Vegan Wine Tasting at Plant Food + Wine

More people are on a vegan diet and do not have diverse choices when it comes to wine. Luckily, there is Vegan Wine. We enjoyed a Vegan wine tasting on October 4, 2019 at Matthew Kenney Plant Food + Wine in the East Village that was small, intimate, and easy to network.

Normally one thinks of Reisling from the Finger Lakes, but the Barry Family Cellars produces this and others like Rosé, Cabernet Franc, Pinot Noir, Gewurztraminer and Chardonnay. Their wines are unfiltered and always vegan.

The 2016 Barry Family Chardonnay was refreshing with notes of melon and lemon. The 2017 Barry Family Pastiche has an interesting blend of 36 percent Chardonnay, 35 percent Gewürztraminer, and 29 percent Riesling with aromas of honeysuckle, roses, tropical fruit and citrus.

Some want a lower alcohol content, and would like the 2018 Barry Family Cayuga Pet Gnat with 10.5 percent alcohol. The wine finishes fermenting in the bottle after it is enclosed to capture the gases and create bubbles. The wines have earned two Governor’s Cups, several 90+ point scores in the major magazines, and even been named as one of Wine and Spirits Magazines “Top 100 Wines of the Year.”

If you like Italian wines, then you would like the 2016 Luca Di Tomaso Montefalco Ross, Winner of the Commended Award at the 2019 Decanter Wine Awards. They also produce grape varietals like Sangiovese, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Sagranti. Here, you can taste the concentrated red-black fruits such as blackberries, plums, cassis, and currant. This is perfect with pizza and pasta.

Also, you can try their orange wines, which one does not usually find. The 2018 Serracavallo Besidiae is a dry white wine with mandarin, apricot, and golden apple fruits in grape varietals like Riesling, Pecorino, and Chardonnay. Also, the 2017 Terre Del Gufo Aylsso Bianco from Calabria, Italy is a dry, white wine with Meyer lemon, pear, and dried apricot with the grape varietal of Vujino. To match the fine wines were delicious plant-based foods like smoked hummus.

Vegan Wines is the first online vegan wine club in the USA. It was founded by long-time vegan and wine lover, Frances Gonzalez. She discovered that there were vegan wine clubs in Europe but none in the US – and so the idea for Vegan Wines was born.

One does not realize that animal products are frequently involved in the wine-making process, particularly in fertilization and fining, making the end product unsuitable for vegans. Their wines are organic without added sugar and are cruelty-free.

The wholesale branch of Vegan Wines is known as Despacito Distributors, a professional wine distributor in the plant-based wine market. Despacito offers 100 percent vegan, plant-based wines from all over the world to business owners in the hospitality and beverage industry at wholesale prices. They accept wholesale orders from California, Florida, New York, Nevada, and New Jersey.

They have a wine club too where one can try fine wines with and without cheeses. Six bottles of hand-selected vegan wines (red, white, rosé, and sparkling) from distinguished wine regions across the world, shipped directly to your doorstep three times a year in the Winter, Spring, and Fall. It cost $140-$200 per shipment (plus tax and flat rate shipping).

There are fully customizable wine club shipments so you can select the vintages you like best. Members receive:

• 10 percent discount on all wines in the Vegan Wines Shop
• Insider content with each season’s shipment, including plant-based recipes to pair with your new wines, interviews with owners and winemakers, and sommelier tasting notes.
• $20 Flat Rate Club Shipping – but if you order a case or more, shipping is included
• Exclusive access to new wines and club promotions throughout the year.
• The option to add vegan cheeses to each shipment

They also partnered with Miyoko’s Kitchen and Vtopian Cheeses to offer some of the best vegan cheeses in the country.

If not sure about joining the club, then one try their Club Sampler Trio features three hand-selected wines from their current club shipments. Buy four sampler trios and the shipping is included.

More about vegan wines can be found at veganwines.com.