Wollersheim Winery and the University of Wisconsin-Madison Collaborate To Make Red Fusion
On Thursday, April 27th, Wollersheim Winery of Prairie Du Sac, held an event to celebrate the release of the first wine from Campus Craft Winery, the label of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Fermentation Sciences program. Red Fusion, an all Wisconsin grape wine, has dry red wine like composition, similar to Cabernet, and is designed to pair with Babcock Dairy’s Dutch Kase Cheese.
The wine is composed of Maréchal Foch (43%), Frontenac (29%), St. Croix (16%), and Marquette (12%). Grapes were donated from Wollersheim Winery and Danzinger Vineyard and produced at Wollersheim Winery. The UW-Madison students from Food Science and other departments participated and assisted throughout process, including wine production, assessing quality parameters, designing the label, and marketing the wine. Wollersheim, Danzinger and UW-Madison intend to use the profits to fund a program that provides outreach programs to enhance wine quality in the state, supports undergraduate education about wine, and conducts wine research to generate new knowledge to assist the Wisconsin wine industry.
Red Fusion is the first wine of its type, but the hope is to continue making different styles of wine and in a larger quantity. UW-Madison will further its attention on wine through offering a class titled, ‘The Science of Wine,’ taught by our newly hired enologist, Nick Smith, to teach students about enology and include their participation in making wine to be sold under the Campus Craft Winery label. For those who are interested in purchasing Red Fusion, it will be sold by the bottle at Wollersheim Winery and by the glass at the Wisconsin Memorial Union and Union South. In the spirit of Wisconsin, Red Fusion definitely makes a statement about science, education, and the Wisconsin wine industry!
