Winemaker Larry Sharrott 3d looked through a kaleidoscopelike instrument called a refractometer, measuring the sugar content of a just-pressed batch of chardonnay grapes. He liked what he saw.
This summer's hot, dry weather has produced the best grape harvest in South Jersey in years, growers say - high in sugars and full in flavor. "Napalike," Sharrott said.
Sweet wines made with American grape varieties or other fruits - cranberries, peaches, blueberries - have long dominated New Jersey's wine industry. But with the number of wineries soaring in the last decade from 12 to at least 40, that's changing.
Sharrott and his father, Larry Jr., started growing mostly European varieties on a former apple orchard in Winslow seven years ago. They joined a group of new and long-established wineries set on making robust red and fine white wines they hope will someday hold their own against the heavy hitters in California - at least in the fight for space on wine lists in the Mid-Atlantic region. This year's vintage will help, they say.
"We wanted to produce a good wine that happens to be from New Jersey," said the younger Sharrott, 35. "Not something that makes people say this is a good wine - for Jersey."
Sharrott splits his time between a job in software at Lockheed Martin and the vineyard, where he manages much of the science of winemaking, researching grape varieties, measuring pH and sugars, and keeping the yeasts happy during fermentation. His father handles the business end and wine blending.
On a breezy morning, they manned the crush together. The younger Sharrott used a forklift to tip 1,000-pound bins of chardonnay grapes into a machine that removes stems. His father, 62, a retired hospital executive, monitored the process that followed, as crushed grapes were pumped into a press and then out as juice and into a fermentation tank.
"This is one of those jobs that's very glamorous until you actually do it," the father said.
The Sharrotts' winemaking venture began as an at-home hobby. They opened the winery to the public about 21/2 years ago. Last winter, they won one of their top honors when their 2008 Cabernet Franc won a gold medal at the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition, the largest competition in the country.
Longtime winemaker Louis Caracciolo said he was glad to see craftsmen like the Sharrotts enter the market. He has been making wine at Amalthea Cellars in Atco since 1976.
He talked about the change in New Jersey winemaking with the giddiness of someone who can finally share a long-held secret: Good wine can come from the Garden State.
Just as Napa emerged as a competitor against the French after winning a blind taste test in Paris 34 years ago, Caracciolo said his state eventually would emerge as a competitor to California in quality, if not volume.
The Golden State produced more than 89 percent of all U.S. wine last year - 631.6 million gallons compared with 1.7 million in New Jersey, according to the Treasury Department. Pennsylvania winemakers turned out 747,054 gallons.
Because few New Jersey wines are distributed outside the state, they receive little or no notice from publications such as Wine Spectator.
As evidence that could change, Caracciolo pointed to national awards that his and other New Jersey wines had earned and the expansion of the region's wineries to handle increased demand.
And they have a new marketing tool. Though it lacks the renown of the Napa Valley or Sonoma Valley, New Jersey's wine region in 2006 earned a federally designated name: Outer Coastal Plain.
"The industry is evolving in New Jersey, and it's getting noticed," state Agriculture Secretary Douglas Fisher said.
Fisher regularly fields questions from people interested in growing grapes in New Jersey. The growth has brought a lot to the state, he said - agriculture-based tourism, an opportunity to preserve more farmland, and another source of income for long-term farmers.
It took some time for Ed Gaventa, a fourth-generation farmer in Logan Township, to convince his parents that grapes were a good addition to their fruit and vegetable farm. His father was raised Quaker and never drank wine, he said. His mother was unsure about the value of the investment.
But the family decided to put 87 acres into farmland preservation and use the money earned from selling the development rights to start a winery. The Gaventas planted grapes in 2004 and started making wine in 2007.
Their Cedarvale Winery sells primarily from a tasting room and at weekly vineyard events.
The state's winemakers are "all getting better and better," Gaventa said. "We're actually running short."
But are New Jersey wines catching on where it matters - with the wine drinker?
"Eighty percent of people looking for New Jersey wines are looking for sweeter wines," said Vladi Nikolich, manager of WineWorks in Marlton, which has a large section of local wines mostly filled with blueberry or cranberry and the popular Cape May Red, a sweet table wine made by Tomasello Winery in Hammonton.
Many of New Jersey's finer wines are priced between $20 and $28. Nikolich said wine buyers today are educated. They know they can get a better California or European bottle for the same price, he said.
Sweet wines from Tomasello Winery, one of the state's oldest, are among the best-selling. But at a media event to demonstrate the crushing process and this season's strong harvest, owner Charlie Tomasello talked mostly about the winery's Outer Coastal Plain varieties.
New Jersey winemakers are trying "to develop their regionality," Tomasello said. "It's a hard nut to crack."
