The Glunz family has been in the wine business since before Paso Robles had a wine business. Louis Glunz arrived in Chicago from Germany in 1871 and hung out his shingle as a wine, beer, and spirits merchant in 1888, a storefront his descendants still run today. Five generations later, the family makes wine of its own on a rolling 20 acres in the Geneseo District, a long way from Wells and Division streets.

From a Chicago storefront to Paso

The Glunz story starts in 1871, when Louis Glunz I came to Chicago from Westphalia, Germany. In 1888 he set up as a wine, beer, and spirits merchant at Wells and Division streets, a business his grandchildren and great-grandchildren still run more than a century later. Few American wine families can claim that kind of unbroken line.

In 1992 the fourth generation opened a winery of their own, specializing in small-batch fortified wines, a rare and old-fashioned craft. When they outgrew their Illinois space and priced out building a larger winery there, family member Matt suggested Paso Robles, where they had already been sourcing fruit for years. The move made sense, and today the winery sits on 40 acres in Paso, with 20 of them planted in the Geneseo District, a Chicago institution putting down California roots.

The Glunz family has sold wine in Chicago since 1888, and their original shop is still open today.

The Geneseo District ground

Glunz farms in the rolling hills of the Geneseo District on the east side of Paso Robles, with a tasting room on Highway 46 East. This is warm, upfaulted terrace country built on the gravelly Paso Robles Formation with decomposed granite, a Region III to IV climate that ripens a wide range of grapes, which suits a winery making more than ten varietals.

The east side earns its quality through the daily temperature swing. Hot afternoons build ripeness and sugar, important for a house that makes fortified and dessert wines as well as dry reds, while cool nights restore the acidity that keeps even sweeter wines from feeling heavy. The free-draining soils concentrate the fruit, and the long warm season gives the grapes time to reach the high ripeness fortified wines in particular require.

The wines

Glunz is unusual in leading with fortified wines, the small-batch specialty the family built its winery around, alongside more than ten varietals of dry table wine. Fortified wines, where a neutral spirit is added to stop fermentation and preserve sweetness and strength, are a centuries-old craft and a rare focus among California wineries, which makes a visit here genuinely different.

The dry lineup spans the warm-climate reds and whites that thrive in the Geneseo hills, but the heart of the house is those fortified and dessert styles, rich, sweet, and built to sip slowly. For anyone who has only known dry Paso reds, the Glunz tasting room is a window into an older, sweeter, and very food-friendly side of wine.

What to pour it with

Fortified and dessert wines are some of the most rewarding wines to pair, and the rule is simple: the wine must be at least as sweet as the plate, or it collapses and tastes thin and sour. Match a rich, sweet Glunz fortified red with dark chocolate, a berry tart, or a sticky toffee pudding, and both the wine and the dessert taste better for the company.

The same wines are a classic match for blue cheese, where the salt and pungency of the cheese play against the sweetness of the wine, a contrast the English perfected with Port and Stilton centuries ago. For the dry reds, go the usual route with grilled and braised meats, where tannin meets the protein and fat and softens. And remember that a sweet wine can also cool a little spice, since sweetness tempers chile heat where alcohol amplifies it.

Glunz Family Winery & Cellars: common questions