Wild Blossom Meadery & Winery

Went yesterday to do a tasting with the ladies. The wines were amazing! We were able to each sample about 6 wines. The tasting itself includes 5 but if you wanted to sample another they were completely okay with that. It’s recommended you don’t try too many because the flavors tend to blend together. I’m looking forward to the tasting room opening which is close to this location but your able to purchase the wines there. The downfall was if we wanted to purchase any we have to go to either binnys or the store which was near. If you have never tried mead wines you definitely should!

We did a Mead tasting last weekend: The mead is awesome! Greg & Joe were very generous in all of the tastings (tried quite a few) and answered all of our questions and dealt with our «tipsy”-ness graciously (love how potent the mead is!!). Can’t wait til their new location opens up in 2015 which will have the «tasting room-​style» vibe we’ve all become accustomed to from wine vineyards across the country.

You can buy it at Bottles and Cans in North Center, Chicago!

I cannot believe this winery does not have an email address on its website. I tried some its mead wines at the Famous wines and beer event at Springfield IL last weekend. I tried many of their mead wines especially the Prairie Passion and the warm Apple Cinnamon were excellent. Such interesting mead wines that excite your taste buds Chocolate Cherry Buzz and Pirates Blood. I just wish that had an email associated to their website so people would know where to buy their wine locally.

We dropped by on Sunday afternoon for a wine tasting. One of the employees stood with us by an open chest refrigerator in the back and allowed us to try practically every mead they sell. That was cool. There were a number of unique flavors, my favorite being the Pirate’s Blood, which has a deep color and is infused with hot peppers. The combination of sweet and heat works for me. Their «tasting room» is also their office, and it was very small and crowded. The employee who was helping us with the tasting told us they are moving to a larger space with a warehouse, a real tasting room and possibly space for a banquet hall.
Wild Blossom was very hard to find. They are on the East side of Western Ave. between 100^th and 101^st street in Beverly. There is no sign out front. They share space with the Bevart brewer supply company, which has it’s name on the door, but there is no awning or anything to alert a driver passing by that they are there. Better signage at the new location will go a long way. Also, Beverly is a dry neighborhood, so when we asked to purchase wine, we were directed to the sketchy liquor store on the other side of Western, which is apparently in a different neighborhood. Parking is free on the street and was plentiful, at least on Sunday.
Enjoyed the afternoon, but probably won’t make a return trip. If I find them in a local liquor store I would buy their mead again.

Their Blueberry Mead is amazing! Cannot wait to try their Chocolate Honey Buzz & especially their Chicago’s Bulls Blood.
This winery/​meadery is dedicated to using local & sustainable ingredients in their products. I discovered them at the Chicago Green Festival 2011.
Check out their cute website for more info (honeybees & wildflowers!) & support local & sustainable businesses like Wild Blossom.
Highly recommend!

Their Apple Riesling is delicious!
They came out to the Beverly Arts Center and did a couple of wine tastings for our young Adult Board. (Thanks again Wild Blossom!)
The crowds loved them! Both times they came everyone had fun and the meads were unique and delicious.
I just wish they were sold at more stores. I’d buy that Apple Riesling more often!

If you think mead is just something to swill at the Renaissance Faire or that stuff brewed by your weird hippie neighbor, let me school you. Chicago has a meadery, its name is Wild Blossom, and they make a damn fine mead, or two, or ten.
Wild Blossom Meadery operates out of the brewing supply shop Beverage Art on Western Avenue in Beverly. I’d read about their mead (honey wine) in a couple of places within a short span of time and was stirred to find out whether they did tastings or anything of that nature. I called to find out; it took a couple of calls to get in touch with Greg, the master brewer/​vintner, and we set up a tasting (he apparently does all kinds of them, even for bachelorette parties etc.) A friend and I decided to truck down to Beverly to check out the goods.
Greg walked us through the wares, offering us samplings of varieties including Blanc de Fleur (a dry mead), «Prairie Passion» (a traditional sweeter mead; this is what I am accustomed to), plus meads flavored with pomegranate (a nice, tart flavor to offset the honey sweeteness), blueberry (a bit too intense to me), mulberry (better balance of berry and honey), hibiscus (I couldn’t taste the floral note, but I’d just drunk the blueberry, so this probably needed to be done in a different order is all), chocolate (an unexpected hit with me, and he said it’s good warm, which he discovered after leaving a bottle in his car where it heated up!), and «Sweet Desire», which is aged in bourbon casks so it attains a complex, smoky, vanilla-​y accord (I LOVED this one). It was too bad that they didn’t have the cran-​nectar flavor in stock, but we tried a whole raft of others, so it was hard to be disappointed.
They can’t sell the meads in-​store (due to some weird liquor zoning in the area), but a liquor store literally across the street sells the products, and they helpfully have a list of other stores (plus bars and restaurants… including Medieval Times!) in Chicagoland that carry them too. They’re also available online through their web site. Prices are not sky-​high, as one might expect, since they have a corner on the market; $ 14 – 18 was about average at the store across the street we went to (the one higher-​priced one was the Sweet Desire, perhaps due to the longer aging? Even that one was still in the range of an affordable wine.)
Greg’s knowledge of his wares, mead in general, as well as honey and wildflowers is quite extensive; we learned more than we expected to on this visit. I for one do not think about the fact that beehives are on rooftops around the city; many of these bees are patiently gathering local pollen to create local honey for Wild Blossom Meadery’s amazing array of products.
It was a pretty casual set-​up (we were just standing around in the shop’s back room), and it wasn’t the most relaxing experience (there was a dog barking its head off further in the back, and the phone was ringing a lot), but we did get an informative session and tried something different! My knowledge of mead has definitely been expanded.
Greg said they have a mead club (you can get in on short-​run meads only offered to those in the club), and they also have mead dinners paired at different local restaurants.
Overall, this was quite an unusual way to spend a Monday! I’ll lift a glass to Wild Blossom in thanks for their information, service and outstanding products!