Wine

To lighten things up, maybe I should discuss why I wrote a post last night about why we can't all just get along and love each other and stuff--I had a lot of wine yesterday! We're visiting Justin's family in Ithaca, as you've probably noticed we often do. As an early birthday celebration, Justin and I borrowed his sister Weatherly for the day as a designated driver and toured wineries along Cayuga Lake. For future reference, since otherwise I'm sure I'll forget, here are the highlights of those we visited:

Swedish Hill Winery: Riesling! (they all have great Rieslings, but this is the only place we bought any) and I think one called Just Peachy! that Justin really liked (it wasn't one of the wines I tried) and we brought home because I thought it smelled good even though I didn't taste it. I also thought their Reserve Chardonnay was lovely, and their Svetska Red is good for a sweeter red (usually not to my taste because sweet reds remind me of communion wine).

Goose Watch Winery: My favorites were their Chambourcin (which in this case I tried but Justin didn't) and their pear wine. It's on a hill overlooking the lake and has frontage, so you can get their by boat. A group of half a dozen college-age guys and girls called from the lakefront and wanted someone to pick them up, but seeing as the only person there was the one server, they didn't get a ride, and they were complaining about it when they came up, despite their appearance of robust health and the fact that it couldn't possibly have been that bad. Or rather, the guys were complaining. Anyway, the server was underage--I think this was the case at another winery, which seems kind of weird, but then there are a ton of wineries in a sparsely populated area so it must be hard to find employees, and it was a Monday, and she was really nice--we did buy more at the wineries where the servers were old enough to drink and thus to tell us what the wines were like.

Thirsty Owl Wine Company: This was the only place that really blew us away with their reds (although of course they had a good Riesling too). We took home bottles of their Syrah and Cab/Syrah/Malbec blend, and had both of them plus their Pinot Noir shipped to Dad. I think the overall quality of the wines was highest here, at least to my unsophisticated palate.

Hosmer Winery: Somehow we managed to bust out of here just with a bottle of Estate Red, a pleasant table wine.

Finally we staggered to Sheldrake Point Vineyard, which has an enormous selection of wines. We really liked the Gewuerztraminer and the Luckystone Red, another nice blend. Then we ate dinner at the winery's restaurant, Simply Red, where Monday nights are Southern night--cornbread, beans, and ribs, yum!

Not a bad way to spend a summer day, all in all.