9 minute read
Crystal Waters & Corning Glass
Crystal Waters and Corning Glass
… The Best of the Southern Finger Lakes
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By Kris Grant
Photo courtesy of Corning and Southern Finger Lakes Visitors Bureau
It is said that God spread his fingers across New York State and when he lifted them, his impressions created what are now known as the Finger Lakes.
Of course, there’s this teensy weensy little discrepancy, since there are 11 Finger Lakes!
I stayed in Hammondsport in the Southern Finger Lakes on beautiful Keuka Lake. You could easily base your visit here and find much to do throughout the region!
Dr. Konstantin Frank Winery
On a visit to the Finger Lakes, you will want to make wine tasting a top activity. You’ll find it less expensive here than in California, usually around $8 to $10 for five or six tastings, and you often get to keep the glass.
On the Keuka Wine Trail, I recommend three wineries:
Make Dr. Konstantin Frank Vineyards your first stop. Although there were already a number of wineries in the region, Dr. Frank was a pioneer of the area, bringing his native German-style Vinifera vines to the Finger Lakes in 1958 where they flourished. Dr. Frank’s grandson, Fred, is now president and Fred’s daughter (that would be Dr. Frank’s great granddaughter) Meaghan Frank is vice president of the winery, which is situated high on a southwestern hills overlooking Lake Keuka. My recommendation: Rkatsiteli 2020, named after a Georgian grape that dates back 3000 years.
Weis Vineyards winemaker Hans Peter Weis grew up in the vineyards and cellar of his family winery in Zell, Mosel Germany. He spent many years learning and gaining experience in the traditional style of the Mosel. After receiving his degree in winemaking, business, and agriculture, he decided to travel to the United States on a quest to pursue his winemaking passion. After working and experiencing a vintage at Schug Carneros Estate Winey in Napa Valley, he visited a friend, Willie Frank, in the Finger Lakes, and then worked for the next 11 years for Dr. Frank’s winery in a multitude of positions including vineyard manager and winemaker. Like Dr. Frank, Peter Weis found the minerality of the soil and climate similar to that of home and knew it would be the perfect place to pursue his passion of handcrafting traditional German-style wines. Both his winery and family are growing in the Finger Lakes: Peter and Ashleigh Weis last year welcomed their first child, Peter William Weis. And in its first four years of operation Weis Vineyards has expanded from its former schoolhouse tasting room, adding an enlarged tasting room, converting a barn into a tasting experience and now building a new production facility. All are located on the eastern side of Lake Keuka, allowing late afternoon sun to shine and ripen its vines to the fullest. Tip: try their unoaked Chardonnay, my favorite!
Next door to Weis, Domaine LeSeurre Winery brings a touch of France to the Finger Lakes. Owner Sebastian LeSeurre hails from the Champagne region of France where he is a sixth generation winemaker; his wife and owner Celine is from the Toulouse region. The pair met while working at Clos Henri winery in New Zealand and they have since traveled the world, working harvests in the northern and southern hemispheres before opening their Finger Lakes winery in 2013.
A visit to Corning, about 30 miles from Hammondsport, is a must! Here you can tour two wonderful museums that are connected with a free trolley that also will whisk you over to Corning’s historic Market Street district, filled with boutiques and great restaurants in 1800s-vintage buildings.
At the Corning Museum of Glass, you’ll find glass works that are beautiful, whimsical, awe-inspiring and, well, just pick your adjective as there are hundreds of expressions in glass from the world’s top glass artists assembled here. But the museum is much more than this, as is the history of Corning glass. Do you use an iPhone? Who do you think made that nearly indestructible glass frame? Our world is connected via a fiber-optics network…Corning pioneered that technology.
Corning continues to innovate, but sadly, not in the town of Corning. I found this out when I asked my shuttle driver to point out to me the factories and production areas of the city today. “Only the offices are here,” she said. “Production has moved to international sites, mostly Taiwan and Japan.”
Glass blowing demonstrations are ongoing daily at the Corning Museum.
Works of art in glass by artists from around the world are on display at the Corning Museum
The Rockwell Museum, a Smithsonian affiliate housed in a Corning’s eerly City Hall building, houses works that speak to our American heritage including Native American culture.
The Rockwell Museum
What a splendid surprise this museum was! Entry can be purchased in tandem with the Corning Museum ($20 gets adults into the Corning Museum, another $8 adds the Rockwell) and the free shuttle plops you right at the entry. The Rockwell is housed in a former 1893 City Hall. Now don’t confuse it with the Norman Rockwell Museum, which is in Stockbridge, Massachusetts! This Rockwell was named after Bob and Hertha Rockwell who owned a local department store where they periodically exhibited their collection of American art and artifacts. Notable works are by Frederick Remington, James Earle Fraser, John Doddato, Andy Warhol, Thomas Hill and too many to name here. You’ll thank me, should you decide to add The Rockwell to your itinerary!
The town of Corning
All this museum viewing will surely build up an appetite. Fortunately you’ll find excellent restaurants right in the Market Street area of Corning and here are a few recommendations. For dinner, The Cellar offers great selections and half portions. Hand + Foot has an eclectic menu and next time I’ll visit the new Quincy Exchange, which has been positively reviewed by numerous media including the Food Network and Wine Enthusiast. The Butcher’s Son just won the award for Best Burger Joint in Steuben County and if barbeque is what you crave, you can visit Nickel’s Pit BBQ or Slammin’ Jammin’ Pit BBQ.
Market Street in downtown Corning is filled with unique restaurants and boutiques
Get out on a Trail or Relax on the Waters
Wine trails, beer trails, hiking and biking trails, the Southern Finger Lakes is a region that’s meant for trails. The Finger Lakes were formed during the Ice Age when huge glaciers carved out the landscape, creating deep glens and grooves for waterfalls. Here you’ll find many Finger Lakes state parks to explore with easy access. Bring your camera, a picnic lunch and a bottle of Finger Lakes wine.
Watkins Glen State Park, ranked by USA Today as the No. 3 State Park in the nation, has 19 waterfalls along its walkable Gorge Trail. Watkins Glen State Park is located about 20 miles from Hammondsport.
If boating, fishing, or paddle boarding are of interest, you’ll find several rental facilities right in Hammondsport.
I stayed at the Park Inn, right on the town square in Hammondsport, and its restaurant is by far the most popular in the city, with a large outdoor-tented structure that is likely to remain after Covid because it, like Park Inn’s culinary offerings, has proved to be very popular with locals.
And with good reason, and that reason is Chef Dan Eaton. Eaton is renowned throughout the region, after hosting a television show and creating over 3000 recipes over the course of 12 years, Eaton is often stopped on the streets, with “I know you!” types of greetings. But his career in the restaurant industry stretches back another 20 years when he worked for some of Rochester’s eateries, chief among them, Rooney’s, where, “We did everything,” he said, and he continues to do so at the Park Inn. “We made our own desserts, breads, pastas. We served rabbit and then took the bones to make a specific sauce – we went deep.”
Eaton has cooked at the James Beard house and staged (a French word that rhymes with lodge and means an unpaid sort of honorary internship) at such renowned restaurants as Bouley in New York and the French Laundry in Napa Valley. Chief among his success is his insistence on local ingredients and collaboration with local farmers and fishmongers. A favorite on his menu: Mariscotta, a Portugese seafood stew. Eaton and his crew smoke their own salmon and make fish cakes from it. And he was excited about the squash blossoms coming into season. “We’ll stuff them with ricotta cheese,” he said. Eaton confesses to many 13 hours days but says “I’m so alive when I’m at work.”
You might also want to try the Union Block Italian Bistro, also on the square, or drive a couple miles out of town to visit Snug Harbor, where you can enjoy Chef Roberto’s specialties while dining alfresco, overlooking Keuka Lake.
My upstairs suite had been recently redone and overlooked the square. Marie, the innkeeper, inquired about my every need and invited me to an afternoon band concert in the square’s gazebo. Alas, I was visiting nearby Corning that day. But you get the picture: the innkeeper, like everyone I met in Hammondsport, including Dan Eaton, the local grocer, Dave Degolyer from the local visitor bureau and passersby on the street, were friendly and outgoing. I sensed they were all leading stress-free lives. Maybe it had something to do with being close to nature, overlooking a lake…and perhaps imbibing regularly in those great tasting Finger Lakes wines.
The Park Inn, circa 1861, overlooks the square in Hammondsport and has been redone into five wonderful suites with sitting areas. The Park Inn’s restaurant has moved outside in an all-weather tent that may remain post Covid.
Dan Eaton, Executive Chef at Park Inn
