Two local winemakers who decided to move from the West Coast found fertile ground in Philadelphia, writes Emily Kovach for Grid Magazine.
Tom Caruso spent seven years running Pray Tell in Oregon’s Willamette Valley with his partner and assistant winemaker, Sydney Adams, before relocating last year to a warehouse in Kensington under the Pray Tell Wines name. The grapes, formerly sourced from the close-knit community of McMinnville, Oregon, now come from Pennsylvania growers, requiring him to rebuild those vital relationships. The pair remain committed to collaborating with Pennsylvania farmers and making the venture a success.
“There’s something beautiful about exploring what this region’s fruit can express,” said Caruso. “How does merlot from Pennsylvania taste compared to Oregon or France? Seeing those true differences of terroir emerge — it’s a wine geek’s dream.”
Meanwhile, in Northeast Philadelphia, Eli Silins, owner of Camuna Cellars, a kosher winery, faced similar challenges. After moving from the Bay Area in 2019, he had to find a reliable source of fruit and discovered a network of small growers in New Jersey’s Outer Coastal Plain AVA wine region.
“Finding vineyards can be ridiculously circuitous,” said Silinis. “Sometimes, if you find one ‘in,’ it leads to another, and soon you have a better map of the landscape.”
Read more about the two winemakers who recently moved to Philly in Grid Magazine.
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