Thanksgiving Farm Vineyards & Winery

Thanksgiving Farm Vineyards and Winery is located in Harwood, Maryland. Owned by Doug and Maureen Heimbuch, who are in the article on the tasting room's wall from the initial groundbreaking, this was Anne Arundel's first commercial winery. They first planted in 1998 and the vineyards have grown to 13 acres today. They have a gorgeous farmhouse that is in an old Victorian style at the top of the hill and then down a rocky, dirt path is their tasting room. All of their reds are blends in the Bordeaux style, most of which are called meritage, which is what we call them here in America. The property is on the National Register of Historic Places which is very cool and interesting. Over the years, their wines have won a bunch of awards in national and international competitions, including gold for the one we chose for the podcast, the 2016 Farmhouse Red. So check that out! The cool thing about the tasting we did, is 6 wines available for tasting were poured fresh into smaller 5 ounce bottles so they were portable, self-guided flights that we could choose to either drink on site or take with us to drink at home, or a combination of both. There is a small bar in the tasting room you can sit at and a small table next to it you can enjoy. Or on a nice day you can  sit outside on their patio that has a handful of tables for additional seating, which is what we did. Our three favorites were probably the franc blanc, the 2016 Farmhouse Red and the 2015 meritage. The franc blanc was medium acid and had a creamy finish. We got notes of peach, apple, pineapple, ginger and lemon. The Farmhouse Red was medium-bodied with medium plus acidity. It was full of great fruit like cherry and cranberry, with smoke, leather, mushroom and oregano aromas. The meritage was earthy, dry and tart with similar fruit and aromas to the Farmhouse  Red, just a little more body. This is a winery we have been trying to get to and try for a number of years and we are so glad we finally did!