Who doesn’t love a nice glass of champagne? Now add fruit and you’ll get FRUITBLOOD, a boutique, natural fruit winery based out of Cincinnati’s Northside neighborhood.
“We make elevated, natural fruit wines by giving fruits and grapes, together, the same kind of treatment that winemakers use to create fine wines; think champagne but made with cherries or peaches,” says Josh Elliott, founder of FRUITBLOOD.
Elliott says the wine is called natural wine because it’s as low-intervention as possible when it comes to making the wine itself. “We do native fermentations, meaning that the only yeast present is what came in on the fruit itself, don’t add any other junk like flavorings, artificial colors, added sugar, etc., and never, ever use artificial preservatives like sulfur,” he adds.
The mission at FRUITBLOOD is to offer a wine that captures and preserves ripe fruit flavors and putting them into a bottle as gently as possibly. “Our primary goal is, first and foremost, to make wine that is fun, flavorful, and that people actually want to drink,” says Elliott.
In addition to offering wine that is desirable by customers is to also create a product that can be appreciated without being a wine connoisseur but is also enjoyed by expert wine drinkers.
Before starting FRUITBLOOD, Elliott says that he wasn’t much of a wine drinker but always enjoyed champagne. “Champagne also has this veneer of luxuriousness, which is fun to both lean into and make fun of, because at the end of the day, it’s still just a bottle of rotten grape juice,” he quips.
Elliott says that previously he worked as a craft brewer and winemaker for 10 years. He also served as the head brewer at Urban Artifact, where he helped to change the craft beer industry with new techniques for brewing with fruit as well as new styles of beer including the Fruit Tart and the Midwest Fruit Tart.
“I subsequently got their spontaneous fermentation program off of the ground, which essentially became a pilot program for FRUITBLOOD,” explains Elliott. “There, I learned a lot about how to capture wild yeasts (and keep them happy), and also how to make the fruitiest-tasting fruit beer I could.”
Currently, Elliott runs FRUITBLOOD with the help of independent branding creative Becca Miller. While Elliott handles the winemaking, marketing, order-filling, and sales calls, Miller helps out with creating a visual brand and communication strategy.
When you shop the FRUITBLOOD collection, you’ll find four wines:
Love Bite – A sparkling blend of French Colombard Grapes and Montmorency sour “pie” cherries. Notes of cherry pie filling are supported by mouth-watering tartness, all of which gives way to lively bubbles to round out the experience
Feral Cat – A sparkling wine made with Albarino grapes and Lobanberries (a blackberry/raspberry hybrid) dripping with personality and a tart bite. Reminiscent of bubbly lemon rose sorbet.
Mercury In Retrograde – A fruit red blend, made with Boysenberries, Barbera, and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes. Dry, familiar, and juicy. Fans of red wines will find a fun twist in this fruity blend.
Sleep Talker – Luscious Marionberries and tart Albarino grapes come together to create a bright, fruity experience for this deceptively dark-colored wine.
FRUITBLOOD also released its first club wine, a bourbon barrel aged version of Love Bite and are planning for regular releases throughout 2022.
When asked what makes FRUITBLOOD unique, Elliott says that he hasn’t found another winery doing what he’s doing and making wines like what FRUITBLOOD has to offer.
“There are two things that make FRUITBLOOD particularly unique,” he says. “First, we let experience guide our decision making, rather than tradition. For example, if I’m somewhere in the winemaking process and have to make a choice, I make that decision based on what will taste best and that’s it. Same for making a decision around packaging or artwork – I ask myself what I think folks will like the most and what will be the most fun, and go with that. Second, and perhaps more importantly, FRUITBLOOD is for everyone. Anyone can pick up a bottle, read the description of what it’s like, and decide right there and then if that sounds good to them or not.”
Elliott says when he launched his wine he wanted to take the guessing out of purchasing wine. “You don’t really need to know anything about wine at all to know if you’re going to like what’s in the bottle or not,” he says. “All you really need to know is it it sounds good to you or not.”
The future is bright for this new wine brand, and FRUITBLOOD is focusing on its Fan Clubs in the immediate future, recently launching a two, a 2-bottle and 4-bottle club. “I really like to bring delight in unexpected ways to people, and making something special out of our fan clubs is something I am particularly looking forward to this year,” says Elliott. “We are also working on a couple of new wines that we will be releasing over the next couple of months.”
These wines include a piquette made with raspberries and white grapes, like a super bubbly baby wine, and a peach wine, which Elliott says may be the best thing he’s created so far.
Currently, FRUITBLOOD wine is mostly online, although you can find wines in a handful of shops in Cincinnati including Urban Artifact and Higher Gravity. Additionally, FRUITBLOOD can be found at The Bottle Shop in Columbus.
Elliott says to keep up with FRUITBLOOD for upcoming tasting parties as well as participation in events when they can do so safely.
You can learn more bout FRUITBLOOD at https://www.fruitblood.com, where you can also place orders, signup for clubs, reach out with questions, or sign up for the newsletter. FRUITBLOOD is also on Instagram and Facebook.
