THE FLAVOR OF THE KLUGE ESTATE WINERY
From the Winter 2005 Issue

Mention Virginia wine to some wine buffs and they wrinkle their noses and sniff, “Virginia wine just isn’t up to world-class standards.” xxAnyone who feels that way is overdue for some enlightenment. Virginia has more than 80 wineries, including some that have earned international recognition. Among them is Charlottesville’s Kluge Estate Winery, located on 1,200 pastoral acres of beautiful rolling hills.

Patricia Kluge, former wife of media mogul billionaire John Kluge, founded the estate in 1999 and has dedicated herself to sparing no expense or effort to do everything right. From hiring a top-notch French winemaking team to installing world-renowned chefs in The Farm Shop, she has made sure Kluge Estate is quickly becoming one of the most respected wineries in the United States.

Located just a short distance from Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, the estate is fulfilling a Jefferson dream: That Virginia make the world’s best wines. Indeed, Kluge wines were initially marketed outside of Virginia and have even been served successfully at the White House.

When entering the estate, one first encounters The Farm Shop, located amidst trees and lush grass reminiscent of Robin Hood’s Nottingham Forest. The structure, designed by the famous architect David Easton, resembles a mountain cabin with cream-painted columns and a pagoda-like parapet.
Inside, visitors can taste the wines, sip a steaming cup of gourmet coffee, pick up delicacies prepared by brilliant executive chef Victoria Dunham, or enjoy a decadent dessert prepared by pastry chef Serge Torres.

Aficionados of cheese can select from a well-stocked case where each cheese is topped with a descriptive sign. Walls are lined with jellies and preserves made from fruit grown on site, and the rear of the shop showcases Kluge’s pride and joy: fragrant topiaries and succulents set in stone gardens.

Elegance in a Glass

The Farm Shop also houses the tasting room where patrons may sample the estate’s wines from Riedel crystal stemware, the world’s finest. And yes, the proper type of stemware is used for each variety. In addition, the tasting bar is covered with sparkling black granite, and wood paneling gives the room a warm and comfortable feel.

Vintages are sipped in a pre-determined order, and include a sparkling wine, a rose, two reds and an aperitif or dessert wine. (See sidebar below for a review of the varieties.)

I had the good fortune to be escorted around the estate by the lovely Kristin Moses, Kluge’s stepdaughter, who capably handles public relations for the enterprise.

	The Kludge vineyard's soil is said to flavor lazy grape varieties for Merlot and Cabernet Franc.

For lunch on the front porch, we sampled a variety of foods from The Farm Shop. There was a cheese tray, as well as an opulent butternut squash soup laced with maple cream that was hedonistically rich and sweet. We tasted a fluffy leek tart, a mushroom tart, and a wild rice salad with duck and cranberries. There was also a salad with dollops of rich blue cheese and crunchy, sweet candied pecans. For dessert, I had a chocolate pinecone, which consisted of chocolate mousse on top of a little chocolate cake and covered with thin, crunchy slices of chocolate so that it actually looked like a pinecone. Accentuated with a little gold leaf on top, this is serious chocolate.
Moses took me for a trip around the estate. We rode past rows of perfectly spaced vines on our way to the winery. She pointed out the half-mile nature trail that winds through the forest from The Farm Shop to the winery. When we pulled up to the winemaking facility, workers were sorting red grapes that were tumbling across a white conveyor belt.

Heart of the Process

The winemaker, a wiry French fellow with a salt-and-pepper goatee named Charles Gendrot, climbed down from a tank and came over to talk to us.

Born to a winemaker in Bordeaux, Gendrot has made wine all over the world. Standing among the dimpled stainless steel tanks, with a bug zapper snapping and sizzling overhead, he enlightened me on his approach to winemaking, and I found that talking to him is like talking to a philosopher, an artist and a scientist rolled into one.

“Wine is like liquid poetry,” he says. “It will make you feel a certain way about life according to your mood when you taste it. You taste the same wine later and it will be different.” He maintains that wine should reflect the soil, the site situation, the climate and the uniqueness of the place it comes from. Winemakers use the term “terroir” to describe this combination of factors that make a wine unique.

Gendrot’s goal is to create a synergy between the grapes and their terroir in which the result is greater than the sum of its parts. He feels that tasting wine will evoke memories from the past connected to your last taste of a similar wine. Beyond just fruit flavors, he wants his wines to have a distinctive personality. After all, as he points out, “Wine is alive.”

The Resting Place

Beneath the winery is an underground cave constructed of concrete beams. Such an engineering marvel that it was featured in an article in a concrete trade magazine, the cave is maintained at a bone-chilling 50 degrees to emulate the limestone caves in Champagne, France. Bottles of Kluge’s SP vintage mature in the cave where chemical changes that occur in the desired flavors.

Gendrot explains that the estate’s soil contains a high percentage of clay, somewhat reminiscent of Bordeaux’s right bank. These types of soils favor Merlot and Cabernet Franc, “lazy” grape varieties that luxuriate in the moist clay soils and produce rich grapes. Cabernet Sauvignon does better in gravelly soil where it has to struggle to survive. This is why Cabernet has more backbone. Each site is matched to its optimum grape variety and each block is picked and vinified separately. When the wines are blended to produce the final result, it is an exercise in artistry similar to a master chef tweaking an opulent sauce and getting it just right.

More Sights on Site

We continue touring the estate, observing rolling brown hills where the earth has been cleared in preparation of planting new vines. We see the brick-and-glass conservatory with its serpentine shrubs lining the sidewalk leading to it. We ride past the orchard of fruit trees and a nine-hole golf course.
Our last stop is the old carriage museum that will soon be converted into a sparkling wine facility and an exhibition kitchen.

Kluge Estate Winery and Vineyard
100 Grand Cru Drive
Charlottesville, Va. 22902
Phone: (434) 977-3895
Fax: (434) 977-0606
Farm Shop hours: Tuesday-Sunday: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Closed Mondays. Call for winter hours.

Directions

Take I-64 to Exit 121A onto Va. 20 towards Scottsville. Go approximately nine miles and take a left on Carter Mountain Road (Va. 627). Go 3.5 miles and turn on Blenheim Road (Va. 727). The Farm Shop is the first right.