Culture Food & Drink

Best pressed

Beginning in 2021, the annual Virginia Governor’s Cup competition, which traditionally recognizes the best wines in the state, included a separate category for cider. In 2022, the competition awarded 10 gold medals to ciders and Albemarle CiderWorks’ 2019 Hewes Crab won Best in Show. Opened by the Shelton family in 2009, Albemarle CiderWorks is Virginia’s […]

Paul Ting | May 25, 2022

Culture Food & Drink

A drink refresher

Do you find yourself stuck in a loop at cocktail hour? When it’s five o’clock somewhere and Miller time has arrived, many people reach for the same beverages again and again. Lucky for us central Virginians, it’s easy to find exciting, locally made products to vary our drink of choice.  Here are a few that […]

Paul Ting | February 16, 2022

Culture Food & Drink

Shiny and new

The change of season may inspire you toward big, bold reds, but there are many white wines worthy of attention during the colder months. These options include sparkling wines, wines made from grape varieties that produce heavier styles, white wines with more textural complexity, and sweet and luscious dessert wines. The Virginia Wine Board marketing […]

Paul Ting | December 22, 2021

Culture Food & Drink

Core focus

It’s well known that our founding fathers brewed beer, distilled whiskey, and, in the case of Thomas Jefferson, worked diligently to make wine in Virginia. But cider, too has been in production since the Colonial era—both Washington and Jefferson also grew apples and brewed cider. The industrial revolution saw a decline in the cider industry, […]

Paul Ting | November 17, 2021

Culture Food & Drink

Drink in color

As summer disappears and temperatures begin to drop, wine drinkers look for more weight, more depth, and more complexity in their glass. This is, in part, to temper the chill in the air, but it also means wines that will better pair with the food of the season. Autumn leads to more roasting, smoking, stews, […]

Paul Ting | October 27, 2021

Culture

Cheers to the west

The foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains rise quickly as you drive west from Charlottesville. Snake into those hills a little bit and you’ll find Waynesboro and Staunton, where a wealth of history and wonderfully preserved architecture surrounds several craft beverage producers worth seeking out.  If you’re getting an early start, head over to Crucible […]

Paul Ting | September 1, 2021

Culture

Water of Life

Sea anemones provide shelter and protection for clownfish; in turn, clownfish keep predators away from the anemones and stir up nutrients nearby. Red-billed oxpeckers eat pesky bugs off of rhinoceros’ backs. Nature is full of examples of symbiosis—two organisms living together in a mutually beneficial way. For a while, Charlottesville had its own example, down […]

Paul Ting | July 21, 2021

Culture

Reason to believe

At first, making beer was just a hobby for Mark Fulton—when he finished punching the calculator during his day job as an accountant, he’d head home to his lab. Then, in 2010, the amateur beer enthusiast snagged a craft brewing apprenticeship with the American Brewers Guild. He untied his tie, quit his accounting gig, and […]

Paul Ting | July 21, 2021

Culture

New domaine

Most people think of their parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles as their family tree. For award-winning King Family Vineyards winemaker Matthieu Finot, it would be more accurate to call it a family vine. Finot’s relatives own vineyards and make wine in their native country of France. The recent launch of the Domaine Finot label in […]

Paul Ting | July 21, 2021

Culture

Lifting spirits

Ivar Aass and his wife, Sarah Barrett, moved to Charlottesville from New York in 2012 with a singular purpose: to distill high-quality spirits in a place that, in Aass’ own words, has “heaps of local pride and an understanding and appreciation of all good drink and food.” In 2015, Aass and Barrett’s Spirit Lab Distilling […]

Paul Ting | June 30, 2021