Loving Cup Vineyard and Winery

September 27, 2024.  The remnants of Hurricane Helene were still making the outdoors miserable when we visited Loving Cup Vineyard and Winery in North Garden.  We really wanted to visit because Loving Cup is the only certified organic winery in Virginia.  How do they accomplish this, and how is their wine?

To get to the winery, we drove south from Charlottesville on Route 29 about 20 minutes and turned onto Sutherland Road.  We found parts of the gravel road carved with ruts from the heavy rain.  One section was washed away, and we had to negotiate around police tape that marked the hazard.  On such a lousy weather day, it was no surprise that we were the only visitors, but our good fortune to have the undivided attention of founder, Werner Hambsch, and could spend some time with his son, winemaker Karl Hambsch.  What follows is some of their story:

Werner is a big, bespectacled, and balding rollie bear of man, who came to the United States from near Heidelberg, Germany as a young man and opened a delicatessen in Miami, Florida.  It is also where he met his wife, Barbara, who worked next door.  After some time, the couple wanted to move to an historic college town that enjoyed four seasons (sort of like Heidelberg).  On a friend’s recommendation, they relocated to the Charlottesville area.  Werner opened a deli and did so well that he eventually owned the Crossroads Store in North Garden which is a fixture at Route 29 and the Plank Road.  He sold his interest in the store a few years ago to focus on the vineyard.

As for the winery operation, Werner started by making wine from crab apple trees on his property, then pears, peaches, apples, and raspberries, before arriving at grapes.  Karl, who reminds me of an earnest Luke Wilson, brought some grape juice home from his work at Veritas Winery one day to try their hand at making grape wine. 

                                                                                            Karl Hambsch bottling his wine

This experiment went so well that they planted a test plot of vines in 2007 or 2008.  At first the aim was a conventional vineyard, but when Karl’s wife became pregnant, he was concerned about exposing their child to all the chemicals that were deemed necessary to grow grapes in the Virginia climate.  He made the decision to try to operate an organic vineyard and winery without using conventional pesticides and fungicides.  Instead, Karl opted to plant exclusively hybrid grapes that had been bred for resistance to fungus and pests. 

At first, the crop failed forcing them to pull-out vines and replant.  But eventually in 2011, they had their first harvest.  Loving Cup was certified as organic in 2012 and has met the annual recertification standards every year since.  They opened the winey in 2014.  The spirit of experimentation still alive at Loving Cup, leading the Virginia Vineyards Association to name Karl its Grower of the Year in 2018.

Loving Cup now has five acres under vine, and they plan to expand further next year.  They remain a very small winery with only around 750 cases produced annually.  All wines, however, are estate grown, with the exception of an apple wine whose juice is from Washington, Virginia.  They tend to harvest in whole clusters and all work is by hand.  Karl was hand-bottling his sparking white wine when we spoke with him.

The tasting room is small and plain.  The wall by the tasting bar is adorned by flags bearing the blue and white heart which Werner imported from his hometown to be the symbol of the winery. 

 

Outside the tasting room is a generous wrap-around porch that looks out over the vineyards.  Of course, when we were there sitting outside even on a covered deck would have gotten you drenched!  Outside food is welcome.  Families are welcome too as are dogs on leashes. 

 

Loving Cup even handles its wine club differently.  You can’t just pay money to join as with virtually every other wine club in existence.  To join and get discounts and other perks, you must perform jobs around the vineyard and winery for minimum of 8 hours a year.  This can include pruning, canopy management, harvest, and tasting room support, among other jobs.  This is a sweat-equity wine club, and they have their share of long-term very loyal workers to prove its worth.  Put in the time and you may get a wine named after you ("Ginny's Block - Cayuga White").

Before getting to the wines we tasted, let’s break for a short note about hybrids.  Most wine grapes grown in Virginia belong to the species Vitis vinifera.  Chardonnay, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon are well known examples.  A hybrid is a grape variety created by breeding two grapes of different species.  For example, Loving Cup white wines often are made from the Cayuga grape, which is a Cornell-developed cross of Vitis labrusca Schuyler and Seyval Blanc (which in turn has multiple species represented including V. vinifera).  Cayuga offers some resistance to rot and can handle some colder temperatures.  [See our “What Grows” module for more info on varietals, clones and hybrids.]  From their website, it appears that Loving Cup uses five different hybrids in their wines. 

2023 Sparkling White.  Very light bubbles owing to Pétillant Naturel in the primary fermentation.  It is 100% Cayuga White.  Dry and crisp.  Since Loving Cup is the only organic winery in Virginia, the Sparkling White is the first (and only?) organically-certified sparking wine in the state.  We rate it a B mindful that we are not big sparkling aficionados. 

2023 Loving Cup White.  Resembling an unoaked Chardonnay, the Loving Cup White is predominately Cayuga White with a small amount of Bianca and a trace of St. Pepin grapes.  It was a little sweet to me, but crisp and complex.  It won Gold in the 2024 Monticello Cup and was in the Monticello Cup Case as one of the top 12 wines in the 2024  competition.  Bianca is a Hungarian hybrid (1963) fairly neutral in taste.  St. Pepin is a hybrid from Minnesota (1986) that resembles Riesling.  B.

2021 Tellurian White.  Not as deep as the Loving Cup White.  More crisp and more tannic.  More buttery due to aging in new French oak.  Very similar blend proportions of Cayuga White, Bianca, and St. Pepin that are found in the Loving Cup White.  B+ and we bought bottles.

2022 Dudley Nose Rosé.  I would say this is a typical rosé.  Tingly in the top palate.  Almost peach in color.  Strawberry taste and a little residual sugar for sweetness.  The blend for this wine is: 56% Marquette, 25% Corot Noir, 9% Cayuga White.  Marquette is a hybrid from the University of Minnesota released in 2006 featuring cherry and berry taste along with some tannin and pepper.  Corot Noir is a Cornell hybrid released in 2006.  It has berry and cherry taste like a Chambourcin.  The resulting wine we rate a B.  One side note about the rosé is that a portion of the sales proceeds go to a local pet adoption center.

2022 Marquette.  This is Loving Cup’s first release of a 100% Marquette wine.  Berry and preserve flavors.  Not too complex.  Ruby color.  Some smoke/tobacco.  Loving Cup tasting notes suggest that this could be your “breakfast wine” if you were looking for one.  And one might ponder the reasoning for that over a stack of pancakes.  ABV of 14%.  Rating of B.

2021 Loving Cup Red.  More managed mature fruit taste than the Marquette, along with some smoke and toast.  Some grip.  Pepper and spice from Hungarian oak aging.  Light-bodied.  The blend is: 54% Corot Noir and 46% Marquette.  I preferred the Loving Cup Red over the Marquette and bought a bottle.  B+

2021 Rye Reserve Red.  Werner also served us a tasting of this dessert wine.  Karl made this wine when, aghast, he saw Werner adding apple sauce to his red wine.  This is 100% Marquette but made in whiskey barrels. It is made at an organic distillery and so it maintains its organic label.  Semi-sweet, some tannins.  A good winter wine – and Werner approves.  High B.

As noted above, Karl Hambsch and Loving Cup have a history of experimenting with their product.  Between 2019 and 2021, Loving Cup had an engagement with the Japanese Government to provide grapes cuttings in bags to improve transportability.  The winery has also experimented with raisinating their Cayuga grapes in what they call “Straw Wine.”  We did not taste it.

Loving Cup regularly features experimental wines in their Tasting Room.  In some cases, long-time wine club members get credit as the inspiration for these blends.  We tried “Red Blaze Version 2” when we visited.  Version 2 was made by rehydrating the pomace of Corot Noir and Marquette with Cayuga juice.  (Version 1, we understand used honey).  Version 2 had a strong floral nose and taste of cherry fruit.  If you can snag a bottle, serve it chilled or see what other experiments are available for you.  It is the best time you can have being a guinea pig.

Loving Cup wines may be available at Wegmans in the Charlottesville and Fredericksburg areas and at some wine shops.

We’ll end this post with a food recommendation, which you know we don’t normally do.  On Werner’s recommendation, we visited Dr. Ho’s Pizza at the Crossroads.  Dr. Horace was a Doctor of Philosophy “as loopy as can be.”  But he also made a great pizza.  We had lunch at Dr. Ho’s after surviving the road washouts leaving Loving Cup.  We ordered their signature pizza, the “Humble Pie.”  You have probably heard of Crozet Pizza, a local legend.  Having had both now, we can say that Dr. Ho’s was easily equal to the famous Crozet Pizza and worth the stop.