Fond is a BYOB, which makes a wine dinner there a little unusual. For one Wednesday night, nobody has to think about what to bring. The Fond Grace Winery dinner on October 28 puts Pennsylvania wine from Glen Mills in front of every course, poured to match a four-course menu from chefs Lee Styer and Jessie Prawlucki-Styer.
Dinner starts at 6:30 p.m. at Fond in Wallingford and costs $125 per person, not including tax and gratuity. Reservations go through Resy, and seats are limited. It is the second of three fall pairing dinners with The Perfect Pour, and the finale on Wednesday, November 18 turns to Spain and sherry.
What the Fond Grace Winery Dinner Pours
Guests start with a Sparkling Cuvée, then move through wines from Grace Winery, a Brandywine Valley estate in Glen Mills that made its first vintage in 2009. The Perfect Pour chose the bottles to fit each course, so the pairings come as a set, not a flight of favorites.
The wines run from a Chardonnay through a Cabernet Franc and a red blend to a port, which gives the dinner a clear arc from light to rich. October is when Pennsylvania wine gets its annual turn in the spotlight, and this dinner is Fond’s way of joining in. A French BYOB and a local winery is a sensible match, and a BYOB makes the arrangement feel even more like a dinner party.
The Menu at the Fond Grace Winery Dinner
The first course is Birchrun Hills Little Chardy with brown butter sourdough, roasted pears and pecans, paired with the Estate Chardonnay from 2024. Next comes arctic char with mushroom risotto, brown butter and sage, alongside the Estate Cabernet Franc from 2023.
The third course is beef strip loin with caramelized onion bread pudding, Romanesco and sauce chasseur, poured with the 1734 Red Blend from 2023. Dessert is a warm dark chocolate torte with blackberries, mascarpone and black currant coulis, matched with a Ruby Port made from Cabernet Sauvignon.
Brown butter shows up in the first two courses, and I like the confidence of that. A Cabernet Franc next to arctic char is the pairing I am most curious about, since red wine with fish is the kind of choice a good sommelier can make sing. Everything else on the Fond Grace Winery dinner menu reads like a proper fall dinner.
Where the Fond Grace Winery Dinner Fits
Fond has been building this run for months. The kitchen started a monthly pairing series in the spring with an Oregon dinner, covered in our Fond wine pairing dinner series story, and our fall series preview laid out the Greek, Pennsylvania and Spanish evenings. The Fond Grace Winery dinner is the middle chapter, and the only one built around a single local producer.
If Grace Winery is new to you, our Grace Winery dinner menu piece shows how the estate cooks and pours at home. Seeing the same wines at a chef-driven BYOB in Wallingford is a good way to compare the two rooms.
Seating is limited, and no seat count is posted, so booking early is the safe move. Reserve through Resy for the Wednesday, October 28 seating at 6:30 p.m. Tax and gratuity are extra, and dietary needs are best raised when you book. Parking and arrival details are best confirmed with the restaurant directly.
Leave the corkscrew at home, bring someone who likes to eat, and let Grace Winery do the pouring. The Fond Grace Winery dinner is a comfortable way to taste what Pennsylvania wine can do, and the Spain and sherry finale on November 18 gives you a reason to come back.
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