Sandra Silfven

Michigan's Peninsula Cellars proves it's got staying power

Steady, but sure: That seems to be how Peninsula Cellars keeps the wine press turning.

The Old Mission Peninsula winery, founded in 1991, had rock-star status from its domination of the Michigan Wine & Spirits Competition in the first half of this decade, and add to that the honors it accrued on the international circuit.

Winemaker Bryan Ulbrich's Manigold Vineyard Gewurztraminer was acclaimed by British wine authority Tom Stevenson as the wine he had waited a lifetime to taste -- a Gewurz made outside France that tasted like Alsace.

And then, after the 2005 vintage and much of the 2006, Ulbrich left to pursue his own dream, making Left Foot Charley wines, in nearby Traverse City.

Can a winery recoup? Try tasting the topflight 2007 Pinot Gris and 2007 Kroupa Estate Pinot Blanc.

Peninsula Cellars grabbed a coveted Jefferson Cup at the Jefferson Cup Invitational last year for its 2006 Select Riesling. That wine also took a Chairman's Award (Double Gold) at the Riverside International Wine Competition last year, and a nod in Time magazine. Ulbrich was mainly responsible for that wine. At the 2008 Michigan wine competition, Peninsula Cellars with new winemakers nabbed Double Gold for its 2007 Kroupa Estate Pinot Blanc. Let it be said that Ulbrich's 2005 Hogs Back Vineyard Merlot also got Double Gold that year.

"We jumped back into it," said John Kroupa, who is general manager and co-owner of the winery with his parents Dave and Joan Kroupa. "I think if you have a competent winemaker, the way we grow fruit here, you are going to make good wine."

Kroupa performs multiple roles at the winery, including stylistic decisions on the blends. He relies on consulting winemaker Chris Guest and assistant winemaker Matt Frollo, who completed the wine program at Michigan State University.

"We are sitting on a great cellar of wines from 2007," Guest said this week. His first wines were the 2007 Pinot Gris and 2007 Pinot Blanc.

Guest, who also consults at Willow Vineyard, founded the one viable winery we used to have in Metro Detroit: Seven Lakes Vineyard in Fenton.

The white varietals are obviously the stars of the tasting room, and the tasting room is another story all by itself -- it's in the peninsula's old one-room schoolhouse.

The two everyday wines are worth your notice. They are appropriately called Old School White and Old School Red, and are complex blends that are not vintage-dated. They have mass appeal. Priced at $11.99, the white is sweet but has such good acid balance, you can easily pair it with food. It's a blend of Cayuga, Riesling, Pinot Blanc and Pinot Grigio. And the red, mainly based on Baco Noir, Marechal Foch and Lemberger, with some added Merlot and Cabernet Franc, is dry to semi-dry, and shows the quality you can get by smart blending.

Some wine notes:

2006 Peninsula Cellars Gewurztraminer, $14.99: The intense floral, citrus, lichee nut character, made in a dry style and capturing all the natural skin tannins is not for the faint of heart. You have to be a hardcore student of wine to appreciate it. It's bitter-sweet and tart-dry in true Alsace style.

2006 Peninsula Cellars Merlot, $14.99: Proof you can still make good red wine in a tough vintage. This was picked in the fall that the Tigers made it to the World Series and fans wore winter coats. The acidity is high, but the fruit and wood manage to balance it out. Think ripe plums, black berries and vanilla beans.

2006 Peninsula Cellars Riesling Select, $25.99: It's no wallflower, with a wallop of lime, passionfruit, kiwi and apricot on the nose, a river of pineapple on the mid-palate and a wonderful minerality that caps it all off.

2007 Peninsula Cellars Kroupa Estate Vineyard Pinot Blanc, $18: It shows some of the uncharacteristic richness that results from a hot, rather than cool, vintage, but the acidity is right there to provide a contrast to the ripe tropical fruit. It's like a cocktail of tangerines and limes, mixed with a dollop of peach and pear, and topped off with Perrier.

Learn more about Peninsula Cellars at www.peninsulacellars.com.

You can reach Sandra Silfven at (313) 222-2440 or ssilfven@detnews.com.