Sumerduck winery uncorks new tasting room

Local
By Bill Walsh
Source: Fauquier Weekend
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 6 2009

The Wine List

• Petit Verdot: Rich and complex, deeply pigmented with firm tannins. Aged in oak, this unfiltered wine promises a good future as well as being enjoyable today. It goes well with hearty fare; serve at room temperature to appreciate its robust character.

• Virginia Red Select: A dry red table wine. This wine will complement roast, steak, Bolognese pastas and other robust flavors.

• Chloe Cabernet: Young and playful with the spirit of Cabernet Sauvignon and the softness of Cabernet Franc.

• Sumerduck Rose: A blush with an attitude. It is a semi-sweet blend that is crisp, fruity, and surprises the palate.

• Barrel-Select Seyval: A spicy white wine, lightly aged in oak. Vanilla and citrus on the nose, follows through with fig and pear on the palate and a long smooth finish reminiscent of a good Semillon.

• Vidal Blanc: A crisp, dry, white wine made in the classic style from 100 percent Vidal grapes. Tasting this wine is a little like biting into a green apple. An excellent partner with grilled salmon or tuna.

• Jacob Christopher Chardonnay: A melody of aromas and flavor to savor solo or as an accompaniment to such delicate fare as lobster bisque or veal. Dry, with a hint of sweetness.

• Virginia White: An off-dry blend of Vidal and Chardonnay. Floral on the nose, with tropical fruit on the palate, a clean, full finish that will complement lighter fare such as pasta in white sauces, poultry, white fish, or simply be enjoyed as an aperitif. Serve lightly chilled.

• Petit Manseng Sweet Reserve: A late-harvest wine with aromas of cinnamon, flowers and peach. Crisp, with apricot, pineapple and spice on the palate.

Rogers Ford Farm Winery is open again, or will be any moment, after shutting down operations in January to renovate its tasting room.

Like everything else about the family-owned, family-worked winery near Sumerduck, the renovation was driven by family concerns.

"We started with the tasting room in a smaller building at the end of [the driveway]," winery founder John Puckett explained. "My son now lives in that house, the house he grew up in. He's got little kids, and the traffic was a concern, so we moved the tasting room up to this cottage" at the front of the property, a two-bedroom house where Puckett's mother once lived.

Puckett and his wife Carlotta bought the 60-acre farm in 1980, while he was still working as an engineer for Lockheed-Martin and making the commute to Ft. Belvoir every day.

"Because of the acreage, we needed some sort of crop in order to be able to afford the place," he recalled recently, taking a break from the tasting room renovation that he has, mostly, done himself.

"We like grapes, so we planted the vineyards and sold the grapes to other wineries for many years. When I got ready to quit my day job a few years ago, we decided to do [the winery]. We have been open for about six years."

Rogers Ford Farm Winery has grown from producing just four varieties in the beginning to making 10 to 12 now, including Petit Verdot, which is, it becomes clear in conversation with Puckett, the apple of his eye.

The Web site describes the wine as "rich and complex...deeply pigmented with firm tannins," a wine that has "a good future as well as being enjoyed today."

Petit Verdot, a Virginia State Fair gold medal winner, "is a top-of-the-line red wine," Puckett said. He bottles the wine in an elegant Italian bottle, and, he concedes, it is pricey.

"It costs twice as much to produce," he notes, "and we only make about 75 cases a year."

Other varietals are more plentiful, but Rogers Ford Farm Winery remains a small operation, with only three and a half of the farm's 60 acres planted in vines.

"We do under 1,000 cases a year," Puckett said. "We did 700 last year, probably will do 800-900 this year. We are selling as much as we are making, with a buffer."

In addition to Petit Verdot, the Puckett family winery produces wines across the spectrum, from bone-dry whites to full-bodied reds and even a dessert wine.

Ninety percent, or more, of its sales are generated through the tasting room, Puckett estimates, though the wine is available in local wine shops and restaurants, at some local farmers' markets, and through an Internet distributor.

Puckett opens bottles of everything the winery offers in the tasting room, and offers patrons the choice between full or partial tastings. Most opt for the former, and pay either $5 to keep the attractive glass with the winery logo, or $2 without the keepsake.

With the removal of a few walls in the former two-bedroom cottage that now houses the renovated tasting room, there will be more room to relax and enjoy the experience, Puckett said. And the new bar is sure to be a hit.

A family friend who owns a portable sawmill won a contract to remove a huge, 350-year-old oak from the Ethel Kennedy estate in McLean, Puckett said, and the friend is crafting a bar from one of the huge slabs of wood that he harvested.

Rogers Ford Farm Winery is off the beaten track, about 10 miles from Remington, nearly as far from U.S. 17. That's just fine with him, Puckett said.

"The business is slow to grow because of that, but once people find us, we get regulars," he said.

"We have interstate travelers who come off 17 and happen to see the sign and pull over. Now they stop every time they go to Florida, or on their way back. So we have regulars that we see just twice a year.

"But we have a relaxed, open atmosphere, a place of refuge when the weather is foul and when it's really hot outside," he added.

Relaxed, indeed. The winery is surrounded on three sides by the Phelps Wildlife Management Area; the closest home in those directions is seven miles distant.

"Remington is 10 miles," Puckett said, and the winery is quiet enough "that we can hear the train when it goes through."

The winery is open from 11 a.m. to six p.m., Fridays through Mondays, and by appointment. It can be reached at (540) 439-3707 and is on the Web at www.rogersfordwine.com.

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