The Gerogian grape Saperavi is quickly becoming a favorite of producers in the Finger Lakes. One of the first plantings of this grape came at Standing Stone vineyard and they have been excelling at this particular varietal for a while now. One variant the winery offers is a rose made from this grape, and with … Read more
While we’ve visited Finger Lakes wineries many times over the years, we only visited Standing Stone for the first time in 2020 on the recommendation of a friend to try out their Saperavi. But after arriving, we found that we enjoyed just about everything the winery offered on our flight. In talking to our server … Read more
When you look at the bottle of Standing Stone Blanc de Blanc from the Finger Lakes, you may be a little confused. Its branding leans in heavily on Hermann J Wiemer, the parent winery of Standing Stone that is located just across Seneca Lake. But while this one does carry the Hermann J Wiemer branding, … Read more
If you’re like us, your first thoughts when it comes to booking a wine tour in Piedmont is all about Barolo. Arguably one of the most famous wines in the world, and the most acclaimed Nebbiolo on the planet, Barolo has lifted Piedmont’s reputation as a fine wine producing region to the likes of Burgundy … Read more
One of the things students in WSET Diploma classes must learn is how to taste wine blind. Part of this is simply to get better at tasting wine. The other part of this is that the WSET Diploma exams that have tasting components often require us to identify characteristics in the wine such as its … Read more
The Finger Lakes is a stunning wine region in upstate New York that grows many cool climate grapes like Riesling, Pinot Noir, and Cabernet Franc to name a few. Throw on native US grapes, fruit wines, a growing beer scene, and impressive opportunities to get out in nature to hike to gorgeous waterfalls, and the … Read more
WSET Diploma D4 covers all things sparkling wine and, to me, was the most daunting outside of D3: Wines of the World. The reason for this is that while the category of sparkling wine does not have many broad topics, the devil is in the details with many nuanced topics on things like local laws, … Read more
If there was a module of WSET Diploma I was looking forward to, insofar as one can look forward to studying at this intense level, it most certainly was D5: Fortified Wines. Part of this was because I simply adore fortified wines and was looking forward to studying (read: drinking), part was because I knew … Read more
Our quest here at The Grape Pursuit is to try every commercially available wine variety in the world, and you can imagine that we do whatever we can in order to taste new grapes. This includes ordering them online at places like Wine.com, browsing obscure stores and the “other international” shelves larger wine stores, and … Read more
WSET Level 3 is an intense 10-week wine course that dives into many elements of wines of the world. As we’ve talked about WSET courses many times on this site, in this one we wanted to turn our attention to the exams specifically. Unlike the exams for WSET Level 1 and WSET Level 2, which … Read more
