Staycation 2013: Long Cliff Winery

Wine-tastings: a mother-daughter tradition

One of the long-standing summertime traditions I have with my mother is an annual day trip to the vineyards of Niagara-On-The-Lake in Southern Ontario. For the past few summers however, this tradition has been bypassed due to me living in Dublin since 2008. Now that I've returned home to the states my mom & I decided to renew our grape-inspired jaunt.

This year, my mother was very pessimistic about the border crossing and unavoidable traffic on the bridges between the US and Canada. So we looked closer to home and chose to visit one of the vineyards on the US side along the Niagara Escarpment. Even better, we found a Groupon for a tour plus tastings at the Long Cliff Winery in Sanborn, NY! We hopped in the Volvo and a mere 38 minutes later with absolutely no traffic slows, we were at our destination on an overcast Tuesday in July.

Long Cliff is located on a sprawling farm... I was told the acreage but for the life of me I cannot remember, so just take it that the winery is expansive and has several rows of lovely growing vines! We entered the tasting room and were greeted by a very friendly girl who happily accepted our Groupon and let us know we were also privvy to two wine glasses as souveniors! Bonus! Don DeMaison, the proprietor, then walked in and introduced himself. He lead us outside to the vineyward and began to give us a very in-depth talk on the wine-making process from vine growth to harvest. We were then shown the warehouse where everything from de-seeding to bottling happens and given a very touching family history of Long Cliff. I don't want to give too many details away in case you visit for yourselves, but it's a very lovely history and Don is an amazing storyteller!

Pinot Magic: truly magical!

Next came the most important part: the tastings. Don gave us ample samplings of all eight of his wines... so ample that I had to grudgingly ciphon off to my mother as I was driving! Long Cliff produces eight excellent small batch wines, all made with the special ingredient of love: two Pinot Gris, a Sauvingnon Blanc, Lemberger, Riesling, two Pinot Noir, and Long Cliff's signature wine the Blauer Himmel ("Blue Heaven").

All of the wines are fantastic, but one that really stood out for me was the Pinot Magic... a WHITE Pinot Noir! PN is my favorite and Don makes one without the skins, therefore a white Pinot! The nose is as if it's red, but the mouth and taste is very different and interesting! I was blown away and couldn't wait to buy a bottle! We wrapped up the tour back in the tasting room with slightly flushed and happy cheeks.

I would definitely recommend checking out Long Cliff along with any of the other wineries along the escarpment. I feel that they are even more unique than their NOTL counterparts and a growing area. My mom and I also felt very good for supporting locally.

Long Cliff Winery
3617 Lower Mountain Road
Sanborn, NY 14132
(716) 731-3316