JULY WINE CLUB 2026
Click above to enjoy July’s playlist
July is nearing and Philly is approaching its semisequicentennial crescendo! July 4th sees a free concert with Jill Scott (!), the Roots (!), the Fresh Prince (ok, now going by “Will Smith”!), and more. FIFA is here, Lemon Hill has been a success, and the USA will advance. So much excitement!
I was walking with my kids the other morning to pick up breakfast and to get Father’s Day presents. We got our hot sauce, pistachios, and “naked” Cheetos for Dad and I was so excited to hear multiple languages – AND have the Target employees be able to match them (at least the Spanish)! – and see so many tourists enjoying Rittenhouse Square and sidewalk cafes. It definitely made me proud of our city.
Know what else makes me proud of our city? I love all of the innovation, grit, and can-do attitude. Some of you may know that I am a co-founder and organizer of the Sisterly Love Collective, a non-profit organization whose mission is to champion, nurture, and support women entrepreneurs in the local food scene. We have grown to almost 150 members, two of whom own local, urban wineries.
Pray Tell Wines is owned by Sydney Adams and Tom Caruso. They originally opened their winery in Oregon, before picking up after seven years and moving to Philly. Mural City Cellars is owned by Francesca Galarus and Nicholas Ducos. Nicholas has worked extensively in the industry, but they began making wine together with their first-in-Philly urban winery. Both opened in Philly expressly to use the local grapes. Grit and innovation – of course with a healthy dose of can-do attitude - indeed!
While Pray Tell and Mural City are relative new-comers to the PA wine scene, wine and wine-making in Philadelphia has a very long history – though *successful* commercial wine-making is much younger and dates to the 1960s when Presque Isle Wine Cellars on lake Erie received the first PA winery license. If you’ve been coming to Jet long enough, you will have had a few of their offerings. Anyway, the first commercially successful winery in the US succeeded due to grapes local to Philly. As the story goes, William Penn brought Bordeaux Vitis vinifera grapes into his woods when he founded “Penn-sylvania”, but they did not survive as such. Instead, they hybridized with a local V. labrusca (not clear which one) creating the so called, “Schulykill Muscadelle”, or Cape grape, Alexander grape.
This hybridized where it was originally planted in Springettsbury, in the Spring Garden/Fairmount area of Philly, and what was nurtured and championed by John Bartram – making it available to many. As it turns out, that grape was important. Jean-Jacques Dufour, a Swiss émigré, originally was granted land in Kentucky. But the vinifera grapes he planted did not survive. He then went north across the Ohio river into Indiana, where he planted his new winery in Vevay (named after his Swiss home) with the hybridized grapes obtained from Batram’s garden. These plantings survived, and the winery obtained commercial success.
Of course, there are always conflicting claims for the “first” of anything, and the same it true for “first successful commercial winery”. A source I trust lists the “Pennsylvania Vine Company” of 1793 as this first, which was made successful via public investment. Being from Indiana, I’ll go with my story!
Onto 2026 and our urban wineries and Sisterly Love Collective members.
Mural City Cellars Pinot Gris
I drank this at the Sisterly Love Collective’s 5-year anniversary gala and immediately asked to have it reserved for Wine Club. It is a good thing I did, because it sold out! It is a beautiful wine with grapes sourced from the Lehigh Valley. The wine explodes in the mouth offering pear and pineapple and lychee, oh my!
Pray Tell Fruit Snacks Rosé
“Fruit Snacks” was the first PA-grape red that Pray Tell made, and they have expanded this fun, fruity bottling to an amazing rosé. It is pale in color, but big in flavor. Grapes are Pinot Noir and Riesling, bringing a great nose of strawberry and roses. Delicious with deviled eggs!!!
Perks!
Make sure you look in your wine offerings for information on Pray Tell and their winery, and for a complementary glass of wine from Mural City Cellars!
Want to learn more and drink wines from other American trailblazers and rebels? Join our Let Freedom Flow tasting on July 15th. Remember, Wine Club Members receive $10 off all ticketed events!