How about a taste of terroir for Spring travel 2024? Terroir can be a tricky term to tackle. This French concept doesn’t just apply to wine – in fact, it’s generally applicable to any agricultural product from bread to cheese to meats and beyond. So what does it mean, and how does it apply to Lake Erie Wine?

There’s an obvious etymological link between terroir and terre, the French word for earth or land. Unsurprisingly, the soil itself is part of the concept of terroir, and within the context of Lake Erie, that means the free-draining sand and gravel soils over a clay base. Why is this important? Grape vines do their best work when they get just enough water to survive but not quite enough to thrive. The sand and gravel topsoils mean that vines have to dig deep to find water, and this also means that they don’t get waterlogged in periods of high precipitation. This is good news because the berries don’t swell with water and dilute flavors, and the green parts of the canopy don’t become overgrown. Instead, the vines can concentrate their efforts on ripening fruit, and the clay base soil retains water so that the vines are never parched beyond the pale.

But the soil, the land, is only part of the equation. Terroir is something more all-encompassing that also takes into consideration things like climate, neighboring vegetation, topography, and anything else that creates a unique sense and flavor of place. It’s why Riesling grapes grown on the sunny shores of Lake Erie, moderated by lake temperatures that allow for a gentle and long growing season, taste different than those grown in Australia’s high-elevation Eden Valley, for example.

Think of terroir as the signature of a time and place. Although it might be hard to define, you know it when you taste it.

Story by Adam Knoerzer / Photography by Jeff Swensen