Episode 83
Mead, Fruit Wines, and the Infamous Roadkill Red: A Winemaker's Perspective
Welcome to the best five minute wine podcast, where we embark on an adventurous exploration of the diverse world of wines. This episode features a captivating discussion with a winery representative who shares insights about their unique offerings, including the state's only method champagne and a range of delightful fruit wines and meads. Notably, we delve into their famous "Roadkill Red," a semi-sweet Colorado red table wine that has captured the hearts of many wine enthusiasts. The conversation reveals the artisanal dedication behind the production of these wines, emphasizing the use of real fruit and the complexities of crafting fruit and mead wines compared to traditional grape wines. As we toast to the joys of wine, we also highlight the importance of enjoying the right wine for the right occasion, whether it be a relaxing hot tub moment or a gourmet seafood dinner.
We close our conversation with Richard Turley of Colorado Cellars. Did you know ?
They grow their own grapes and fruit, keep bees for honey wine, personally make and bottle their wines – even deliver it themselves. They are unique amongst Colorado wineries in that they are – and have always been – exclusively in the wine business… no second jobs, second incomes, or second careers.
Your Host: Forrest Kelly is an experienced Radio/TV broadcaster who has interviewed some of Hollywood’s biggest celebrities from Shania Twain to Kevin Costner. A lover of wine who is fascinated by the science behind it.
Welp Magazine voted it as one of the best travel podcasts of 2021!
Our new music bed is from David Maine. Who is David Maine? David Maine is an NYC-based composer, multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He is currently the in-house composer and sonic brander of The Gravel Institute. He operates out of his studio in Ridgewood NY. What can he provide you? Custom or Library compositions for all kinds of media and experiences, creative sound design, and sonic branding.
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Transcript
Welcome. Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast. I'm your host, Forest Kelly. From the seed to the glass, wine has a past.
Our aim at The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast is to look for adventure at wineries around the globe. After all, grape wines think alike. Let's start the adventure. Our featured winery is. All right, let's focus on the wines. You said you had 27.
Winery Representative:We currently sell 27, yes.
Forrest Kelly: Okay. And then starting in: Winery Representative:Sure. There's basically three different categories.
The grape wines, we make pretty much every major vinifera, varietal that you can think of anywhere, from Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir. We've got a moscato, Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio. Pretty much they're all there.
We make the state's only method champagne fermented in the bottle champagne. We've got eleven fruit wine. We've got two meads, two honey wines, and we actually make something here that we could have been famous for.
Back in:And we started doing that after a 60 minutes piece came out that said what we're not allowed to say by federal law. Drinking wine, especially red wine, can help clean your arteries, help you live longer.
So a lot of people started wanting to drink red wine, but they didn't like the oak, you know, the very dry oak red wine. That's what people progress to that. But nobody ever starts drinking that.
We have the infamous roadkill red, which is a semi sweet Colorado red table wine.
Forrest Kelly:Okay, is that a big seller?
Winery Representative:That's a trademarked brand. Yes, it is a big seller. Up until recently, it was probably our best seller out of everything.
Forrest Kelly:Wow.
Winery Representative:But, yeah, being in, and, you know, it took off right away, being a semi sweet red wine, and it was such a hip. We started making a sweeter red wine called eclipse sweet red wine. We also make port here. We pioneered in Colorado anyway.
We pioneered making pretty much every type of wine you can make.
Forrest Kelly:Do you enjoy making the mead? I know you can make that year round and. No, you've got the labor with the bees. You know, you gotta pay them well.
Winery Representative:Yeah, they're, they're, they're more work, but, yeah, it's fine. They, they do good. Yeah, mead's fine. I mean, fruit wine and mead wines are harder to make than grape wines, anything will ferment.
Anything that's sweet will ferment. But can you imagine a pot of honey fermenting? It sort of looks like a, like the mud pots in Yellowstone, you know what I mean?
Forrest Kelly:Right.
Winery Representative:Fruit wines, you press a grape, you get free run juice. Consider pressing a peach. What do you think you get? It's sort of a mush, you know what I mean? It needs to be diluted. But we use real fruit here.
There's no fake stuff. It's all real and right off the tree or off the bush. And we do well with them as well.
Forrest Kelly:Are there any that you've mentioned so far? Is there one that you're most proud of?
Winery Representative:My old friend Robert Madhavi used to say when he was asked that question, he'd say, my wines are like my children. I have no favorite. But to be fair to you, I mean, it depends on what I'm doing.
If I'm sitting in a hot tub, you know, one of these fruit wines is simply wonderful.
Well, you know, with a steak, a good pinot noir, cabernet Sauvignon, seafood, we've got a kind of a buttery Chardonnay that just is wonderful with seafood. You know, it depends on what's going.
Forrest Kelly:On, looking ahead down the vast grapevines. Anything new and exciting in the future or you're just going to keep grinding?
Winery Representative:We're going to keep grinding and make the best product possible. We don't have time to do anything else for us. If you need something else, please call.
And I want to thank you for thinking of us and giving us this opportunity.
Forrest Kelly:Before we close out the show, I'd just like to thank David Main. David has lended his talents with new music for the show. He does custom scoring and sound design for all types of media.
You're looking for ideas or you've got something specific in mind, reach out to David. It's David main scores.com. i'll have a link to his web address in the show notes. Let's enjoy a couple of seconds of David's music.
Winery Representative:Thank you.
Forrest Kelly:Thank you for listening. I'm Forrest Kelly. This episode of The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast was produced by ihism.
If you like the show, please tell your friends and pets and subscribe. Until next time, pour the wine and ponder your next adventure.
