It’s Fall here in the US and my thoughts have shifted to cooler temperatures and wines to warm me up inside. While this is a nice dream, here on the West Coast, it has only recently been somewhat cooler to even consider this.

I set out again to find a state I had yet to try wines from for my long overdue quest to try wines from all 50 United States. I’m growing closer and many of those left will be difficult states to purchase wines from and ship to California. Even for this state, Ohio, it was extremely difficult to find a winery that would “legally” ship wines to California. I probably went through at least 15 winery websites before I found one that would. Often times, the winery I do find ends up being totally worth it and this one fit that scenario quite well.

Let’s first, though, look at the history of wine in Ohio. It’s another one of those early American states filled with a strong historical history of wine and winemaking. Alexander and Isabella grape vines were first planted there in the early 1820s, both being hybrid crosses of Vitis labrusca (native) and Vitis vinifera (imported). Both aren’t overly popular today due to their foxiness and are widely overshadowed by better options. By 1860, Catawba vines were planted and became the primary grape in the state when it produced more wine than any other state in the US. Due to its location in a budding country, Cincinnati became the most important city in the nation for wine trade.

Unfortunately, like a broken record, Ohio’s wine industry was wiped out by Prohibition just like most of the other states. It wasn’t until the mid 20th century before winemaking began taking back off. Today, Ohio is in the top ten states producing wines.

For my Ohio wines, I chose Debonne Vineyards, located in Madison, about an hour east of Cleveland and is part of the larger Lake Erie AVA. They have over 175 acres of vines and apparently even sell their pressed juices during harvest to home winemakers! As a home winemaker myself, this is great to hear! Would be rough to ship that to me, but maybe someday I will try.

Debonne Vineyards started as a fruit farm in the early 1900s by the Debevc family from Yugoslavia and transitioned into a winery a few decades later. Chalet Debonné Vineyards was producing award winning wines by the 1970s and continued to expand over the last few decades. It is now the largest estate winery in Ohio.

My first wine was their 2021 Chambourcin, a pretty middle of the road standard hybrid red. Its tannins were mild to medium with notes of darker cherries and medium acids. It wasn’t the best Chambourcin I’ve tried, but was good enough in my book.

I tried their 2022 Riesling Reserve Lot 907 for my second wine. This was a phenomenal white wine, and could compete against any well known Riesling I’ve ever tried. The sweetness and acid levels were perfect for me. It had notes of stone fruits like peach and a blooming floral aroma. Seriously, this was truly a great wine. I say this often here, but I typically prefer reds more than whites, but this one hit the spot. This wine is their reserve from a very specific lot and I can see why. It’s truly a special batch. It makes me curious to how much it differs from their standard Riesling though.

Well, if you hadn’t figured it out yet, I certainly preferred the 2022 Riesling Reserve Lot 907 as my favorite of the two. There really was no competition here.

I had been holding out on trying Ohio wines as I had a pretty good feeling that I would like their wines. Ohio has fairly good climate location in the US and at least from my own experiences has a great reputation for making homegrown wines. I can only imagine that as the years go by this reputation will continue to spread and more and more people will become impressed as well. I just hope that someday it becomes easier for all of us to try their wines.

* No AI was used in writing this review (and it probably shows!)

You can see a list of states I’ve reviewed on my main 50 Wines From 50 States page.