NEWS & INFORMATION

Wine tasting at home, with Karsten and Nishant

Normally, "going wine tasting" would mean getting together with a bunch of your friends and hitting a wine trail or visiting your favorite winery. But since this isn't currently possible, we want to offer you a similar experience – a brand new experience – in your own home.

For a limited time, during the month of April, we are making our Wine Tasting series of videos available to you! These are the videos we created in partnership with Keuka College for our Wine of the Finger Lakes online course. They feature Karsten König, our tasting room manager, and Nishant Ceyyur, one of our stellar employees, giving you a personal wine tasting with all of the knowledge they have to offer. Both Karsten and Nishant hold a Level 3 Certification from the Wine & Spirit Educational Trust.

The first video in the five-part series is available for free! Grab a bottle of Riesling and taste along with Karsten and Nishant. The other videos in the series focus specifically on tasting Reds, Whites, Sparkling wines and Rosés, and Dessert wines.

To get access to these four other videos, simply purchase the special Wine Tasting Bundle we've put together with all of the wines featured in the series.

Normally, these videos are part of a $400 course, plus the cost of wine. But since social distancing is requiring all of us to do things differently, we've decided to change things up.

It's another small thing we and our partners at Keuka College can to do bring some fun into the adjustments we're all having to make these days.

The Fine Print

These wine tasting videos and the Wine Tasting Bundle will be available April 2 through April 30, 2020.

The first video (Wine Tasting - An Introduction) is free to access and taste along with. Grab a bottle of Riesling and taste along right now!

Access to the remaining four (4) tasting videos will be provided with the purchase of our Wine Tasting Bundle. Important note: Due to rules and regulations beyond our control, this specific bundle of wines cannot be sent to all states. Please phone the winery to see how we can adjust the bundle for you.

Links and passwords to the remaining four wine tasting videos will be included with the Wine Tasting Bundle when it ships to you.

The videos are hosted on a third-party platform, Vimeo.

TECH REQUIREMENTS: Viewing the videos should be pretty straight forward. You just need a computer or mobile device that can play web-based videos. Make sure you can play the introductory tasting video. Where you able to see everything okay? Were you able to hear everything okay? Then you should be all set, technology-wise.

ACCESSIBILITY: The videos are not yet closed captioned. However, we have complete transcripts available. If a transcript would be helpful to you, just let us know when you order your Wine Tasting Bundle. We'll get you the transcripts at the same time we send the links and passwords. We'd also love to know how we can make these videos even more accessible in future iterations.

If you have any questions at all, please get in touch with us by phone (315-595-2812) or email (info@huntwines.com).

Front Door Service for You

As you've heard by now, the governor of New York has ordered all bars, restaurants and other places serving food or beverage to temporarily close to help stop the spread of the coronavirus. This is a smart decision and we're happy to do our part.

However, practicing good social distancing does not mean you have to go without wine. So here's our Front Door Plan to continue serving you. Starting today:

1. We're providing front door pick-up at Hunt Country Vineyards, Tuesday - Saturday, 10 am to 5 pm.
• Call in your order (315-595-2812) and make payment over the phone.
• Schedule a time to pick up your order or call when you arrive.
• Wait in your vehicle and we'll bring your purchase to you. (Have your ID ready because we may need to check it.)
• Return home and enjoy your wine.

2. Our online store remains open 24/7.
• Go to HuntWines.com.
• Order your favorite wine. Have it shipped straight to your front door or to a friend's front door.
• We're currently offering FREE SHIPPING on orders of 6 or more bottles.

Our Front Door Service will be in place through April 15 May 15 for the foreseeable future, per the governor's orders. But, obviously, things are going to continue changing over the next few weeks. So we'll keep you posted with our newsletter, website and social media. If you have any questions at all, please get in touch with us by phone (315-595-2812) or email (info@huntwines.com).

Be good to yourselves. Take care of your family, friends and neighbors. And let us know how we can help you out!

Coronavirus update

Hello friends and fans,

We want to take just a few moments to touch base with you about the continuing spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) and the steps we're taking at Hunt Country in response.

First and foremost, we hope you're all doing well! If you're feeling ill, we hope you're able to stay home for a few days and take care of yourself. Keep washing your hands. Stay supplied with the items you'll need for several days. Stay informed with the most accurate information. And let's be sure we're taking care of our family and neighbors, too!

Second, we plan to remain open during the hours currently posted on our website. In our tasting room, we're implementing best practices to keep the tasting experience safe and enjoyable. We're washing our hands preventively and often. Staff are staying home when ill. We're regularly cleaning all of the high-use surfaces (like our serving bar and door handles) with EPA-approved antimicrobial products. We're sanitizing our glasses and other serving items according to guidance from the New York Department of Health, and we're doing the laundry according to guidance from John Hopkins Medical.

One specific change we are making is temporarily limiting the size of group visits and tours. Please give us a call for more details.

Of course, some of the best advice to minimize exposure to the virus is to avoid public places and crowds – which could mean not visiting our tasting room. If that's the case for you, we'll definitely miss seeing you for a while but we completely understand spending more time at home. Our online store is always open, and we're thinking up some fun new ways to interact with everyone through our newsletter and videos.

Monitoring the coronavirus situation has become like watching the weather here at the farm: we're paying close attention every day. Depending on how things progress, our hours could change, planned events might be rescheduled, and new events might pop up. We'll keep you posted through our newsletter, social media and website.

If you have any questions at all, please feel free to get in touch with us by email (info@huntwines.com) or phone (800-946-3289).

We look forward to seeing all of you soon!

The Hunt family and team

Hunt Country receives 2020 Sustainability Award

Hunt Country Vineyards on Keuka Lake is the recipient of the New York Wine & Grape Foundation's Sustainability Award for 2020.

"We congratulate Hunt Country Vineyards for being recognized by their peers as a pioneering winery deploying extensive sustainability practices on their farm and in their winery," says Sam Filler, executive director of the Foundation.

Presented for the first time in 2019, the Sustainability Award recognizes an organization or business that has demonstrated noteworthy sustainable practices and a commitment to conserving natural resources, protecting our environment, and contributing to the overall success of the New York State economy. The winner is determined by nominations from within the wine and grape industry, as well as related businesses and individuals.

"Hunt Country Vineyards sets the standard for what it means to be a sustainable winery operation in New York," says Filler.

"It's wonderful validation of many years of taking care of the land for future generations," says Art Hunt, co-founder and co-owner of Hunt Country Vineyards. 

"It's great to receive this recognition," says Suzanne Hunt, Art's younger daughter and an international consultant for clean technologies and sustainable farming, who is also helping to run the family business. "The fact that the New York Wine & Grape Foundation created this award shows real leadership. We're honored to be the first winery to receive it."

When Art and Joyce Hunt, his wife and business partner, took over the farm in the 1970s, they realized that they needed to do more to care for the land and their community. Hunt Country Vineyards has since become a regional leader in sustainability. The seventh generation family farm has a 350 solar panel array that provides the majority of the farm's electricity needs. Hunt Country was an early adopter of extensive geothermal heating and cooling, and installed a system which has replaced the conventional A/C and heating in the tasting room, winery and warehouses. Hunt Country is the only Finger Lakes winery to provide free EV charging stations to customers. Several acres of the vineyards have been certified organic and the winery plans to release its first wine made from organically-grown grapes in 2020. Soil health is a priority, and Hunt Country has doubled the soil organic matter in their vineyards over the past decade. The vineyards and farm are managed as a complete ecosystem, providing ample habitat for a diverse community of bees, birds and other wildlife.

"Every winery and farm can do it," says Art. "It's not all or nothing. You can work at it every year without it impacting your bottomline too much and gradually increase your profitability."

The award will be formally presented to Hunt Country Vineyards during the Unity Awards ceremony at the Foundation's B.E.V. NY Conference at the end of February.

Our new online course about Finger Lakes wine!

 

We are thrilled to announce that we're partnering with Keuka College to offer a fully online certificate program about the art, science, history and tradition of wine and winemaking in the Finger Lakes!

The instructors for the program include some of your favorite members of the Hunt Country family and team: Art Hunt, Suzanne Hunt, Karsten König (tasting room manager), and Craig Hosbach (winemaker).

The ten lessons involve wine tasting, video instruction, curated reading materials, and online discussions with classmates and instructor. The program content is original and produced right in our own vineyards and winery. The wines you'll be tasting as part of the instruction can be shipped directly to your doorstep.

And upon completion of the program, Keuka College will award you a Wines of the Finger Lakes certificate!
 
The Wines of the Finger Lakes program begins Feb. 3, 2020.
 
Click here to learn more and register. (It might just make an excellent gift for that particular wine lover on your holiday list.)

 

Our Reserve Wines are getting some love

Check out this outstanding review of our 2017 Reserve Cabernet Franc and 2017 Reserve Riesling by the amazing Annemarie Morse over at The Cork Report.

"I felt a real sense of family, dedication to creating great wines and a sense of environmental awareness strongly illustrated in this visit and I look forward to tasting more of the wines that Craig and the Hunt family continue to create."

Lovely!

Scenes from the Rustic Furniture Workshop

The Trevor Irby Memorial Scholarship

A little over a month ago, we shared the tragic news that Trevor Irby – a former employee and a friend of our family and staff – was killed during the mass shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival in California. Trevor made a true difference in the lives of everyone who knew him. He never stopped helping in ways both big and small. We all miss him very much.

So to honor him and the person he was, Trevor's long-time girlfriend, friends and Keuka College are creating the Trevor Irby Memorial Scholarship. The scholarship will be awarded annually to a student who embodies the same qualities, compassion, energy and love for life.

To create this endowed scholarship, Trevor's friends and Keuka College are seeking to raise $50,000. If you are interested in helping to make this happen, here's how you can do it...

Contribute online

1. Go to https://www.keuka.edu/give.

2. Click on the "Make a gift now" button.

3. Fill out the required information on the first page.

4. At the top of the page, under "Please use my donation to support...", select "Other" and then type in “Trevor Irby Memorial Scholarship.”

5. Click "Submit" to complete the first page. Then enter your payment information on the following page.

Contribute by check

1. Make your check payable to "Keuka College".

2. Write “Trevor Irby Memorial Scholarship" in the memo section of the check.

3. Send your check to Keuka College at the following address:

Keuka College
Development Department - Attn: Billy Jo Jayne
141 Central Ave
Keuka Park, NY 14478

If you have any questions or need help making a contribution to the scholarship, please contact the Keuka College Development Department at 315-279-5684.
 
Thank you so much for your consideration.

Scenes from our Reserve Wine Celebration

Scenes from the Stonemason Workshop