Growing Grapes—and Interest

We’re not only making great wines in the Finger Lakes. We’re growing interest around the world. Perhaps best known for our world-class Rieslings, we also cultivate esteemed vinifera varieties along with heirloom hybrids and native grapes that honor our heritage and continue to shape our future.

The first reference to vinifera grapes in the Finger Lakes was in the Pleasant Valley Wine Company sales catalog in 1862. Our history with these European “traditional” wine grapes is long and our future with them is bright. More and more, they define the fine wines that the Finger Lakes region is known for.

White V. vinifera

Chardonnay

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Fresher, green orchard fruit that can be restrained or have tangible minerality.
  • Delicate with crisp acidity, and typically light and bright due to our cool climate.
  • Most producers using stainless steel or neutral oak barrels, but new oak is subtle and allows fruit freshness to shine.
  • ML depends on estate’s preference.
  • Used widely for traditional method sparkling wine production.
  • Original Charles Fournier plantings from the 1960s are still farmed today at Standing Stone Vineyards.

Gewürztraminer

  • Ripening: Late season.
  • Fruit-driven, spicy, and floral.
  • Restrained due to our cool climate, offering beautiful balance to the intensity of fruit and florals.
  • Fresher, lighter mouthfeel than warmer climate expressions with higher acid profiles.

Gruner Veltliner

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Citrus, green fruited, and herbal/spicy.
  • Crisp, food-friendly style is most typical.

Pinot Gris/Grigio

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Orchard fruit, well-developed fruit character without being overly rich.
  • Typically, less opulent than Alsace or Oregon Pinot Gris.
  • Moderate acidity.
  • Across the region, both light and lean and more rounded styles are produced.

Riesling

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Vibrant citrus and crisp orchard fruits, subtle florals, distinctive minerality.
  • High acidity and raciness is a defining characteristic, adding balance.
  • Fruit purity, precision, and concentration from long ripening period created by lake influence, which leads to ageability.
  • Range from bone dry to sweet, with ice wines’ and late harvest wines’ sweetness balanced by cool-climate acidity.
  • Many wineries produce a range of style expressions from dry to sweet, and traditional “Sekt” style traditional method sparkling to forced carbonation.

Red V. vinifera

Blaüfrankisch/Lemberger

  • Ripening: Mid-late season
  • Labeled as both names across the region.
    • Blaüfrankisch preferred for its traditional Austrian heritage, some older producers lean on the German Lemberger.
  • Fresh, dark red fruit, subtle spice and mineral character; bright acidity.
  • Gaining traction as a chillable red in some cases when unoaked, and also made in a more dark-fruited and structured style.
  • Cabernet Franc/Blaüfrankisch is a classic Finger Lakes blend.

Cabernet Franc

  • Ripening: Mid (rosé), late (reds) season.
  • Characterized by bright red fruit; herbaceous, peppery, subtle earthiness depending on vintage.
  • Lighter and fresher profiles due to our cool climate, increased acidity, and aromatics.
  • Commonly used for wonderfully fruity and slightly savory dry rosé wines; one of the more popular grapes for rosé production in the region.
  • Production styles vary from traditional oak aging to stainless steel and some amphorae.
  • Bottled as single varietal wines, in Meritage blends with Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, and as a classic Finger Lakes blend with Blau/Lember.

Cabernet Sauvignon

  • Ripening: Late season.
  • Fresher, leaner structure to be expected than those from warm climates.
  • Clear red fruit expression.
  • Marked vintage variation for ripening ability.
  • Common in Meritage blends with Cabernet Franc and Merlot.

Merlot

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Fresh red and blue fruits.
  • Soft tannins, balanced acidity.
  • Often used in Meritage style blends with Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc; may be labeled as Meritage or with a proprietary name.

Pinot Noir

  • Ripening: Mid season.
  • Delicate red fruit, earth, and floral.
  • Lighter body, cool-climate elegance
  • Some of the oldest Pinot Noir vines in America can be found in the Finger Lakes; Dr. Konstantin Frank included in early plantings starting in 1958.
  • Used widely for traditional method sparkling wine production.

Saperavi

  • Ripening: Mid season.
  • Rich, black-fruited, earthy.
  • Firm structure, high acidity, powerful, age worthy.
  • Regional specialty, with a handful of producers making it; very rare outside of its Georgian homeland.
  • Gaining popularity for use in dry rosé and sparkling.

Zweigelt

  • Ripening: Early-mid season.
  • Fresh red and dark fruits with peppery spice.
  • Bright acidity and moderate tannins.
  • Also used in dry rosé.

Hybrids/Natives

In many ways, we owe our success to our history with heirloom grapes, also known as hybrids and natives. We have always made award-winning wine from these varieties including the “Great Champagne of the Western World,” Pleasant Valley’s gold-winning Catawba sparkling from the World’s Fair in 1873. And we continue to pioneer new cold-hearty hybrids that yield innovative and intriguing wines.

There is a subset of historically significant hybrids that played a pivotal role in pre-prohibition wine making in the Finger Lakes, primarily for sparkling wine. They are often referred to as native grapes but are not technically full V. labrusca.

White hybrids

Cayuga White

  • Ripening: Early season.
  • Developed in the Finger Lakes at Cornell University’s New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in 1945; commercially released in the1970’s.
  • Cross of V. Labrusca hybrid Schuyler and French hybrid Seyval Blanc.
  • Productive with strong disease resistance, with some producers farming fully organically, which is difficult for a wet region.
  • Citrus and tropical fruits with high acidity.
  • Used in refreshing, crisp and light white wines and blends; incredibly popular as an off-dry or sparkling wine.

Seyval Blanc

  • Ripening: Early-mid season.
  • Successful French hybrid and parent grape to Cayuga.
  • Historically significant as a cold-hardy, early ripening grape well-suited to the climate.
  • Clean, bright citrus and green orchard fruit.
  • High acidity.
  • Most used in white blends or as a blending grape to add acidity.

Vidal Blanc

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • French hybrid created for cold hardiness to withstand cool French winters; became a historically significant grape in early Finger Lakes viticulture.
  • Noted for intense acidity, lending to balance in sweeter wines.
  • Widely known for ice wine production in Canada, and some can be found here in the Finger Lakes as well; championed for ice wines here by some of the longstanding producers in the region.

Vignoles

  • Ripening: Early-mid season.
  • Renamed Vignoles right here in the Finger Lakes in 1970.
  • Intense tropical fruits, citrus, and floral; high acidity.
  • Known for its use in off dry blends, where the cool climate acidity balances the rich sweetness, as well as late harvest or ice wines; some producers have become well-known for incredibly age worthy drier expressions.

Red hybrids

Baco Noir

  • Ripening: Mid season.
  • French hybrid bred for phylloxera resistance and planted in Europe; both cold hardy and disease resistant.
  • Rustic, earthy, smoky.
  • Medium body with firm tannins and high acidity.
  • Historically significant in red blends.

Chambourcin

  • Ripening: TBD
  • French hybrid with unknown parentage and good disease resistance; planted widely up and down the east coast.
  • Fruity, spicy, earthy.
  • Often made in an off-dry style or blended.

Chancellor

  • Ripening: TBD
  • French hybrid now grown almost exclusively in the Eastern US and Canada.
  • Dark fruit, deep and inky color.
  • Typically not made as a varietal wine and often blended with Merlot.

Marechal Foch

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • French hybrid developed in Alsace for cold and disease resistance.
  • Dark fruit, subtle earthiness.
  • Historically significant in red blends.

Heirlooms with historical significance

Catawba

  • Ripening: Late season.
  • Most modern viticulturists believe it’s a hybrid that emerged after European settlers brought V. vinifera cuttings to North America.
  • Semillon is the V. vinifera parent, crossed with V. labrusca.
  • Often called an “American grape” due to this history.
  • Fruity and grapey.
  • Used today in off-dry sparkling wines and popular in pétillant naturel.

Concord

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Developed in Mass. in 1849, and roughly one-third V. vinifera; genetically identical to crosses between Catawba and V. labrusca.
  • Most widely planted hybrid, important in juice and jelly production and significant part of table grape industry in Western NY.
  • Historically significant as variety used in sacramental wines.
  • O-Neh-Da Vineyard, the oldest sacramental winery in America, still produces a Concord altar wine.
  • Used in some sparkling wines and pétillant naturel, and blended.

Delaware

  • Ripening: Mid-late season.
  • Another American hybrid with V. labrusca parentage.
  • Historically significant in the Finger Lakes as a being part of the blend in Pleasant Valley Wine Company’s early “Great Western Champagne” that won first place at the 1873 Vienna Exposition.
  • Used today in sparkling wines and pétillant naturel.