Wrapping Up the Vermont Wrap Up

Have I convinced you about Vermont yet? This green and gentle state, for now, safe from the fires ravaging the west, still cold enough for grapes to struggle to produce (historically the most wonderful locations for wine) is already producing lovely and sometimes profound wines and will without a doubt become an important wine region. Affordable for the newcomer, this is the place where small farms can get ahead. It is in Vermont where the Euro vigneron model can proceed and turn industrial winemaking around and bring it back to where it belongs. This is why it moves me. There are and will be more new voices in 2021 as projects such as Chertok and Kalchē get going. Max Rose of Chertok Wines planted four acres and until they are ready—within 2-3 years—he’ll be working with some purchased grapes, his 17 acres of apples and 12 Imertian qvevri. He will be continuing the anything-fermentable-is-fair-game approach. There’s also Kalchē Wine Cooperative, in Fletcher, not far from where David Keck has set up in Cambridge, with contracts in Mad River Valley.