneers has taken the lessons of the previous generation to heart. They have deepened and elevated the development of both established and emerging vineyard sites.
“We are currently restoring this tiny, two-acre, low-yielding site growing Chardonnay,” says Christopher Bennem, co-principal of the recently launched Glen Hollow Vineyard. Its estate vineyard was first planted in 1988 by John Ingle on Canandaigua Lake.
The vineyard, while small, has some mighty bona fides. “We are just down the street from Ingle Vineyards. It’s the only single-vineyard site in the Finger Lakes that has produced four vintages for four different wineries at the hands of three different winemakers that has received ratings in the 90s from four different ratings agencies,” he says.
Bennem sees himself, amid the slow and careful replanting of severely underperforming vines, as a custodian of “the history and potential” of this region.
At Forge Cellars, Rainey and Godard work with a group of long-term growers sprinkled along the southeast side of Seneca.
“We started seeing a common thread across vintages in certain vineyards,” says Rainey. “So we started making single-vineyard, bone-dry Rieslings, all made in the same way in neutral barrels. Who in their right minds would make 16 different Rieslings? But our effort was born out of curiosity and our eagerness to share the magic of these sites.”
After a few years, Godard says they expanded the exploration to Cabernet Franc and Pinot Noir.
“Without officially discussing it, we all internally had the same ideas of the best sites,” she says. “Internally, we referred to them as Premier Cru and Grand Cru.”
Rainey says that the growers have become invested in the exploration. That’s in part because other brands see the success that some of these single-vineyard productions have earned can mean that their fruit is more sought after than ever.
Kelby James Russell, cofounder and winemaker at Apollo’s Praise, says that there are vineyards across the Finger Lakes that demonstrate consistent and exciting characteristics. At first glance, many of these sites are difficult to identify as special. Russell sees many decades of happy discovery ahead.
“The Knoll at Lahoma Vineyard makes standout dry Riesling year after year, with electricity and opulence, and a saltiness,” says Russell. “But if you were just driving by, you’d never guess that those hills would make some of the best Riesling in the Finger Lakes.”
Winemakers and growers in the Finger Lakes region have, over 68 years, come a long way to understand the intricacies of its microclimates and vineyards. But there’s a long way to go. And don’t expect an official Grand Cru classification to emerge anytime in the next 932 years, if ever.
“The idea of anyone successfully creating a classified vineyard system and getting people to agree on it is laughable,” says Russell. “But instead of worrying about that, let’s just focus on the sites producing wine that blows our socks off.”
The next time you want to dig into the nuances of Finger Lakes terroir, there are a handful of vineyards you may want to seek out.
Finger Lakes vineyards to seek out
Magdalena Vineyard
TheMagdalena Vineyard is 2.5 acres and was planted in 2004 at Hermann J. Wiemer on Seneca Lake. It’s a warm site that offers optimal fruit development. Through careful farming and cellar work, the vineyard’s Cabernet Franc bottlings have helped the long-simmering argument to make the red variety New York’s flagship red.
The Knoll at Lahoma
The Knoll is a two-acre single vineyard within the greater Lahoma Vineyards. Situated on the western slopes of Seneca Lake above the shale line with distinct sandstone soils, it’s owned and farmed by Kelby James Russell and his wife and partner at Apollo’s Praise, Julia Rose-Hoyle. The current release is sold out, but stay tuned for a new release soon.
Eugenia Vineyard
This small plot within Dr. Konstantin Frank Winery’s larger Keuka Estate vineyards was originally planted in 1968. The old-vine Riesling grows in shallow, slate-heavy soils, which produce wines of extreme brightness and shimmering minerality.
Breakneck Creek
This vineyard is located on the east side of Seneca Lake, with steep, shale-rich silt-loam vineyards. Forge Cellars is fond of this site for dry, delicate Rieslings that offer salt, vibrancy, and a long, silky finish.
