LEFT FOOT CHARLEY
By Janice Binkert
Nearly 40 wineries can be found nestled among the vineyards dotting the picturesque, hilly slopes of the Leelanau and Old Mission peninsulas that jut out into Traverse City’s East and West bays. By contrast, for 17 years Left Foot Charley has been firmly ensconced in the historic Village at Grand Traverse Commons – the former Northern Michigan Asylum – as the first and only urban winery in northern Michigan. And on the sunny late September day that I visit the winery, owner-winemaker Bryan Ulbrich is overseeing the whole-cluster pressing of chardonnay for Gitali Blanc de Blanc, a sparkling wine named for his daughter. He explains that pressing is not the same as crushing, but rather aims to minimize the grape skins, which is desirable for a sparkling wine. “We just want the core part of the juice,” he says, adding that for this year’s vintage, he will also be adding in a bit of pinot noir. While that all sounds intriguing, don’t expect to be able to taste this new creation anytime soon. “From here, it will be pumped into a stainless-steel tank and allowed to settle overnight,” says Ulbrich. “Then we take the clear juice that’s left and put it in the fermenter.” A few months later, after bottling, it goes through a second fermentation that lasts three years – that’s when a lot of the mouthfeel, the flavor and the bubbles develop, he says. The good news: The 2018 Gitali is
expected to be released in early October. Sparkling wine is the new kid on the block at Left Foot Charley. Still wines still rule the roost here, having already attracted a loyal following. First came the outstanding whites – riesling, pinot blanc, pinot gris, chardonnay – later followed by some impressive reds (blaufränkisch, gamay, cabernet franc). Hard cider is another Left Foot Charley specialty, with the very popular Cinnamon Girl leading the way for newer favorites like Fortis Maelum and the single-origin Antrim Cider.
In the Beginning The beginnings of Left Foot Charley go back to 2004. “That was our first vintage making wine,” says Ulbrich, “but we were not here at the Village yet.” The winemaker had a production area out on Old Mission and was just selling to restaurants. “But we grew faster than we expected and soon needed a bigger space,” he says. “The opportunity arose to move to our present location in 2007, and it has turned out to be a perfect fit for us.” The unique location of Left Foot Charley’s new home spawned a very different concept than that of wineries who have their vineyards, tasting rooms and production facilities together on site. “We saw it as an opportunity to pool a number of small growers together and highlight their individual contributions to the larger wine scene,” says Ulbrich. This, says Ulbrich, would give the grower
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an opportunity to taste their labor with each vintage. With that arrangement, Left Foot Charley didn’t need to be grounded in a single estate. “We could be anywhere,” he says. Ulbrich observed how the Village seemed like a good place to gather, “…which has certainly proven to be true,” he says. “We set out to become a communityoriented winery, both in our nature and how we farm, having 15 vineyards and three apple orchards growing exclusively for us and working very closely together with them,” he says. One of these growers is Werner Kuehnis, owner of Island View Vineyard on Old Mission Peninsula. “Werner was an early investor in Left Foot Charley and grows pinot blanc for us at Island View, the oldest vineyard in Michigan for that particular grape,” says Ulbrich. “He’s my partner – my brother in wine.” Michigan Ties Ulbrich and his wife Jennifer are coowners and managing partners of Left Foot Charley – he, the winemaker, and she, the business manager. In his “former life,” as he calls it, he was on track to specialize in history and law, but a part-time job at an Arizona winery turned his interest in another direction. “Everything else I was doing was theoretical and interesting, but it didn’t excite me like wine,” he says. After three years of learning about winery management, winemaking and farming in Arizona, though, he was ready to
return to the Midwest. “I’m a northern woods-and-waterkind of guy,” he says. “And although I grew up in Illinois, I have always had a strong attachment to Michigan, because my grandfather had a family cottage in Arcadia where my family used to vacation.” At that time, the wine industry in Michigan was really taking off and Ulbrich says he liked the style of wines that were being made up here. “It seemed like a good time and place to continue on my newly chosen path,” he says. Left Foot Charley occupies two adjacent buildings in the Village: the main tasting room, which also houses the production facility, and the Barrel Room.
