05/20/2026
The Annex Cellar Collection - Chapter 4
Michael James and I moved to Chicago shortly after we married in 2003.For me, it was going back home. For him, it was a whole new world.
We bought a 1923 bungalow on Chicago’s South Side and set out to make her our jewel of a home. That same year, for my birthday, we signed up for the Apple Cider Century — 100 miles cycing on our tandem through the orchards, farm roads, and lake air of Southwest Michigan.
On our drive from Chicago to New Buffalo, we stopped at a tasting room off Exit 6 of I-94. That was our first visit to Round Barn Winery. That was also where we met George — warm, knowledgeable, enthusiastic, and just quirky enough to make us feel like old friends.
We were skeptical at first. Midwest wine? Surely sweet, surely Muscadine and Concord grape forward
Then we tasted.
And we were surprised by how bright, balanced, and thoughtful the wines were. That memory feels especially close right now, because we are watching something similar happen at The Annex.
When people first hear “non-alcoholic wine-inspired elixir,” I know there may be a little skepticism. Then they taste.
And more than once now, we have watched their faces change.
That is the heart of the Annex Cellar Collection: not imitation, not juice in a pretty glass, but a thoughtful interpretation of flavor, structure, memory, and place.
Chapter 5 will come from that Round Barn memory, too.
But Chapter 4 belongs to Vineyard Tears — Michael’s favorite.
It lives somewhere between a soft Pinot Grigio and a lightly off-dry Riesling: white peach, ripe apple, lemon zest, and a clean orchard finish.
This is the Annex Cellar interpretation of Vineyard Tears, built with white grape, peach, apple, lemon, soft tannins, salinity, and a hint of Midwest soil acidity.
Soft, bright, orchard-kissed, and quietly beautiful.
