By, Angela Avila

In college, at the ripe old age of 21, I thought I would have myself a dignified, sit-down dinner party with friends. On the menu: Pasta Primavera. I asked all of my friends to bring a bottle of wine to share. Among the bottles on the table was a small bottle of Port a friend had taken from his parents house (we were poor college students after all). Dinner was served, the bottles were opened and we sat down to enjoy our very “sophisticated” dinner. After a bottle or two of Merlot was enjoyed, the Port was passed around. As we sipped the drink with our pasta dish, I watched the faces of my friends contort as they drank the wine. While some had a look of surprise, other faces showed pure disgust in what they had imbibed. Curious, I took a sip. WHEW! Strong…and sweet! I coughed to catch my breath. We quickly decided as a group that the Port was disgusting! A bottle of Chardonnay was quickly opened.

I laugh as I remember my first experience with Port wine. Little did I know at the time that I was drinking it “wrong”. That is to say, there is a time and place for Port and at the dinner table with Pasta Primavera was not it. Port is a dessert wine…a sipping wine.

A true Port wine comes from the Douro Valley in Portugal. Typically, Port is a sweet red wine that has been fortified with a spirit, often Brandy. Many port-style wines are now produced around the world and can also be found in dry, semi-dry and white varieties.

Traditionally, Port is served as an after dinner drink, often with desserts. It is also referenced as a dessert wine because its sweet and strong character makes it a great wine to serve with dark chocolate or cheesecake.  Furthermore, Brandy is known as a digestive aid, so a small glass of port (fortified with Brandy) may help you fill less full after a big meal. I can’t help but think of a bunch of old men sitting around a fire, loosening their belts after a big meal, sipping on Port and puffing away on big cigars.

Well, you don’t have to be an old-man or a cigar smoker to enjoy a glass of Port. If I had only known in college what to do with that small mysterious bottle at the dinner table, I could have offered dark chocolate mousse with a small glass of Port to each of my guests. I would have probably walked away from the dinner party as a Port lover and wouldn’t have waited so many years to give it another try!

If you have never tried Port or are looking to try something new, Prairie Berry Winery produces a Port-style dessert wine called Great Grandma’s Chokecherry Bliss. It is made from hand-picked South Dakota chokecherries and is a premium sipping wine. A fun way to serve Great Grandma’s Chokecherry Bliss is to dip the rim of a frozen cordial glass in melted chocolate, and then add the wine. It’s a classy presentation and you can enjoy your chocolate and wine together with every sip! As for me, my re-introduction to Port will continue with a bottle of Rosenblum Cellars Desiree Chocolate Port. I have been hearing wonderful things about it. Desiree is a blend of Zinfandel, Syrah and chocolate…how could I go wrong. Perhaps I’ll pick up a bottle tonight for dessert!

by Michele Slott, Prairie Berry Winery

If you are just starting to blossom as a wine lover and thinking about traveling to other areas to do some tasting, be sure to plan ahead about getting your purchase(s) home. You wouldn’t think that getting something from point A to point B could be a big frustration, but it’s important to remember that alcohol is a highly regulated commodity. Following is just an illustration of what CAN happen. Thinking ahead can prevent it from happening to you.

Okay, now pretend you’re on a trip, meeting some friends in Napa Valley, California. Your friends are a couple who had just recently moved to Salt Lake City, and after you all spend a few days enjoying wine country and San Francisco, you’re going to finish out the vacation week at their new home in Utah, then return to South Dakota. At one tasting room you find a wine you both particularly enjoy and want to take home to commemorate the occasion. But wait, there’s a discount if you buy a case… And then you can enjoy it for longer, so what the heck? You’re on vacation! Then you start talking to the staff about shipping it back to your home states… What? Your friends can’t ship to Utah because it’s against Utah state law. You, on the other hand, being from South Dakota, have no problem shipping it home.*

Okay, change of plans… So, you ship a case home to South Dakota and your friends decide they will buy just a few bottles and stash them in their bags. They make the purchase, take the bottles back to the hotel and wrap them carefully in clothing to prevent breakage and zip the suitcases shut. Just as on the trip out, they plan to take their bags as carry-on to avoid the checked baggage fees, the possibility of losing belongings, and having to deal with waiting at the baggage carousel. As you all stand at security chatting, waiting to put your bags on the scanner, you see someone ahead of you pulling wine bottles out of their own bag and chucking them in the garbage. Suddenly you remember — wine is a liquid. Bottles of liquids larger than 3 oz. are not allowed in carry-on baggage. What were you thinking? Well, of course, you were all on vacation and weren’t really thinking… Sadly, your friends chuck their vino too. The security guard gives you a sad smile and says, “Thanks.” You assume it’s for not making a stink about throwing wine/money away… But you figure you should have known better, and he’s just doing his job.

As you get your shoes back on and grab your bags to head to your gate, you see a gift store with an espresso bar down the way. It’s not too busy and you’ve got time to kill (and you’re feeling kind of lousy about tossing the wine), so you offer to buy your friends a grande anything to lift their spirits. As you’re waiting for the Barista to make your beverages, you look around and your gaze falls on a display of local wines, including the same variety your friends had just thrown in the garbage a few yards back at security. Choking on your tongue, you ask the Barista what she knows about getting the wine on the plane.

“Oh yeah, if you buy it AFTER you’ve gone through security, you can take it as carry-on. If you buy it BEFORE going through security, you have to send it through checked baggage.”

Yes, it’s true — so be forewarned as you travel. There are over 10,000 rules and laws governing whether or not wine can be shipped directly to someone — each state has it’s own ruling on things (counties and municipalities weigh in on it, too, in some places), and the laws are ever-changing. For instance,

• Some states have expensive permits wineries must purchase,
• Some require taxes to be filed and paid monthly, quarterly or yearly,
• Some require every wine label to be registered with that state
• Some just say “no” while others say “no problem.”

One winery may opt to not ship to a certain state just because it’s too big of a headache, while another winery down the road is willing to deal with those problems. And of course, shipping and handling is an additional expense to the consumer, too.

If you live in a “no-ship” state, remember what the Barista said: wine CAN be taken on aircraft, but only as checked baggage if purchased prior to going through security. It can be taken as carry-on if it is purchased AFTER going through security. Many airports do not have shops past security with wine for sale by the bottle, yet, but the number is growing (although it does generally make the wine more expensive).

If you’re travelling by car, then you’re only limited by your space — unless you’re going to Canada, in which case you are allowed to bring in no more than two 750 ml bottles per person.

DO go explore some other great wineries!
DO purchase wines you love (especially if you ask the staff and it’s a wine that’s not available anywhere except the winery itself) — it’s a great way to remember the trip and share with the people you love.
And more than anything DO plan ahead how much you can afford to purchase, and how you’re going to get it home. Don’t leave your vacation memories in the Security Screening garbage can!!!

* Note: If you live in SD and had been visiting a winery within your home state or tried to call and make a phone order, you’d be out of luck because South Dakota wineries cannot ship within the state of South Dakota as per state law, although out-of-state wineries CAN ship in so long as you are physically present at that winery to make the purchase. Oddly enough, in 2005 the U.S. Supreme Court overturned laws for New York and Michigan that allowed in-state wineries to direct ship to citizens within these states, but made it illegal for out-of-state wineries to ship to those same people. The Supreme Court said it was unconstitutional for the states to treat in-state wineries differently from out-of-state wineries.  For more information go to:   http://www.freethegrapes.com/state_laws.html.

by Carol Jobman, Prairie Berry Winery

I am a new member of the Prairie Berry staff having been employed since last summer.  Learning the wine business has been fascinating and rewarding and I have welcomed the opportunity to write submissions for the Wine Nose Blog.  I recently left a career in education and still find myself thinking about each new month with the anticipation of what the days to come have to offer in holidays, events, and seasonal changes.  With that in mind, I look at April as a month to promote recycling and sustainability noting that Earth Day and Arbor Day are a part of this month. Wineries as a whole are ag-based businesses, of course, due to the nature of our raw product. And as such, we have to be keenly aware of best practices for sustainability. We have a strong recycling program in place here and the winery staff continues to look toward improvements to be made to our practice. The efforts begin with each employee; grow to include the staff as a whole, and leads to an enhanced experience for each guest.  The well-known slogan, “Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle” is practiced throughout the winery.  Prairie Berry recently adopted a Recycling and Sustainability Guide that will lead to improved practices.  Some highlights of the guide include the following:
Reduce
•    All to-go items from our kitchen will be packaged in bio-degradable containers
•    We will not offer bottled water once our current supply is gone.  We will offer our guests great South Dakota drinking water right from the tap
•    We will strive to go paperless in many aspects of our business using instead electronic communication and whiteboards
Reuse
•    Recycled and/or Eco paper is used for our letterhead, envelopes, and brochures
•    We use rechargeable batteries
•    Wine case boxes are reused to box customer wine orders
Recycle
•    In the future, production waste and food waste from the kitchen will be composted.
•    Cardboard, glass, plastic, and aluminum cans are recycled
•    Prairie Berry will soon be offering a reusable eco-bag for guests to carry home their wine purchases
Soon the weather will warm and the growing season will once again be embraced by many.  The five generations of wine makers in the Vojta family have been resourceful stewards of the land, creating wonderful wines from the bounty of produce available in the Midwest.  That concept is likewise part of the green movement.  The very idea of sustainability can be strengthened by the resourcefulness of each of us.  So enjoy the season to come and consider what you can do to create your own “green lifestyle.”