Deirdre Heekin, owner and operator of La Garagista Farm and Winery in Barnard, has been named one of Food & Wine magazine's Drinks Innovators of the Year for 2023. Heekin and the eight other awardees were celebrated as "groundbreaking talents who are changing the way we drink for the better."
"The history of Vermont wine can be separated into two eras: pre– and post–Deirdre Heekin and her winery, La Garagista," Food & Wine wrote in their profile of Heekin in the magazine's April issue. "With frigid winters, short summers, too much mud and loads of deer ticks, the Green Mountain State is not a likely spot for winemaking stardom. But even before Heekin had bottles for sale, she believed that Vermont’s wine could be worthy, or even great."
From her vineyard on Mount Hunger, Heekin makes ciders and wines and pioneered the now-popular blurring of boundaries between the two. "Today in Vermont," the magazine reported, "there are about a dozen new micro-wineries, many led by women who studied with (Heekin) or leaned on her for advice."