As we continued our cross-country road trip, we stopped in Milton-Freewater, Oregon, at a couple of eastern Oregon wineries. What a contrast it was between the western Oregon wineries we have visited in the past and these two eastern Oregon wineries. We didn’t have to pay any tasting fees, the attitude of the winery tasting […]

As we continued our cross-country road trip, we visited three Idaho wineries, one in Glenns Ferry and two in Caldwell, Idaho. They all produce their wines exclusively with Idaho grapes, and we found some pretty good wines at each stop. Our first stop was at Carmela Vineyards, in business since 1988. They produce about 10,000 […]

As we traveled through Colorado, we made several stops at wineries near Palisade, Colorado. We were impressed that each of the wineries we visited sold only Colorado grown grapes, offered complimentary tastings, had nice professional tasting rooms, and their wines were pretty good. Our first stop was at Grande River Vineyards, Colorado’s oldest winery. Their […]

Our host for the June edition of Wine Blogging Wednesday, the blogosphere’s monthly virtual wine tasting event, is Dr. Debs of Good Wine Under $20. She has selected Rhone Whites as our theme. With the warm summer weather coming soon (hopefully), many of us will be looking to enjoy some nice white wines. Excellent options […]

As our cross-country road trip continued, we visited the Prairie Berry Winery near Hill City, South Dakota, tasted some of their South Dakota wine, and had lunch in their Euro-Deli. While they have an impressive tasting room and lunch was great, the wines were very mediocre. There were not any wines that I could seriously […]

During our cross-country road trip, we have been taking in some sporting events, mostly Major League Baseball games. Actually, our first ballpark was not a ballpark at all, but Churchill Downs, the famous horse track and site of the Kentucky Derby in Louisville, Kentucky. On Derby Day, they served a choice of Fetzer Chardonnay, Zinfandel, […]

“I’m a big fan of Shiraz…great quality and value.” –Francis Ford Coppola While virtually every wine lover is familiar with Syrah from the Rhone Valley in France and Shiraz [sha-RAZZ] from Australia, I am more and more impressed with the quality of Shiraz/Syrah from areas not traditionally known for this grape, such as Washington and […]

In recent weeks, we’ve reported from the road on winery visits in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Tennessee and Kentucky. Today, I’ll report on our wine tasting visits in Ohio, Wisconsin, Missouri, and Nebraska. On the way out of Cincinnati, Ohio, we stopped at Ohio’s oldest and largest winery, Meier’s Wine Cellars. It was almost […]

We recently had another one of our double-blind private tastings. All we knew when we sat down for dinner was that these two wines were red, but we did not know their region of origin or varietal. For a more complete description of how we set up these private tastings, please refer back to my […]

Our next stops on our road trip across these United States of America were Tennessee and Kentucky. We headed for Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and visited three Tennessee wineries, Mountain Valley Winery, Apple Barn Winery, and Smoky Mountain Winery. My opinion after these three visits is that Tennessee is not yet serious wine country. The only wines […]