Wine 101: Area wineries create unique vino blends to capture all palates By Marshanna Hester Origanal air dateMay 15, 2013 from WEEK-TV CENTRAL ILLINOIS -- Paul Hahn, co-owner of Mackinaw Valley Vineyard, believes youve got to be a little crazy to get in the wine business. Luckily for him and his wife Diane, crazy turned out to be clever. Its been 10 years since they opened what they call wine country in your own backyard. This was a corn field when Paul bought the property, said Diane. So everything you see here was planted or built by him. Grapes span 14.5 acres to create 22 varieties of vino at Mackinaw Valley Vineyard, many of them award-winning. But you wont find any popular bottles of wine, like Merlot or Zinfandel at an Illinois winery. Those grapes cant survive the cold winters. Diane said what they can grow produces one-of-a-kind wines that can stand up to anything. A good analogy is the Seyval Blanc that we grow, is a hybridized form, with parentage back to the Sauvignon Blanc that many people are familiar with, she said. It would take a very sophisticated palate if you take our dry white Seyval against a Sauvignon Blanc to have someone discern the difference. In 1998 there were 15 wineries in the state. There are now more than 90, generating more than $250 million a year. Rory Conner is the Executive Director of Kickapoo Creek Winery. He said, most of the wines produced in our area are sweeter wines. Its not necessarily because the wine makers themselves enjoy those types of wines, but for the area itself, thats what is selling, sweeter wines. The 22 wines produced at Kickapoo Creek Winery are made on site from grapes grown on 15-acres, and from juices and grapes purchased from local farmers. Conner said sales are increasing about 15 percent every year, and expects this year to be one of the most productive. There havent been hot spring days and the April showers havent hurt the crop. But he said too much rain is bad. The wetter they get the more plump they get, they lose their concentrations, said Conner. And when the grapes are stressed or theres a drought, they actually like that, there are more concentrations of the flavors and sugars. Mother Natures unpredictability means, each year, customers will have a different experience with the same wine. The flavor of a vino made with grapes from last years drought will be more intense compared to a wet year. I think some of the local customers like it, some dont, said Diane. But were not trying to be the McDonalds of wine making. The wines will vary from year to year. As the years pass, some expect the industrys growth to slow and the loss of some wineries. But that, they said, will increase the wine quality, and Illinois can gain the notoriety it deserves as a Midwestern wine state. To learn more about events these wineries offer, visit Mackinaw Valley Vineyards Web site and Kickapoo Creeks Web site.
Posted on: Sat, 21 Jun 2014 00:47:36 +0000
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