Vineyards near Richmond, VA with good food nearby
I'm new to this board (I'm from Boston) but my boyfriend recently moved to Richmond for school. I'm trying to plan a day trip to some local vineyards on a Saturday in March. I would prefer that they are close to Richmond (about an hour to and hour and a half driving) since we don't plan on spending the night. Ideally I'd like to find 2 great vineyards and then a nice place to have dinner afterwards. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance!
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I also really enjoyed a recent visit to Blenheim Vineyard. They're still a young vineyard, but the staff was very welcoming and knowledgable. They've built a fantastic tasting room that's built over the wine cellars. There are large windows in the floor that look down into the cellar.
I thought it was worth the upcharge to take the cellar tasting tour. It was an interesting look into the wine making process and included some tasting of wines in progress, straight from the fermentation vessels. Pretty neat.
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Tasting Room
16 E Washington St, Middleburg, VA 20117 -
williamsburg winery has horrible wine. Stay in the Charlottesville area -- Barboursville is good, veritas is not bad, jefferson is close to Cville and Cville has wonderful restaurants: C and O, Escafe, Michaels, L'etoile, Bijou, etc. Cville's restaurant scene is much better than Richmond's.
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Thank you for all of the great suggestions. We ended up going to the Charlottesville area and staying at a B+B in Charlottesville for the night. Unfortunately it was raining the whole trip but we still had a great time. On Saturday we started mid-day at Kluge. It was our least favorite of the 4 vineyards we visited. It was a cute place and very cozy with the fireplace going but it didn't meet our expectations in terms of experience and wine. I was surprised that they served the wine in plastic flutes and didn't personally explain each wine to us. Instead they just gave us a sheet of paper with the explanations on them. We also didn't really enjoy the wines. Out of the 12 we tried (2 different tasting flights) we only liked 2 and didn't care at all for the other 10. I don't think I would go back here or recommend it when there are so many great vineyards in the area. It was also the most expensive vineyard we visited.
The best part of Kluge was that they recommended we try another winery down the road that we hadn't planned on visiting, Blenheim Vineyards which happens to be owned by Dave Matthews. I would go there for the view alone! It was gorgeous even in the rain. The woman who explained the wine to us also added to the experience as she was very knowledgeable and personable. We were pleasantly surprised by the wine and greatly enjoyed their Chardonnays and Petit Verdot.
Next we went to Jefferson Vineyards which was our favorite. Not so much for the atmosphere but we really enjoyed their wines and left with a bottle of their Pinot Gris.
Sunday we visited Keswick vineyards on the way home. The drive there was gorgeous and so was the vineyard itself. We also really enjoyed the wines here and left with a bottle of their Consensus wine. Overall I was very impressed with the Virginia vineyards and would definitely visit all but Kluge again...preferably on a sunny day so we can fully appreciate the beauty of the vineyards!›1 Reply -
The Williamsburg Winery in Williamsburg is fantastic, and only about an hour from Richmond. They have a 'tavern' restaurant that is open for lunch and a hotel on the property that has a wonderful restaurant open for dinner. Also good in town are the Blue Talon and the Fat Canary. New Kent Winery is a new winery a few miles out of Williamsburg that is fairly good, although not as good as the one in Williamsburg, IMO.
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My boyfriend and I did a wine tasting at Kluge Winery over Halloween weekend, and we had a great time. Kluge is located near Monticello, so it's a little over an hour from Richmond, on 64 West. The wines are quite good, and the setting is fantastic. They also have a nice selection of cheeses and other gourmet treats to tide you over.
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re: AnjLM
I'm not sure what the hours are. It's a little pricy for just a tasting -- I think around $10. I thought it was worth it, though. When we were there, Kluge offered two different tasting flights to choose from, so my boyfriend and I got one of each and the young man behind the wine counter poured us half-tastings of all of the different wines, which worked out really well. When we were there, they were also running a special where you could get full tastings of both wine flights, with cheese pairings for something like $27.
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re: AnjLM
Also near Barboursville and Keswick Vineyards (2 really good Va wineries I think) is Pomme an amazing restaurant. This is probably the very best for a day trip as it's on the Richmond side of Charlottesville.
I tried the brewery last time I was out there and was pretty underwhelmed by the food. We had soup that was somewhat flavorless and unimpressive brats that were only helped by the housemade mustard, which was delish.
Another fun winery that I adore is Delfosse and while they don't serve a full menu, they have a great cheese plate (think lots of cheese at reasonable prices). You can also eat light fare at Kluge. Both of these are near each other and near Jefferson. If it were me, I might plan a day trip to these two wineries and plan to nosh at each. Or I'd do Barboursville, Keswick and Pomme.
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Barboursville Vineyards is a little over an hour from Richmond and has a wonderful restaurant, Palladio: http://www.barboursvillewine.net
Barboursville is one of four vineyards on the eastern part of the Monticello Wine Trail: http://www.monticellowinetrail.com/ex...
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re: mojoeater
there is also a vineyard right near monticello (jefferson i believe) that is nice and a fun part of a trip to charlottesville - where there are great places to eat.
we just went south of charlottesville (afton mountain area) to cardinal point (which was average) but the views were great and it was near a lot of other little vineyards and the shop greenwood gourmet grocery - that does lunch/picnic fare was AMAZING!!! highly recommend. at exit 107 off the 64 (on route 250). i wish richmond had a shop like this. i think it'd do well.
http://www.cardinalpointwinery.com/visit.phpalso i'm not certain you're far from staunton there and the staunton grocery (restaurant) gets great reviews here.
http://www.stauntongrocery.com/
there are LOTS of great day trips from richmond!-
re: AMFM
I love the Afton area. Vineyards around there include Veritas, King Family, Pollack, and Afton Mtn Vineyards as well. There's also a great brewery, Blue Mountain, that serves mostly organic local fare: http://bluemountainbrewery.com.
It's a bit further from Richmond, but worth the trip.
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