Shalestone Vineyards

About Shalestone Vineyards

Shalestone Vineyards sits on the east shore of Seneca Lake in Lodi, on the stretch of Route 414 that carries the east-side wine trail. Rob and Kate Thomas bought the 13.5-acre parcel in the early 1980s and founded the winery in 1995; the tasting room and a hillside production building followed in 1998. Six and a half acres of vines run downhill below the tasting room on shallow, clay-rich soil, with the deep lake softening winter and stretching the ripening season.

The house line is "Red is all we do," and they mean it: roughly 1,500 cases a year of dry red from Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Syrah, Pinot Noir and Lemberger, with Saperavi and Zweigelt in smaller lots. Seth Thomas, head winemaker since 2016, works in a ripe, oak-framed style; the Cabernet Sauvignon shows cedar and bramble fruit over dense tannin, and the Cabernet Franc carries vanilla and toast above mixed berries. The blends are where the estate gets inventive: Synergy layers Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Syrah, and Cross-Rows comes from six interplanted rows of Merlot, Syrah and Lemberger picked and fermented together, a true field blend.

The tasting room was modeled on the historic Queen's Castle at Fossenvue, with doors and trim milled from black walnut, butternut and cedar cut on the property. Tastings are seated at a few high-top tables rather than a bar, run on hourly reservation slots for parties of six or fewer and capped at 45 minutes: a focused, serious stop rather than an afternoon-long one. The family also rents a guest house above the vines and a cottage on the lakeshore below.