Last Sunday was a rainy day so I decided to take a ride out East to wine country.  I like touring the wineries when it’s raining because I don’t mind being indoors when the weather is not too good and I don’t fee guilty about being indoors when the weather is lousy. On the weekends most of tasting room have some sort of musical entertainment to go along with the wine. I decided to stop into tasting rooms that are off my radar and that I don’t stop into often.

My first stop was Lieb Cellars winery located at 35 Cox Lane Road in Matttituck. They share their location with the Premium Wine Group, a custom crush facility that produces wine for over 70 vineyards. They describe their tasting room as “industrial chic”. The winery is known for their Pinot Blanc which is not widely planted out here but I had the red flight tasting.  Of the five reds I taste which included the 2005 Reserve Merlot, the 2008 Petit Verdot, the 2008 Right Coast Red,  the 2005 Meritage and the 2007 Reserve Cabernet Franc, the Cab Franc was my favorite with  a stemmy, vegetal nose, silky fruit with a moderate to long finish. I felt that all of the reds have crisp acids at the finish.

From there I kept heading East to stop at the Winemakers Studio, the cooperative tasting room in Peconic. After drinking all that red at Lieb I started with a tasting of the 2011 Anomoly which is a white Pinot Noir. It had a slight copper color with good body and balance, unoaked and dry it was a nice glass of wine. Other than that there was nothing new to try so I grabbed an espresso and hit the road.

The weekends are the busiest time for tourists to visit the wineries and most of the wineries have live music and I was in the mood to listen to some music and chill out with a glass of wine in my hand. Bedell Cellars is on the way back west and I know they usually get a good crowd on the weekends so I stopped in. Sure enough it was pretty crowded. The front room had the wine flight tasters and the back event space was packed with people having a good time drinking wine and listening to the one-man band. I grabbed a glass of the 2011 “First Crush” Red. A blend of Merlot, Syrah and Cabernet Franc aged entirely in stainless steel with indigenous yeast, it was dry, young and fruity, a good party wine to sip.

Back on the road I passed Laurel Lake Vineyards at 3165 Main Road, Laurel. It’s one of those wineries that are off my radar, in fact I couldn’t remember the last time I stopped in so I decided to stop in this time. Bedell Cellars was a crowded party, when I walked into this tasting room there was a quartet of people out back listening to the two-man band and thats it. The guys were doing a good job of playing Hank Williams “Hey Good Looking” so I grabbed as glass of the 2009 Cabernet Franc and spent the end of the Sunday afternoon with a glass of red in my hand and listening to the excellent music.