Wine Life - Houston

  The next stop on the Lodi wine trail was at Mohr-Fry Ranches to get a view of the gnarled old vines that made Lodi famous. We parked on the road next to certified historical vineyard , Marian’s Vineyard. which holds 8.3 acres of old vine Zinfandel planted on its own roots. The vineyard sits on Lodi’s west side and is located in the highly esteemed Mokelumne River AVA. This historic vineyard was started in 1901. It sits on sandy soils on the Mohr-Fry Ranches property. Owner, Jerry Fry named the vineyard after his mother. It is currently farmed by father/son team Jerry and Bruce Fry.   The Mohr-Fry property consists of vineyards and orchards, along with diversified row crops. They grow twelve varieties of wine grapes, two varieties of cherries and over twenty-five varieties of dry heirloom beans. The agricultural history of the Mohrs and Frys extends back to the 1850s when Bruce Fry's great-great-grandfather on Jerry's mother's side, Cornelius Mohr left his j...

     Lodi’s famous Bechthold Vineyard sits on 25 acres  in what is now the southwestern Lodi sub AVA, Mokelumne River. This parcel of land is home to 133 year old vine Cinsault which was planted in 1886. The vines are head trained, un-grafted, dry-farmed, and organically grown on sandy loam soil. Bechthold has the distinction of being the oldest continuously farmed vineyard in Lodi and the region’s only known large planting of Cinsault.   Cinsault is a red grape originally from southern France primarily used in both red and rosé blends. Cinsault is valued for creating wines that have fruity aromas with a pleasant texture. The Cinsault vines at Bechthold Vineyards are believed to be the oldest Cinsault vines in the world due to the vines of Southern France being replanted in the early 20th century after the phylloxera epidemic.   Kevin Phillips of Michael David Winery, has farmed the vineyard with his team since 2008 under a long te...

As seen in the June 2019 issue of Galveston Monthly magazine