Looking for a new, outdoor spot to drink wine? Home Range Winery invites you to the family farm | Food

CANAAN, N.Y. — An area vineyard’s roots are firmly planted within the heritage of 4 generations of the Bartlett household and the household farm.

Some 50 years after being bought and getting used as a working farm, Flatbrook Farm is now residence to a vineyard that makes use of fruit harvested from bushes and vines planted by the Bartlett household generations in the past.

All of it started in 1972, when Edward C. Bartlett purchased the farm for his mother and father, Edward R. and Gladys Bartlett. “He wished to assist care for them and transfer again [from the state of Washington] to the place he had grown up in west Pittsfield,” mentioned Peter Bartlett, co-founder and proprietor of Residence Vary Vineyard, including that white-faced beef cows had been raised on the 30-acre farm from the mid-Seventies to the Nineteen Eighties.

Edward C. Bartlett offered his curiosity within the steel spinning enterprise, O.W. Landergren in Pittsfield, within the mid-Nineteen Eighties with the intention to deal with caring for his aged mother and father. At round that very same time, the household obtained into elevating smaller animals for meals on the farm, simply over the New York border, together with rabbits, chickens and pigs.

“My dad spent all his time on the farm,” Peter mentioned in a cellphone interview Tuesday. “He helped rework, did planting and took care of the animals.” He added that his father was an avid wine drinker. “He did not make wine, however he beloved wine and drank it day-after-day.”

Following Peter’s grandfather’s dying in 1985, “My grandmother and father planted rows and rows of raspberries, blueberries and grapes, and intensive raised beds for greens,” Peter mentioned. “They’d get 200 kilos of raspberries a yr.”

Peter moved into the two-family residence on the farm within the early Nineties, whereas his grandmother was nonetheless there, and raised his three now-adult youngsters, Jessica, Patrick and Ethan there. All of them now assist out on the vineyard, which started as a pastime about seven years in the past for Bartlett and Susan Powell, an beginner winemaker, who he met whereas on a landscaping job. “Our love of horticulture introduced us collectively,” mentioned Powell, a local of the Midwest, who got here to the Berkshires from Seattle.

They started making wine utilizing the blueberries, raspberries, blackberries and harmony grapes planted by Bartlett’s grandparents — and Residence Vary wines had been born.

When creating the label for his or her wines, Bartlett and Powell selected utilizing the picture of a deer. “My dad was an avid hunter and fisherman, and a part of the rationale he purchased the farm was to go looking,” Bartlett mentioned. “Deer have a ‘residence vary’ [an area in which they regularly travel in search of food or mates] and it grew to become Residence Vary Vineyard.”

“The large barn was crammed with junk and we determined to wash it out,” Bartlett mentioned. “And we began making American hybrid wine [wine made from grapes created specifically for a specific region and vetted by Cornell University].”

The barn now has a tasting room on the principle stage and a processing room on the decrease stage, the place the entire wine is processed.

They planted the winery in 2016, utilizing 500 vines. “Our wine is 100% New York product [products made or bought from New York only] as a result of it’s a farm vineyard,” Bartlett defined. Nearly all of the brand new vines planted had been Marquette, a pink grape. One other pink grape, Baco, and two white grapes, Traminette and Cayuga, had been additionally planted.

The couple began promoting wine commercially in 2019, and nonetheless solely promote on-site, being restricted in manufacturing resulting from state laws. The vineyard averages round 1,000 instances of wine produced yearly. Bartlett and Powell, the only real winemakers, produce 15 kinds of wine: Raspberry, blueberry, blackberry and pear, and pink, rose and white wines. As well as, they provide blended wines made with blended grape varieties.

After a “low-key” summer time final yr throughout the pandemic — there was no dwell music or meals venues — Powell and Bartlett are trying ahead to this summer time.

“We had been open and we did fairly nicely. We struggled via [last summer], nevertheless it was OK,” Bartlett mentioned. “We discovered tips on how to get via it.”

This summer time, there will likely be dwell music and meals vans on the vineyard each different weekend, totally on Saturdays. Bartlett mentioned the schedule will likely be posted on the winery’s Facebook page and website.

There will likely be three oyster festivals additionally, one in June, August and September. “They are going to function an oyster man from Cape Cod, opening recent oysters and serving them on the half-shell; meals vans and dwell music,” Bartlett mentioned.

“If you wish to sit, have a glass or bottle of wine and speak to Susan and me, come on Thursdays when it isn’t so busy,” Bartlett mentioned.

Within the tasting room, guests can have a wine tasting for $12; a glass of wine, $10; a bottle of wine, from $23 to $28; a charcuterie board for $12 to $15, or craft beers from the Chatham Brewing. Soda, crackers and peanuts are additionally out there.

However a go to to the farm/vineyard is not simply all concerning the wine. Guests can have a look at the antiques on show within the tasting room, stroll via the gardens and go to the livestock — pigs, chickens, geese and quail. There are tables exterior and guests are inspired to carry their very own picnics.

“We wish it to be an expertise; we wish you to come back and revel in my grandparents’ farm.” Bartlett added, “My dad died in 2011 and by no means noticed Residence Vary Vineyard, however he is right here.”