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The northeast isn’t typically considered a wine-producing powerhouse, but several quality vintners on the southern coast stretching between Cape Cod and Rhode Island have been quietly working to remedy that for the past few decades. Chief among them is Westport Rivers Winery, located on a 200-acre farm not far from Buzzards Bay Brewing. Both companies are owned by the Russell family — Bob and Carol founded Westport Rivers in 1982 (wines first went on sale in 1991), and now the vineyard is primarily run by their sons, Rob and Bill. It’s the largest in New England, producing about 8000 cases of wine per year — roughly 3000 of them sparkling and 5000 of them still. In the latter category, crisp, fruit-forward chardonnays like the 2001 Estate Classic, and dry rieslings like the 2002 Johannisberg are favorites. But it’s the sparkling wines, like the ’99 Brut Cuvée, a buoyant bubbly with effervescent essences of pear and citrus, that really make Westport Rivers shine.

Just a little to the southwest lies Newport Vineyards, about 45 acres run by Paul Nunes and his family since 1995. There thrives a wide variety of grapes, including riesling, chardonnay, pinot grigio, sauvignon blanc, merlot, pinot noir, and cabernet sauvignon. The winery’s location on breeze-kissed Aquidneck Island is ideal, Nunes says. "We’re smack in the middle of Narragansett Bay. The water on three sides protects us from harsh winters and the fall and spring frosts. That allows the leaves on the canopy to stay green almost until November." And as the weather warms in the late spring, "the coolness of the water slows us down before everything buds out. A frost and an early bud is bad. It’s good farmland down here. It’s high and dry, with well-drained soil, high enough from sea level for the breeze to blow through."

Newport Vineyards aims for "French-style, crisp, delicate wines, with complex flavors of tropical fruit and citrus, wines that pair well with foods," says Nunes. "That’s really what the chefs are after."

Just down the road a piece in Little Compton, Rhode Island, lies Sakonnet Vineyards, the oldest winery in New England. Run by Earl and Susan Samson for the past 18 years, its success stems from the fact that the cool and moist seaside Southern New England climate mimics that of some of France’s famed winemaking regions. Its 50 acres of vitis vinifera varietals — including pinot noir, cabernet franc, and vidal blanc — yield excellent wines like 2001 Fumé Vidal and the sparkling 1996 Sakonnet Brut, and specialty series like the Newport line, with its Eye of the Storm, America’s Cup Red, and Spinnaker White. Like other New England wineries, Sakonnet plays to the region’s strengths. "New England chardonnay is more like Chablis than the chardonnay that comes from California. It’s a different style," says Susan Samson. And, while admitting that you can grow grapes almost anywhere in the country, she says that "New England wines are getting more and more acceptance. Our part of the world is getting quite well-known for sparkling wines." And, of course, "our wines are good with food. Especially seafood." Maybe that’s why Jasper White’s Summer Shacks feature Sakonnet’s vidal blanc as the house wine.

Aside from the venerable Old Mr. Boston line of liquors and the über-cheap Poland Spring gin and vodka (a product of White Rock Distillers in Lewiston, Maine), New England is hardly known as a hotbed of hooch-making — at least not the high-quality variety. Nantucket’s Triple Eight Distillery means to change that. In 1997, Dean Long, who’d owned Nantucket Vineyard since the early ’80s with his wife, Melissa, applied for a license to distill spirits to make grappa and fruit brandy. Finally, in 2000, he got the expensive piece of paper. But Long decided to go whole hog — no mere cordials for him. Soon after, with partners Randy Hudson and Jay Harman (Randy and his wife, Wendy, founded Cisco Brewers in the early ’90s), he set up a still, and the first licensed microdistillery in the state started distilling in earnest.

First up: Notch whiskey — so called because, not being brewed in Scotland, it’s "not Scotch." But since the single malt must age for five years in oak barrels (50 barrels are slated for release in 2005), the Triple Eight folks decided to distill something that was salable right away. Having sold many of the Notch barrels to private investors, they had the capital to try their hand at vodka.

Harman says the triple-distilled Triple Eight vodka can easily compete with top-shelf titans like Grey Goose, Ketel One, and Belvedere. Classy joints like No. 9 Park, Mistral, Bomboa, and Spire seem to agree. What’s the secret? "Definitely the water source," Harman says. "There’s natural aquifer on the island that we tapped into, it’s rain water filtered through the sand bed." It’s well number 888 that yields pristine water from the center of the aquifer, with a perfect pH level that suffuses the vodka with a "really clean, organic silkiness."

Another Triple Eight product is Hurricane rum. "It’s white rum that we age in bourbon barrels," says Harman. "We bottle it every year on the first hurricane that hits the island. When it hits land, we blend the first batch with a proof based on the wind strength." For instance, the batch bottled during Hurricane Isabel, with its 90 mph winds, was 90 proof. Hurricane Gustav, before that, was an 80 mph/80-proof affair. Luckily, Isabel and Gustav were relatively mild category-one hurricanes. A category five, on the other hand ... "I don’t think our distillery could even withstand that!" The next Triple Eight product is slated to be Gale Force gin, handmade with botanical aromatics like coriander, angelica, and juniper.

While Harman jokes about the "captive market" for their product — the wealthy tourists who flock to the island ever summer — he believes there are other reasons why this small operation has been successful so far. There’s the quality and craftsmanship of the liquor, of course. But there’s also the simple fact that "people like to support something local."

Mike Miliard can be reached at mmiliard@phx.com