The Cork Club February 2024 Selections
A celebration of the singular deliciousness of Fjord Vineyards
I’ve partnered The Cellar d’Or, a great wine and cider shop in Ithaca, NY, to create a one-of-a-kind wine club that delivers some of the most delicious and unique wines from the Eastern United States right to your door. These aren’t bin ends or mass-produced, factory wine garbage. These are real wines made by real people. They are the wines I’m drinking myself — from producers you’re probably not going to find in any other wine club.
Sometimes timing is everything.
My original plan for this month’s The Cork Club shipment was to base it on a trip to the Finger Lakes that I had planned for later in the month. I had to cancel that trip but found myself at Benmarl Winery a couple of weeks ago with some friends (we were heading to Poughkeepsie for a comedy show) to meet and taste with Casey Erdmann and Matthew Spaccarelli of Fjord Vineyards.
Matt’s family owns Benmarl and he makes the wines for both labels there.
Like I said, sometimes timing is everything. And our timing was perfect.
The Fjord Vineyards 2023 Cabernet Franc Rosé had been bottled the day before. Fresh, clean, and varietally correct — with the right amount of cabernet franc-ness at its edges — it’s the kind of rosé you know I love.
Fjord’s tasting room doesn’t open until April, so that’s when it will be released. But, if you’re a member of my club, you’ll get it next week.
We also got to taste a tank sample of the Fjord Vineyards 2023 Albariño, which is always among my favorite North American examples. The new vintage is terrific — fruity, and floral, with that classic gritty skin tannin feel albariño often brings.
“When are you bottling this?” I asked.
“This week or next,” he said, probably knowing exactly why I was asking.
Yes — members of my wine club are going to get to taste this before it’s released too. It went into the bottle the day after we ordered it.
At this point, I was thinking about what other wineries and wines I could combine with these two wines to round out the February shipment.
Then we tasted some red wines — including the Fjord Vineyards 2022 Gamay Noir.
New York gamay often disappoints me. Don’t get me wrong, most of them are well-made and perfectly delicious red wines, but they rarely taste like gamay. Matt’s does in all of its crunchy red fruit glory. Fjord doesn’t produce much, but they had enough for the club.
Could I do an all-Fjord shipment? I hadn’t done it before, but then we tasted the Fjord Vineyards 2022 Cabernet Franc and I knew I wouldn’t be able to help myself. Ripe, juicy cabernet franc with a great combination of fruit-driven flavors backed by savory herbs and earth? I couldn’t help myself.
That’s how I ended up doing an all-Fjord shipment this month. It’s the first time I’ve chosen four wines from a single winery. Maybe it’ll happen again at some point. Maybe not. I’m excited about it and you should be too. These wines are absolutely delicious and show off the potential of the Hudson River Region AVA.
Fjord Vineyards is a special producer of special wines — so I thought it made sense for Matt to tell you about what he and Casey are doing, in his own words.
Hello from the heart of the Hudson Valley. Or, as the wine world knows it, the Hudson River Region AVA. A bit long-winded if you ask me, but it’s the place we call home. My name is Matthew Spaccarelli, and along with my partner Casey Erdmann, we own and operate Fjord Vineyards. We sustainably grow 37 acres of vines west of the Hudson River in the towns of Marlboro and Milton, approximately 60 miles north of Manhattan.
Casey and I started this endeavor back in 2014. At the time, Casey and I were both working at my family’s Winery, Benmarl. Casey as the tasting room manager and I in the cellar and vineyards (where I still currently work). At the time, we had planted some experimental vineyards around town. An acre of cab franc here….an acre of albariño there…..then a bit of riesling. and then it hit us. . . . We have a story to tell here. Lets start our own label with these single-vineyard, estate wines.
Fast forward a decade and we are now growing 15 acres of 8 vinifera varieties that include albariño, blaufränkish, cabernet franc, chardonnay, gamay noir, merlot, pinot noir, and riesling.
We often get asked “Why Fjord Vineyards? Are you Norwegian?” Or “What does a Fjord have to do with wine?” And rightfully so. Most folks do not associate New York with Fjords. However, just south of our vineyards, between Mt. Beacon and Storm King Mountain, the Hudson River flows through the most equatorial fjord on the planet (Equatorial meaning closest to the equator, in either the northern or southern hemisphere).
This geologic wonder serves as the gateway to the heart of the Hudson River Region AVA.
In the native language of the Lenape, the river was referred to as Mahicantuck, or “the river that flows both ways.” This is because the Hudson River is a tidal estuary, flowing south but also flooding north with the ocean’s tide. The valley that the river flows through has a moderating effect in our region. Not because of the water, but the shape of the valley acts as a conduit of temperate maritime air drawn up from the Atlantic Ocean. It is not as impactful as the water surrounding the North Fork of Long Island or the depth of Seneca Lake, but it does give us an advantage over our surrounding areas.
As for our approach to growing and making wines, it can be summed up in a single phrase. “Not Dogmatic” Spontaneous fermentations? Sure! Unfined and Unfiltered? You bet! Filtered and fined? Why not? Organic? Definitely not! But we take pride in sustainably farming our vineyards. We find that adjusting to the current situation is the best way to successfully achieve good wine in such a marginal climate as the Hudson Valley. We hope that you enjoy these wines. And, we look forward to hearing your feedback. Please feel free to reach out, we are all ears, and happy to talk about what it is that we do here.
Matt
And there you have it — my picks for the February 2024 Cork Club shipment. I know you’re going to love these wines as much as I do.
I live in the Hudson Valley, not far from Benmarl and Fjord, and have long admired and appreciated the wines made by Matt. I'm convinced that he's one of the finest winemakers in the Valley. I buy his Albariño by the case. What really stands out in Matt's wines is their typicity--they always display the character of the variety in the bottle. thank you for such a excellent article about Fjord.