This Niagara winery makes a perfect day trip from Toronto to sample exceptional food, wine and honey
If there's one winery you must visit in Niagara this year, it's Rosewood Estates. About an hour and a half from Toronto, right off the QEW, this family-owned winery makes fabulous red, white and rosé at reasonable prices, but it's also a meadery and honey estate.
'Our family were beekeepers first, then winemakers,' says William Roman, general manager of Rosewood Estates.
Roman's grandfather had a passion for beekeeping and for making honey wine, called mead, as a teen living in Ukraine. When he moved to Ontario, he continued to keep bees with his son, Eugene. But he couldn't secure an Ontario honey-winery license and abandoned his mead-making pursuit.
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The lobby and bar area of Rosewood Estates.
ANZIT MEDIA INC Robert Anzit
Years later, that dream was realized when his son and daughter-in-law, Eugene and Renata, founded Rosewood Winery and Meadery in Beamsville in 2003.
'There are 40 beehives on this property,' says Roman.
You can visit those hives to get up close and personal with the honeybees themselves.
'We offer a full beekeeping experience from May through September on Saturdays. You can get all suited-up and venture into a live hive,' says Roman. The two- to three-hour experience costs $60 per person.
Honey from Rosewood's beehives is used on the menu and to make mead, honey wine.
William Roman Rosewood Winery an
Rosewood's bees produce honey that the winery sells on site and that it uses to make mead. 'Mead is the world's oldest alcoholic beverage,' says Roman. 'It's the way humans discovered alcohol, preceding grape wine by 4,000 or 5,000 years.'
That honey also finds it way onto Rosewood's recently revamped menu.
In Spring 2024, the winery renovated its bottle shop, kitchen and indoor dining area and hired chef Peter Pietruniak to lead its food program. Pietruniak found his way to Rosewood after turns at leading restaurants, such as the Michelin-starred Dinner by Heston Blumenthal in the U.K. and the Michelin-recommended Trius Winery Restaurant in Niagara-on-the-Lake. The first thing he did when he joined the estate was build a garden on-site to grow his own food.
'He dry-ages his own charcuterie in the winery's cold spaces. He makes his own sourdough bread. And he grows his own food in the 232-square-metre garden,' says Roman. 'What he can't use fresh, he preserves and pickles for use all year around.'
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Rosewood chef Peter Pietruniak grows the winery's food on-site, dry ages his own charcuterie and makes his own sourdough bread
ANZIT MEDIA INC Rosewood Winery
The menu at Rosewood includes small plates and sharing plates from what Pietruniak calls his 'scratch' kitchen. Nearly all the ingredients the chef uses are from his on-site garden or from other sources in Ontario.
'There are only four ingredients in the kitchen not from Ontario — salt, olive oil and a couple spices,' says Roman. 'So, it's hyperlocal.'
While you can enjoy lunch on a whim in the indoor dining area all year around or on the patio in the summer, more structured dining options are also available.
Reserve the Food + Wine Experience for a bespoke four-course tasting-menu lunch, available Friday, Saturday and Sunday ($70 per person). The menu changes daily based on what is freshest in the kitchen and includes library wines from the cellar. There's also a Cheese & Mead Flight highlighting four different meads made on-site, paired with four cheese creations ($50 per person). The food experiences must be pre-booked on the winery's website, rosewoodwine.com.
So beeline it to Rosewood Estates this summer to fill your trunk with some beautiful bottles of wine and mead and a jar or two of very good honey. And a deeper appreciation for honeybees.
4352 Mountainview Rd., Lincoln, Ont., rosewoodwine.com
Rosewood wines and mead.
Megan Smith Prokop
The best bottles to try at Rosewood Estates
Sidle up to the bar or sit in the dining area to enjoy a flight of four wines or four mead samples ($20 per flight, $40 premium). Here are some wines excellent wines to request.
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NV Rosewood Charmat Rosé VQA Ontario ($25/bottle)
NV Rosewood Charmat Rosé VQA Ontario.
Supplied
Score 95
Though William Roman calls this wine 'raspberry Jolly Rancher in a bottle,' don't let that put you off. Yes, it's delicious in that full-fruited way, but it's not at all overly sweet. It's a lip-smacking blend of 61 per cent Chardonnay, 24 per cent Cabernet Sauvignon and 15 per cent Cabernet Franc that calls to mind height-of-summer raspberries and strawberries — perfectly ripe, beautifully balanced and pressed to perfection. Elegant yet easy-drinking sparkling wine that will thrill everyone in the room or garden. (12.5% alc., 10 g/L sugar)
2021 Chardonnay Niagara Escarpment ($42/bottle)
2021 Chardonnay Niagara Escarpment.
Supplied
Score 93
Flinty lemon zest aromas lead to a luminous yet steely attack that soon broadens to reveal a kiss of toasted marshmallow, a touch of lemon curd and a note of ripe pineapple. This serious yet supremely drinkable white with plunging minerality tastes well toned, tightly wound and satisfying. Quite a gastronomic white to build a dinner party around. (12% alc., 2 g/L sugar)
2022 Night Moves VQA Niagara Peninsula ($25/bottle)
2022 Night Moves VQA Niagara Peninsula.
Supplied
Score 96
This pure Gamay nods toward cranberry and incense, blackberry and church pew. The entry is cool and swift with a bright centre that slowly dims to a lamplit glow. A wine that's felt as much as it's tasted, this expression feels moody and sensual as it cascades slowly toward a long, slow finish. (12% alc., 2 g/L sugar)
2022 Shoulders of Giants VQA Beamsville Bench ($45/bottle)
2022 Shoulders of Giants VQA Beamsville Bench.
Supplied
Score 90
For those who like big, bold reds full of tension, this pure Cabernet Franc is your bottle. The fragrance is pure raspberry jam — sweet and forward. Then, it slips in tasting taut and tight-fisted, full of tension. Cranberry and black olive, freshly turned earth and graphite thread the bold, blackberry centre and linger. Long. (14% alc., 2 g/L sugar)
2020 Legacy Heritage Cyser Mead ($20/500 ml)
2020 Legacy Heritage Cyser Mead.
Supplied
Score 92
About 30 per cent apple cider, 30 per cent honey and 30 per cent water, this cyser starts with a fragrant, hoppy nose laced with wildflowers, beeswax and honeyed apples. The entry is cool and glassy-smooth yet rich. Well balanced with mouth-watering acidity, it keeps you sipping while flavours spiral with marzipan and apple crumble, beeswax and lemon curd. (13% alc., 40g/L sugar)
Solera Mead ($60/500 ml)
Solera Mead.
Supplied
Score 93
Like Sherry, this mead hails from a solera system that involves fractionally blending multiple years of the honey wine — in this case, seven years. The nose calls to mind sherry, candied orange peel and butter pound cake with a bright lemon glaze. The entry is round and smooth with a dry, nutty salinity that nods toward elements found on the nose, then shifts to an expansive and distinctive, dry-roasted almond character. (20% alc., 88.5 g/L sugar)
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