Damiani Wine Cellars

We are reviewing this from solely our experience with Margo. She was the most pleasant, warm and welcoming with a bubbly personality from the entire group of women working there. She was very knowledgable on the wine, process and history. We arrived later in the day without knowing the winery was closing, some of the other women working made us feel rushed and uncomfortable, Margo kept us at ease and assured us that we could finish our family of 6 tasting. We were so pleased with the tasting, the wine, and process, we will be visiting just for Margo soon!

We came at closing time on a Saturday. David was so welcoming he took such great care with us that we enjoyed every moment of our time at this Vineyard. What a wonderful place we had such an amazing time, thank you for your hospitality!!!

A great place to visit if you are a fan of dry wines. Extensive portfolio, especially for dry reds, which is not the most common in the Finger Lakes. 2011 Meritage was spectacular. Loved every wine!

Best dry wines on senceca lake. And also on of only few growing a Sauvignon blank that is on par with Née Zealand. The owners of the winery also are the owners and care takers of their vineyards so they are truly vested in making great wines.

Unusually good reds for the Finger Lakes (though their whites are pretty good too). Highly recommended if you’re looking for a change from sweet Reislings!

My partner loves sparkling wines, so I made it my mission to find a winery that offered such selections.
Their Brut was well balanced, great aroma and mouth feel, as was their Pinot Noir.
We felt so rushed through our experience though and server seemed to suggest pours of sweeter selections first, which seemed a bit odd to me.

Wine was good but staff was off putting. Rushed us through our tasting and then asked if we were going to buy anything else. Not engaging.

Absolutely my favorite winery on Seneca lake ! Wonderful Sauvignon blanc! I’ve always had very knowledgeable staff. «small «tasting room but great view of the lake !

Nice location with friendly staff. Wine offerings were decent for the area but slightly over priced. Worth the stop on the trail.

5 stars for their Dolce Bianco wine! It is such a nice white and for only 9.99 a bottle, you can’t beat it
3 stars for the tasting room. Pretty bland in my opinion considering all the wineries that are on the lake. This winery isn’t a place I usually go for a tasting or to hang out, but I def. stop in to stock up on some of their wine!
Therefore, I give it a 4!

I am generally not a fan of dry wines but Damiani has won me over. They have a great selection of whites and reds. Their best including a blend, MC2 and a semi-​dry Reisling. They have a Meritage that is great and only second to my favorite from Wagner.

Specializing in red wines, Damiani is worth a visit. On a recent Saturday, Damiani was offering gourmet chocolate samples from a local chocolatier that paired perfectly with their wines. The servers in the tasting room know their stuff about wine and provided just the right amount of information for us to make good choices. What stuck with me is that Damiani and his wine grower Davis are passionate about the grapes and making a high quality product. It shows.

Did some say wine and chocolate? At Damiani Wine Cellars, life’s a party. When I first walked in, the music was blasting and there was a ton of people enjoying the tasting room. I’ve never thought I could enjoy a dry red, as I lean towards the sweeter side of whites. Damiani changed my mind about that. As I learned from a day of tasting, it really depends on the winemaker. I spent a lot of my time tasting and learning about winemaking, and it really is fascinating.

I went to Damiani Wine Cellars immediately after I have learned they specialize in dry wines. They offer very impressive selection of dry and semi-​dry whites and dry reds. My favorite is Sauvignon Blanc among whites, which is very hard to find at this region, and Lemberger among dry reds. Dry Riesling is not bad, but little too watery for me. I would recommend this winery for those who really explore Finger Lakes wines, and are open for new tastes and flavors. If you have a sweet palate, this place is not for you.

Definitely stop in and sample, great wine and really personable staff!

My sister, mom and I had a great time here! Francis helped us. He was knowledgeable, professional and great at multi-​tasking. There were 3 groups tasting and he gave everyone plenty of attention. The winery was full of laughter and has a beautiful view and very classy tasting room. The prices war decent and the wine delicious, though I will admit my palate is not at all refined. My favorites were the dry reisling and the reserve sparkling wine Francis recommended. Check this place out!

The winery has a beautiful Seneca lake location. Sadly the wines are all crap. Even the Pinot Noir tastes like a watered down version of a real wine. The service Was also extremely slow. They also charge extra for a chocolate pairing of 4 chocolates you could easily grab as free samples on the other side of the room.

I visited Damiani for the first time with a medium-​sized group. Despite having a reservation, we arrived to find them unprepared for us, and were told to wait outside for about 15 minutes. It appeared there were just two people working in the tasting room, which was surprising given that it was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, and a group larger than our own had finished up shortly before.
When we were finally ushered back in, our group leader then had to stand in line at the register to pay for all of our tastings. Another delay.
Finally, on to the wines. They were mostly on the dryer side, and actually quite good for Seneca. So it was disappointing when the young woman pouring for us wasn’t interested in telling us anything about the wines or the winery. In fact, I had to ask a couple times for her to repeat what she was pouring because she barely spoke up. At one point she left our group entirely to work the register.
I get it, there are some rowdy groups wineries can’t wait to get rid of. But this was hardly the case here. Everyone was truly interested in learning about and enjoying the wines. When you pay a higher than average for Seneca tasting fee, it’s nice to walk away with more than a bad taste in your mouth.
As good as a vineyard’s wines may be, the experience counts for something. And this certainly won’t be an experience I subject myself to again.

(Representing 3.5 stars)
Dryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy…
Okay, I made the schoolboy error of visiting Damiani immediately after a tasting at Hazlitt, which blows all wine-​tasting logic out of the water — Hazlitt’s wines are, of course, syrupy-​sweet. Damiani’s, by contrast, are like battery acid. If you’re doing both of these in sequence, do Damiani first!
It’s all excellent wine — if you like dry, complex reds, this is absolutely superb stuff, but I wasn’t offered any palate cleansers or water, something I would feel is a must with more complex wines, especially reds like the Pinot Noir here — and with Hazlitt clogging my palate, they blurred into one another with alarming ease.
A bowl of crackers and a carafe of water would add a star to this review easily — it’s a great little tasting room with friendly staff and an amazing view.

One of the few brave wineries that actually markets and works towards drier styled wines — a difficult task in the NY Finger Lakes region. And lo and behold, they do quite a good job of it.
We’re here on vacation and both had the full tasting — $ 5 for everything they sell. This is the one winery that did not make us pay up front for the tasting. The gent doing the pouring was very knowledgeable about the wines, and did a good job fielding questions from some pretty rude guests who clearly knew nothing about wine, and obviously didn’t like drier wines. Also, this was the only place that did a proper tasting, from lighter bodied to fuller bodied, and rinsed our glasses with wine when switching from white to red. Other wineries used water, so this place was a nice surprise.
We left with several bottles of wine– the 2010 semi-​dry riesling (hey, it was good — I’m currently enjoying a glass as I write this review). The 2010 Lemberger — it tastes like a BBQ in a bottle — can’t wait to try it with ribs. 2009 Merlot — a small batch, but it does have cocoa layers as promised. 2009 Meritage — can’t go wrong with a blend — it really does taste like a bordeaux style. Did I mention we were really pleasantly surprised here? We also picked up some 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon reserve — delicious and bold!
Damiani single-​handedly smashes the perception that NYS wines are all sweet, no matter what, and that attempts to do otherwise are futile. Kudos to this winery — we’ll be back if we’re out this way again and will certainly recommend this winery to our local friends and family!