2024 Competition Winners Announced! See Medal Winners Here!

To help identify the best of the best, ASWA holds an annual wine competition, the largest in the nation focused exclusively on the wines of the East Coast. The competition covers the 17 states from Maine to Florida that border the Atlantic including Vermont, West Virginia and Pennsylvania.

Held in late summer, our professional competition judges hail from all parts of the country and from many facets of the wine trade.

We host an awards ceremony on Capitol Hill every year after the completion of the competition under the auspices of the Congressional Wine Caucus. The perpetual Jefferson Loving Cup, designed by Tiffany in sterling silver, is engraved with the winning winery’s name and presented to the Best of Show entrant.

Winning wines are showcased at the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium in Sacramento, CA, the leading wine industry convention typically drawing 15,000 attendees. ASWA Board members host dinners in California with industry professionals to highlight the strengths of eastern wines, give educational presentations at the university level, and bring focus to Atlantic Seaboard wines through a leading wine and food radio broadcast. Opportunities for increased exposure then continue throughout the year.

Scroll down for a list of this year’s medalists!

2024 REGISTRATION IS CLOSED Information on how to enter next year’s Competition will be posted in late spring.

2022 Riesling by Glenora Wine Cellars of NY Takes Best of Show in 2024

Glenora Wine Cellars owner Gene Pierce was the recipient of ASWA’s Grape Productivity Award last year. As a founding partner at Glenora in 1976, he was vital to the winery’s, and indeed the region’s, development over the next several decades. The first winery on Seneca Lake has now grown into a 40,000 case winery, fine dining restaurant and 30 room inn.

Glenora winemaker Edward Miller holds a UC Davis Winemaking Certificate as well as a Master’s Degree in Viticulture & Enology from Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Piacenza, Italy. He has had wide-ranging  experience, having made wine in Sonoma, Napa, New Zealand, and Western Australia after discovering his passion in New York right after college.

Miller states, “The 2022 vintage produced beautiful wines in the Finger Lakes. The overall crop size was quite small, allowing for great concentration of flavors. We had a particularly cold January at the start of the year, leading to some bud damage, and then a hot and dry summer, which resulted in smaller berry sizes. From a winemaking perspective, the low yields and warm, dry weather allowed the fruit to ripen fully and develop intense flavors and color.”

Glenora Riesling 2022 is 100% riesling from the Finger Lakes AVA with fruit from a number of different vineyards. “The majority comes from Zugibe Farms located on the northeast side of Seneca Lake,” according to Miller. The site is west facing, so receives more hours of afternoon sun. He continues, “We find that this site usually provides more tropical, riper aromas and flavors. About a quarter of the blend is sourced from our neighbor, Glenora Farms, on the southwest side of Seneca. This vineyard provides a great balance between fruit and mineral notes while maintaining a strong acid backbone.”

The individual lots were fermented in stainless steel using three different yeasts. Fermentation lasted 20-30 days at 58-62F. Some lots were allowed to progress to dryness, others were arrested at a higher sugar level in order to be able to achieve a semi-dry final blend. The resulting wine has 23g/L residual sugar.

Miller and his team believe the challenge, and the fun, of winemaking lies in the blending process. “During March and April we spent several days tweaking percentages and finding the blend that we most preferred. Once decided, the blend was assembled in the cellar and allowed to marry for a month or so before bottling.” His tasting notes reveal that the wine offers aromas of peach, apricot, white flower, as well as bursts of tropical fruit such as pineapple and guava. The palate shows firm acidity and reflects the nose with flavors of grapefruit marmalade and wildflower honey ending with a pithy finish. 

Best of Show Gallery (under construction)

Atlantic Seaboard Wines You Need To Know!

This Year’s Medal Winners

See Lists of Prior Years Here Wines with descriptions can be viewed by clicking here.

Meet Our Judges (under contruction)