Welcoming Spring with Beautiful Long Island Wine
By Linda Delmonico
I had planned on this column being a roundup of a number of beautiful Long Island wines, and I promise, next month’s column will be just that. However, I had the pleasure of sampling a wine that so blew me away I’m going to give it the space it deserves in this column.
The wine is Paumanok’s 2023 Cabernet Franc. I opened it thinking I’d just have a taste, but I ended up enjoying it for three nights. This is surprising for a number of reasons. The first being the speed of which I drank this wine, or more accurately, the lack of speed. I absolutely savored each sip. The second reason, the outstanding versatility of this wine. Night one I paired it with pasta and fish, night two was a burger, and night three was pizza. I also paired it later one evening with dark chocolate. In keeping with complete transparency, I’m a vegetarian, so it was plant-based fish from Gardein, and an Impossible Burger.
This wine would definitely be enjoyed at barbeques with steak and firepits with s’mores. Also notable is the fact that this wine tasted just as delicious on day three as it did on day one. This is no small feat as most wine lovers know by day three, in most cases, wine is noticeably less fresh. This wine holds up remarkably well. Of course, if you’re sharing the wine, I was not, there probably won’t be any left after day one.
This wine is crafted from 99% cabernet franc, Long Island’s signature wine, and 1% merlot. It has notes of charred candied dark cherry, licorice, and anise on the nose and on the front of the palate. The mid-palate, and the finish, is bursting with fresh red fruit flavors. This elegant, medium-bodied wine was structured, layered, incredibly smooth, and incredibly missed.
The last pleasant surprise is the wine’s price. I sample wines without reading too much information about them, other than the varietal, prior to tasting. I like to taste with an open mind. Drinking this wine, I imagined the price to be somewhere between $45 and $49. Honestly, it would be well worth a $50 price tag. I was pleasantly surprised to find the price to be only $36.
While it is a wonderful wine to welcome spring, it’s not a wine that needs to be limited to a season so stock up now. The wine sampled was the 2023 vintage, though the photo depicts the 2022 vintage.
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