August Evening in the Vines

What a beautiful day! We spent the evening in the vineyard picking concord grapes. The whole family was involved. The kids had a great time! Afterwards, they used an old hand press and made grape juice. Spending time like this with the family is so wonderful… I wouldn’t trade it for anything!

We are truly blessed!

The Long History of Cassel Vineyards and Pavone's Restaurant

(The picture on the left shows the family of Squire Cassel who is seated in the front row on the right. His son, Calvin is seated beside him second from right and directly behind him is Christian Cassel. Christian bought Cassel's Brookside Farms and also bought the schoolhouse where Pavone's Restaurant is now located. He sold the schoolhouse to the Sleva family who turned it into the original Cracker Barrel who then sold it to the Pavone family.)

Cassel Vineyards of Hershey’s Wines have found a new home at Pavone’s Restaurant. It’s not actually a new home because the wines from Cassel Vineyard are essentially coming home. To understand what I mean one has to know the history of Pavone’s Restaurant. Pavones was originally built by Squire Calvin Cassel who owned the adjacent land and farm bordered by Route 22 to the north which contained the Cassel Mansion. Squire Cassel raised Christian E. Cassel who was the owner and founder of Cassel’s Brookside Farms one mile South of Pavone’s along Old Hershey Road (present day Rt.39). Presently, the 5^th generation of Cassels are now working the same farm and have brought the fruits of their land full circle by establishing their vineyard and bringing the wines of Cassel Vineyards of Hershey back to the school where their Great, grandfather once lived, worked and played.

Various Pruning Techniques

The three pictures above show the various pruning techniques which we are employing at Cassel Vineyards of Hershey in order to find the best technique to suite each variety. On the left is our High Wire technique which we are using on our Chambourcin and Concord varieties. This technique employs one wire at 5 feet on which we train two canes from each grapevine. The vines then cascade down and bear their fruit on the top wire. The center photo shows our VSP or Vertical Shoot Placement method which is we are using for both the Chardonnay and the Vidal Blanc. VSP allows the plants to branch to the left and right on a 3 foot high fruiting wire. As the canes send out shoots, we then tuck each shoot up between two catch wires located at the 4 foot and 5.5 foot level. this keeps the grapes from being covered by foliage but allows the plants to grow vigorously upward to produce plenty of sugar to store in the grapes. The final picture on the right shows our Scott Henry pruning technique which provides two fruiting wires at 3 and 4 feet and catch wires below and above the fruiting wires. In this way we train our Cabernet Franc vines both upward and downward away from the grape clusters and drain excess vigor from the plants to avoid a vegetative taste in the fruit. The pruning takes a good deal of time and labor but we think it makes a difference in the quality of the wine. We hope you agree.

Upcoming Events

We will be at the Farmers Market in Hershey. This is a wellness-focused farmers market with locally sourced foods in Derry Twp. The Farmers Market in Hershey is on the grounds near the Cocoa Beanery Cafe and Englewood barn, off Bullfrog Valley Road next to Hershey Center for Applied Research. It is open 3-7 p.m. on Thursdays through October.

We will also be at the "Car, Truck and Motorcycle Show" at Saunderosa Park in Mercersburg on Saturday, August 14 from 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. There will be a chicken BBQ, craft vendors, food vendors, and of course, Cassel Vineyards of Hershey. It will be fun for all!

Grape update.

Our Chambourcin grapes are beginning to turn red. This is a process called Veraision.

Another Restaurant is carrying our wine.

The "Wick" (Warwick Hotel) of Hummelstown joins our list of restaurants that are carrying our wine. Don't forget to ask for it!

Look who is serving our wine!

We have two restaurants so far who are offering Cassel Vineyards of Hershey wine on their menus. Pavone's restaurant off of Rt. 39, and The Penn Hotel in Hershey. See their pictures below. We are working on a few more in the Hershey/Hummelstown area. We'll keep you posted.