The Leelanau Peninsula Wine Trail has announced the launch of Sips & Soups. Proceeds from this SOUPer wine and soup tasting event will be donated to Leelanau Christian Neighbors to help restock the local food pantries after its holiday needs are met.
When Randy met Mari, it was loathe at first sight. “She’d just moved back (to Northern Michigan) from California,” said Randy Chamberlain, who is today the chef-owner of the Glen Arbor restaurant Blu. But when Randy met Mari Patton, he was sous chef, the deputy head chef at Windows, an Elmwood Township restaurant. This was the 1980s, and Mari Patton had brought back with her all sorts of West Coastisms, including “purple highlights” in her “wavvy” hair. “So before there was any interaction or conversation, (I) immediately had an impression of her,” Randy said of Windows’ newly hired server. “It was something you’d sneer at.”
Dan Matthies, proprietor of Chateau Fontaine in Lake Leelanau (along with wife Lucie), still remembers the day over 30 years ago that he saw a tiny advertisement in the Leelanau Enterprise: “Looking for farmers to grow wine grapes.” Matthies and his wife had been fascinated with wine and the idea of wine making since they’d first tasted the beverage in the 1970s — but they’d never seriously considered the possibility that their land, acres upon acres of steep hills with south-facing slopes, would be an ideal spot for following the lead of wine maker Bernie Rink. Rink, a neighboring farmer who’d planted a test plot of French-American hybrid grapes as well as a few vinifera varieties on 16 acres of rolling Leelanau County land back in the mid 1960s, had debuted his Boskydel winery, the first winery to open in Leelanau County, in 1975.
Fall is here, and Susan Braymer, who along with her husband Bill, owns and operates Laurentide, a Lake Leelanau winery that opened its tasting room in the summer of 2012, finds that this is a season at the end of which she breathes a sigh of relief. “It’s a rushed and stressful time,” she said, “but after the harvest, you get relief. The grapes are off, and they’re on their way to the next point of their journey.”
Quaint and creative Empire already hosts the Asparagus Festival in mid-May and the revived Hill Climb racecar event in September. Next up is the village’s inaugural Hops Festival, which organizers hope will also become an annual event.
With Charlie Edson, owner and winemaker at Bel Lago Vineyards and Winery mentoring them, the Alan Eaker and Linda Ackley selected vines, and planted 10 acres of wine grapes on their land. Today there are 12 acres of grapes, including hybrids Cayuga and Frontenac, and vinifera varieties Riesling, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris and Cabernet Franc.
Cedar Rustic Inn owners Aaron and Nikki Ackley are itching for a change. Not a huge change, like leaving the restaurant business altogether, but a transition of Cedar Rustic Inn from American comfort to brew pub. This idea, said Aaron, has been in the works for at least three years.
Oryana Natural Foods Market is proud to offer the largest selection of locally grown produce in Northern Michigan. This first annual Farm Tour, on Saturday, Sept. 13, from 1-5 p.m., will provide the community with a first-hand look at where some of these delicious, local goods are harvested.
For farmer Andria Metrakos, the more holistic, satisfying life she began to imagine while working in Detroit’s auto industry has come to fruition at her Red Gate Farm, which occupies a verdant swath of land on Burdickville Rd about a mile west of Myles Kimmerly Park.
Sitting with owner and executive winemaker Charlie Edson on Bel Lago Vineyards and Winery’s tasting room patio on a sunny summer day, it’s easy to appreciate his Italian father-in-law’s inspiration for the name “Bel Lago,” which means beautiful lake in Italian. From the vantage point of a steep hill above the western shore of Lake Leelanau, the view is indeed spectacular—white clouds in a blue sky reflecting onto the bluer waters of the southern end of the lake.