The springs on the screen door yawn under the stress of stretching as a visitor enters the shop that was the old creamery building.

Monday, July 17, 2000

The springs on the screen door yawn under the stress of stretching as a visitor enters the shop that was the old creamery building. Springs speak again as it recoils, and the light wood frame supporting the screen closes with an unassuming bang. The wooden floor creaks and echoes beneath the weight of the visitor.

The fragrance of sweet fruit wine greets Scenic Valley Winery visitors with the same measure of friendliness offered by the store’s owner, Kari Ristau. Nestled in quaint downtown Lanesboro, the winery has been offering carefully crafted fruit wines since 1984.

The shop has a wide range of fruit wines from semi-sweet to wines as sweet and thick as a port.

Although she never anticipated becoming a vintner, Ristau has enjoyed the past 16 years of making wine and eventually taking ownership of Scenic Valley Winery from her parents.

"Each day is different," Ristau said of her career. "I really enjoy meeting the different people who stop by and the freedom of owning my own business."

Ristau also likes making the wine, "some more than others," she said.

Each fruit used bares a different flavor, and all require variations in the wine-making process.

Rhubarb, apples, grapes, plums and cherries are purchased from local growers. Raspberries and strawberries generally have to be ordered from growers outside the state to ensure a sweet fruit.

"I generally place ads in the paper to get the fruit," Ristau said. "We didn’t have any luck trying to maintain our own vineyard. We lost more plants than anything, so buying the fruit is better for us."

Plus, not having to maintain a vineyard or orchard allows Ristau and her family to concentrate on the sometimes time-consuming process of making the wine.

How the wine is made depends on the fruit used. Some fruits are pressed, then fermented. Other fruits are fermented before they are pressed.

"Eventually all the fruit is pressed, but the process is a little different with each," Ristau said.

The fermentation period also varies with the fruit and even between the different crops.

The amount of wine made also depends on the crop. This year, Ristau was able to purchase a large quantity of quality rhubarb. However, the strawberries she was offered had too much water in them, and would yield a sweet wine.

The wines that visitors to Lanesboro are enjoying this year were made in a process that began well more than a year ago.

"The shortest is rhubarb, which only takes about a year," Ristau said. Currently, in the winery above the shop, two of a half-dozen or so large storage tanks are filled with fermenting rhubarb. Those storage tanks range in size from 200 to 550 gallons.

The one vat is in its second fermentation stage, while the other tank is finally approaching the temperature required for fermentation.

"It needs to be about 70 degrees for the yeast to become active," Ristau explained. "But you can’t heat it up to that temperature because the sugars will burn.

"We transfer the wines to different tanks every three months to keep the tanks fresh. In this job, there’s a lot of baby-sitting," Ristau added.

Other wines are made in smaller batches because of the availability of the fruit.

Scenic Valley Winery’s wild blackberry wine is stored in large bottles called carboys until it’s ready for bottling. It’s then sold in smaller bottles.

Of course, before the wine hits the shelves, Ristau has to make sure the wine is sweet, not sour or bitter. Quality assurance testing is one of the perks of the job, Ristau admits with a laugh.

The wines Ristau produces generally would be considered dessert wines or suitable with cheese and crackers. Some of the less sweet wines also can be served with a meal.

Their wine list, ranging from dry to sweet is: rhubarb, Ruby Red, Harvest Blend, cranberry, wild plum, raspberry, sweet rhubarb, apple, strawberry, Purple Passion and Cherry Chill.

Scenic Valley also offers two cooking wines – green pepper and onion.

Ristau, who gets help from her mother and any other willing soul, bottles about 7,500 bottles of wine a year.