One Florida Winery Has Produced The Very First Avocado Wine

While Florida ranks high on the list of American places to visit, it's rarely considered a wine destination. That's unless you consider its perfect weather, abundance of fruit-growing regions, and wine entrepreneurs creating vino from the luscious bounties they have on hand. In addition to Florida's well-known muscadine grapes, you'll now find fruit wines flowing from harvests of mangoes, lychees, passion fruits, and dozens more. But there's a relatively new kid in town, one whose namesake fruit comes from the Náhuatl word "ahuacatl" in Aztec culture, according to Wine Enthusiast.

If you guessed avocados, you're ahead of the experimental wine game, so to speak. With more than 500 known avocado varieties in the world, several grown in North America, wine aficionados have previously ventured into avocado wine "pairing" but not "producing." Though it's an unconventional choice, the real surprise is that nobody thought of creating wine from this immensely popular fruit until recently.

There is indeed a Florida wine, two in fact, that is made from avocados, and it hails from the Southernmost Winery in the United States, according to its creator. Schnebly Redland's Winery nestles within a lush tropical patch of land in Homestead, Florida, just south of Miami and north of the Florida Keys. Well known for their exotic fruit wines, including mango, carambola star fruits, guava, and coconut varietals, Schnebly finally indulged its entrepreneurial spirit with two avocado wines.

Introducing them as the first wines ever to be made from avocados, the winery describes the nuances that make each unique. The aptly named Sweet Avocado wine, whose label features a Florida alligator and avocado tree, is a light wine with a lemon-zest nose. Its companion wine, AvoVino, leans toward citrus-pear with notes of grapefruit. Schnebly explains how natural oils in the avocados separate during the fermentation process, resulting in a pleasing, light acid that enhances the wines.

Like most fruits, avocados come packed with valuable nutrients right off the tree. They're loaded with potassium, vitamins C, B, and E, folate, and antioxidants such as lutein and zeaxanthin, which can deter age-related vision problems, according to WebMD. From heart health to brain function, anti-depression, bone strength, and healthy blood sugar, reasons to consume avocados abound. Now there's one more: You can drink them in a glass of wine.