Blueberry Wine - Edible Communities

liquid assets
Blueberry
Wine
TAN CHILDS
WINERY
BY KATHLEEN KELLOGG
PHOTOS BY CAROLE TOPALIAN
12 EDIBLE BUFFALO | SUMMER 2008

Tan Childs Farm and Winery is
an oasis along the dusty and
sometimes overgrown path
linking Western New York’s truly local liquid
assets. This fledgling estate winery is Cattaraugus
County’s only winery and is situated
midway between the Lake Erie and Finger
Lakes plantations, on Cooper Hill in
Humphrey and overlooking the southern
sweep of the Enchanted Mountains. It is not
listed as a stop on a tourist’s wine trail because
this winery is staking its reputation not
on grapes, but on “the best” blueberries.
While a few wild blueberry plants were established
before the Childs family came to
Cooper Hill in the 1980s, owners Peter and
Rita Childs have gradually introduced other
varieties to the rows of bushes that stretch like
vineyards across their mountaintop property.
These are sustainably cultivated at the farm on
Cooper Hill, to take advantage of the unique
acidic soil chemistry rarely found elsewhere.
The soil is moist enough and uniformly highacid
to support blueberries without extensive
soil amendments because Cooper Hill escaped
the churning effect of the glaciers as they bypassed
the hilltop farm. These well-manicured
rows are cultivated to please the palate of ordinary
folks who enjoy their fruit fermented
and poured into a glass, as well as the taster
schooled in the viniferous tradition but seeking
a new and refreshing experience.
Tan Childs Winery owners Peter and Rita
Childs have nurtured the four decades-old
fruit wine tradition from the family’s unlikely
homegrown roots in a South Buffalo back
yard. Peter picked up the rudiments of hobby
winemaking there in his youth, harvesting
wild dandelion, elderberry and raspberry
through the seasons for his father, Bob, a
home hobbyist who shared his skills with his
children and his friends.
Bob Childs and his wife Audrey followed
their passion for berries into retirement in the
1980’s, leading their family to the 2,250 feetelevation
farm where they found wild blueberries
growing back in 1965. Today the
winery is the new neighbor next door to Bob
Childs’ now-bustling U-Pick Childs Blueberry
Farm. Both enterprises attract visitors
who are drawn from the family’s successful
farmers market stands.
When Peter and Rita married in 2002 they
launched their five-acre winery, merging their
agricultural heritage and joining their old
family names—Tan comes from Rita’s Chinese
ancestry—to create the mountain winery label
and the symbolic raised glasses held by a
Chinese farmer and an American cowboy on
horseback. They strive for quality in the operation
that they want to keep small for the time
being. The hand-picked pesticide-free blueberries
undergo a two-stage fermentation
process for wine-making that enhances their
natural antioxidants and free radical protection.
The fermentation begins in the blueberry
skin and continues in Peter Childs’ cellar
where it is aged in 212-gallon stainless steel
drums. This juice is then strained and aged for
one year before it is marketed.
When asked what is the best way to drink the
wine, Childs says at first, it should be viewed
as an adventure and people should experiment,
but then he hefts an imaginary jug
over his shoulder, a gesture that speaks
volumes about his philosophy of making a
wine that appeals to everyone. While he
admits the blueberries that are sold at the
farmers markets are the same ones that go
into his wines, he says he’d like to keep the
secret of which varieties make the best bottles
of wine.
“They say ‘No wine before it’s time,’ and
that’s true of fruit too,” said Peter, who subscribes
to a pioneering spirit but has intentionally
avoided the economic pitfalls of “real
farming” and donned the mantle of “gentleman
farmer.” He has studied the scholarly
research into the fruit’s health-boosting, agedefying
antioxidants and anti-inflammatory
properties, and he welcomes input from scientists
who have visited Cooper Hill to study
the soils. The family regularly tests plant foliage
and applies any recommended mineral
supplements to the soil, following strict
timing in the application of integrated pesticides
that occur well before or after harvest.
“It’s like sustainable forestry. We try to leave
the land better than when we started. That is
not included in the definition of organic and
you can destroy the soil with organic
treatment,” said Childs. “In theory a good
farmer wants to be farming today and also
In theory a good farmer wants to be
farming today and also next year.
You can’t do that with heavy chemicals
and pesticides.
next year. You can’t do that with heavy chemicals
and pesticides. Good farmers don’t want
to use them.”
The winery markets only a few hundred
bottles of semi-dry and semi-sweet blueberry
and elderberry wines, an artisan effort for a
relatively few appreciative customers who he
said have begun to return each year as a dedicated
cult following.
As Peter Childs leads a lesson in tasting, it’s
not hard to see why a proper sip, rolled
slowly over the tongue, can lead to membership
in that cult. The berry’s slight acidity
will open the taste buds and prepare them
for food, so anything will taste better, he advises.
But the table wine’s tingling and the
changing flavors—the same “complexity”
that sold cases of the stuff to a liquor store
in Saratoga Springs—are unexpected. Even
more complex—and surprising—is the dis-
EDIBLE BUFFALO | SUMMER 2008 13

tinct sensation following a sip of the semi-sweet blueberry
wine: it’s the fleeting explosive aftertaste of biting into a juicy
ripe blueberry.
The production and direct marketing efforts are purposely
limited to maintain quality control, with sales managed by extended
family members and trusted agents at a handful of farm
markets. The wines are also sold to a select group of liquor
stores around the region, while about ten cases a year are sold
next door at the Child’s Blueberry Farm gift shop that is frequented
by the throngs of visitors who come each July and
August to pick their own fresh blueberries. The winery’s colorful
Internet site, www.tanchilds.com, is an easily-accessible
purchase outlet for customers who can’t visit the winery or one
of the farmers markets that carry their products. These markets
include North Tonawanda Farmers Market, East Aurora,
Hamburg, Clarence, Downtown Buffalo, and the Rochester
Public Market.
Cattaraugus County’s pockets of acidic soils help other blueberry
growers supply the growing legion of fans of this sweet blue fruit.
Childs Blueberries is one of seven U-pick blueberry farms open
to the public, but may be the only one with its own winery. eB
Kathy Kellogg is a freelancer and gentlewoman farmer in Cattaraugus
County. She finally found a good reason to plant her first
two rows of blueberry bushes this spring.
Cattaraugus County
U-Pick Blueberry Farms
Blueberry Hill Farm & Greenhouse
10016 Allegany Rd., South Dayton 716-532-2920
Blueberry Meadows
Rowe Ave., Westons Mills 716-373-2865
Burdick Blueberries, Inc.
8267 Thompson Rd., East Otto 716-257-9760 or 1-800-642-4245
Camp’s Blueberries
67 Larkin St., Randolph 716-358-6422
Child’s Blueberries
3207 Cooper Hill Rd., Humphrey 716-557-2529
Pepper’s Blueberries
3370 Bear Creek Rd., Franklinville 716-676-2469
Shadbush Farm Blueberries
2430 Ten Mile Rd., Allegany 716-373-0301
14 EDIBLE BUFFALO | SUMMER 2008