Southern Grove Vineyard — Attraction in Fairhope

We went to Southern Grove on a Friday evening with another couple. We were impressed by the ambiance, which included live music (acoustic guitarist with a good song selection and perfect volume to enjoy but not inhibit conversation). The place is quite pleasing to the eye.

As you would expect, the wine is not top drawer. I had the Sauvignon Blanc and two others at our table had a red blend (Tempranillo & ? … maybe Cabernet Franc or Cabernet Sauvignon … the waitress wasn’t quite clear and persistently mispronounced Tempranillo). Both wines had good balance and were drinkable, but lacked depth. The red blend was a touch hot and tasted quite young. One of our party was craving beer or a cocktail, but that is not an option. Wine only.

The menu offered a good-sounding selection. No real cooking going on like burgers, seafood or such, but a few sandwiches, salads and charcuterie boards. Also two pizzas; a margherita and a meat lovers. We ordered a Harvest Board (charcuterie) and the margherita.

The food arrived in a reasonable amount of time. Here’s where the fun stopped. The presentation on the charcuterie was abyssmal. It literally looked like it had thrown on the board. Very fruit heavy, with grapes, watermelon that looked like it had been sitting in the fridge about a week too long and, for some reason about 15 blueberries. I am not sure on what planet watermelon and blueberries belong on a charcuterie board let alone one described as a harvest board … in November. There was a tiny dab of goat cheese with a gob of some kind of jam on top. In all there were about five varieties of cheese which were not identified on the menu or by our waitress. The cheeses, which included perhaps Havarti, pepper jack and Swiss in addition to the goat cheese were the high point. The meats were pedestrian and not particularly plentiful. There was also a small bowl with about a dozen crackers, including a few water crackers and Ritz. No fig preserve or anything else to add to the meat and cheese on your Ritz. The proportions were 2/3s fruit and 1/3 everything else. For this train wreck, we paid $36.

The margherita pizza, which cost $21 dollars arrived on a 6” piece of naan bread (think toaster oven) slathered in balsamic to the extent that you literally couldn’t taste anything but that. We all had one small nibble and that was too much. We left 2/3s of the postage stamp “pizza” uneaten and we were craving Ravenite … which would have been four times the size for less money. Likewise, the fruit on the charcuterie. Five minutes after the food arrived, on an evening we planned to spend at the winery, we started to decide where to go next to get real food.

The service was lackadaisical. Water was brought, but not poured. Our waitress never once asked if our food was OK, even when bringing the hefty bill and seeing almost everything uneaten.

We all had been looking forward to the experience, but having experienced it, as my partner said, “There is nothing here that makes me want to come back.” Having visited many vineyards in my life, while the wine was a cut above, say, The Biltmore in Asheville, the food was over-priced and completely underwhelming. When, I think of the amazing offerings at, for instance, Red & White in Mobile, I think Southern Grove missed the...

Really beautiful venue. Someone put a lot of time and effort into the ambience. From the start I’d say it was a disappointing experience. The hostess greets us with “how many of you are there”, not with a welcome or anything. She then sat us at a table next to another table where I could not get my chair out. The place was empty so it was a horrific choice as my husband was on crutches which just made the seating choice more inappropriate. Couldn’t wait to be done with her task and done with seating us, zero warmth or personality. The waitress was very nice but the service was unbelievably slow. We did the wine tree tasting for 3 of us and it was nothing special. Two of the four dishes we ordered were quite good, the tomato bisque and the cobb salad were tasty, the other two dishes were fine but not memorable. The cob salad was served with the wrong dressing but I think she heard vinaigrette instead of oil and vinegar. We just went with it, no big deal. Getting the check took 30 minutes as no one checked back with us as the manager sent our waitress outside to help with a baby shower group. We still tipped 20% as it was not the waitresses fault that she was sent in another direction. Seems like generally poor training and management. Overall not a great place, wouldn’t go back of my...

My wife and I went to Southern Grove Vineyard for a Thursday date night. Southern Grove has been open for less than two weeks so we anticipated some hiccups.

The Good: -Beautiful piece of property with great potential for a nice winery. -We had the dessert of the day, which was Strawberry Shortcake, and it was excellent!

The Bad: -We came just for drinks and dessert, but the hostess sat us at a table inside when we wanted to relax outside. -The lighting inside was VERY bright, not what we were expecting. -Our waitress had no idea about the wine (we asked where the grapes were sourced from). -Our waitress had extreme trouble opening our bottle of wine, so much so that we had to enjoy cork in our wine throughout the night because pieces fell into the bottle. -We were the youngest couple in the venue and it seemed like management were catering much more to the older tables (management went around and spoke in depth to those tables, but just briefly came by to say check in at ours).

Overall we are hoping that Southern Grove will evolve and develop into a great venue, but we will give it some time before going back. We are excited about the potential for a brewery on the...