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Travel // Recipe // Wellness
Experts A Tipple Grows in Brooklyn
CRL’s travel writer takes you on an alco-crawl to Kings County’s best wineries, distilleries and meaderies. Buckle up. BY ALEXANDRA BAACKES
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ay “I’m from New York” to someone in the Capital Region, and he or she will likely wonder which part of the Empire State you hail from. But say the same to anyone else in the world, and he or she will immediately assume you grew up in one of the five boroughs of New York City. OK, so at least we know the difference
between upstate and downstate—i.e. upstaters do a little less creative cursing at our fellow motorists and pedestrians— but when has that ever stopped us from Amtrak-ing it down to the Big Apple to reap its many rewards? There’s nothing like hitting a Broadway show in Manhattan (many of which will be reopening this September); grabbing a super doughy, justright bagel in Brooklyn; or checking in with
the monkeys and snakes at The Bronx Zoo. Recently, though, I was surprised to learn that New York City, which encompasses five of the 62 counties I set out to explore this year—New York County (Manhattan), Kings County (Brooklyn), Queens County (Queens), Bronx County (The Bronx) and Richmond County (Staten Island)—has a lot more to offer than just the usual suspects. While us Upstate New Yorkers love to boast about our blackbelt in craft beverages, the Big Apple is teeming with them, too, and they’re well worth planning a tasting trip around. At least to craft beer drinkers, it will come as no surprise that you can visit a brewery in each of NYC’s five counties—in fact, there are more than 30 breweries inside the city limits. But there are also a number of other less-expected sips to be had. It turns out that the City is home to a winery, two meaderies and three distilleries. And I was determined to try them all. I emerged onto the sunny rooftop of the aptly named Rooftop Reds vineyard slightly out of breath. I had wandered around the
The| C“Orange 50 A P I T A L R E G I O You N L I V I NGlad G | S U MIt’s M E R 2Not 0 2 1 2020?” flight at Rooftop Reds in Brooklyn.
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