Lori, from StuffIAte, has been telling me about the virtues of the wineries in Long Island for years.  I was skeptical.

Could decent wine come out of Long Island?  I don’t know what I was picturing, but it sure wasn’t this…

Our first stop was Lori and her Awesome Boyfriend’s favorite, Clovis Point.  We actually had a Groupon for a tasting and then glass of your choice with a cheese plate.  It was just about to expire (whoops!), so we decided to head out the week after Thanksgiving. (YAY for off season!)

We tried the full menu and I was really impressed.  I enjoyed all the wines on the list.

I actually really got into Chardonnay (and Pinot Noir) when Mike and I were in Napa. I didn’t think I was a Chardonnay person, but turns out you can make a damn good Chardonnay if you know what you’re doing.  We all wound up taking some bottles of Chardonnay home, but I especially enjoyed the barrel fermented one.

And so I drank it (and took home a bottle… or two)

The cheese plate was a good little snack in the middle of the afternoon with the wine. And there is a lovely tented area outside nearer to the vineyard (Lori told us it’s open during the nicer weather).

Cheers!

I usually don’t post photos of people on the blog, but I think this picture of Lori and her ABF is just too cute not to post.

The day was young, so we decided to head to another winery.  As it turns out, most of the wineries are within a few minute drive of each other.  It actually really reminded me of a little Napa.  It was quaint and homey and come on… vineyards!

Our second winery was Pindar.

There was a lovely windmill outside and the sun was just setting.

(Photo courtesy of Mike)

While the vineyard seemed lovely, I was not impressed by the tasters who didn’t care to explain anything and seemed to want to be left alone as much as possible.  I didn’t really LOVE the wine there and I wound up taking NO pictures. Whoops!

Our last stop of the night was at Duck Walk vineyard.  This is probably the best known LI winery, however, we went to the one on the North Fork, which was supposed to be “smaller.”  I can’t image what the “bigger” one looks like because this was was bea-u-ti-ful.

The inside of the tasting room had these awesome chandeliers

And really put us in the holiday spirit.

And a lovely aquarium.

The staff at this tasting were splendid, adding a lot of color to the tasting and just being all around nice people.  The cute guy serving us was talking about how he just can’t find a “nice girl,” so that’s your cue single female readers. Head out to Duck Walk in the North Fork to find your wine loving mate.

We wound up falling in love with their dessert wines.  It was all good, but there was something special about their late harvest Gewurztraminer called Aphrodite.  We also really enjoyed (and also took home) their Blueberry Port.

Our trip out to Long Island was an eye opener. It was so beautiful and so lovely, I can’t believe we didn’t do it before.  We also had a lovely dinner at Love Lane Kitchen (post to come) that just made me fall in love with the area even more.  I can’t wait to go back.

Thanks Lori!

Check out Lori’s post about Clovis Point Winery and her photos of Briermere Farms, where we really enjoyed but I forgot to take pictures.

Tags: clovis point vineyard, day trips from manhattan, duck walk vineyard, long island day trip, long island wine tour, long island wineries, long island wines, pindar vineyard, wine, wineries