Home Made Scuppernong Wine

New industry is taking root in Henry County

Sunday, July 3, 2011

By DEBBIE HALL - Bulletin Staff Writer

Grape vines spill over tautly stretched wire attached to rows of neatly aligned posts. They form the foundation of what will become the area’s newest winery.

“Muscadine are planted on one side; scuppernong on the other,” Noel “Keenan” Campbell said of the two main types of grape vines planted on the property where he and his wife, Blanche Campbell, plan to open a winery, tasting room and a bed and breakfast.

The couple requested, and the Henry County Board of Supervisors last week approved, a rezoning on the property that is located on Wagon Trail Road in Horsepasture. They plan to produce wine, retrofit an existing home into a tasting room and operate a bed and breakfast there.

The couple has planted muscadine and scuppernong grapes. “As far as we know, this is the first muscadine vineyard in Virginia,” Blanche Campbell said.

Muscadine wines are red; scuppernong wines are white, and there are health benefits to drinking both, Keenan Campbell said.

He explained that his wife had high cholesterol and tried many remedies to lower it. Drinking a glass of wine each night has helped to restore her cholesterol to a normal level, he said.

The new business venture sprang from an interest in viticulture that Keenan Campbell developed over the last 15 years or so while the couple lived in Kernersville, N.C. Before that, the Campbells traveled extensively and lived in many other places both domestically and abroad during Keenan Campbell’s service in the military.

Now, Blanche Campbell has retired, and her husband soon will. The business and the move back represent a homecoming of sorts for both.

Blanche Campbell grew up in the Villa Heights area of Henry County, and their business is located on property that has been in Keenan Campbell’s family for many years.

“I grew up here, basically,” he said at the site of the new winery. “Then, we moved across the hill to Ziglar Road.”

Many of his relatives still live in the community, “in the woods, down in the holler and down the road, both ways,” Keenan Campbell quipped.

The rows of vines are growing in place of a former vacant field and a lot that was used to store vehicles waiting to be refurbished, Keenan Campbell said.

Can anyone give me a good muscadine wine recipe? | Grapebizs.com

Jack Keller is your man. See http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/muscadine.asp for his prize winning muscardine recipes, but take time to browse the rest of his home winemaking site because it has all the info anyone needs on how to make wine from local grapes and fruits, what problems you might have and how to solve them. Plus the reasons why things happen and the explanation behind the actions you have to take.

Plus he’s good at answering email requests.

And take time to read his blog.

Site navigation is not too brilliant but if you have a questionon home winemaking, the answer is on his site.

The Gardener's monthly and horticultural advertiser

The Clinton has succeeded everywhere, and is now becoming a popular wine grape. ... heretofore, been the lack of experienced vine-dressers. The Scuppernong ...

The Gardeners' monthly and horticulturist

Our finest wine grapes are the varieties belonging to the jEstivalis type. ... heretofore, been the lack of experienced vine-dressers. The Scuppernong ...

The Picayune Creole cook book

Scuppernong Wine Vin de Mutrade9. 4 Quarts of Scuppernong Juice. ... When cool add a teacupful of yeast (home-made), and put all into a clean, tight cask, ...

Our home journal

Scuppernong Wine. * UR friends at Pass Christian, and other points on the Gulf ... Quite a large quantity of wine has already been made, but the work is not ...

The American farmer

I must add, that I wish it home in mind, that, as the corn grows, the space of earth .... is said to have made some wine of a good flavour* from our grapes. ...