Tassel Ridge Winery

Tassel Ridge Winery–December 2007

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New Wines:

2007 Nouveau

This wine is made entirely from grapes we grew in our vineyards this season!  Our Nouveau is a dry red blend of St. Croix and Frontenac. It has had no malolactic fermentation and no oak ageing so the fruit is right up front. Consider serving the 2007 Nouveau at your holiday meals or whenever you want a light, dry red wine that is reminiscent of a fresh Pinot Noir.

This is our third Nouveau and is our best, so far. It has great fruit and a smooth finish.  Nouveau’s don’t generally improve with age however our 2005 and 2006 both got better with some time in the bottle.

Price: 2007 Nouveau in 750 ml bottle is $14.

2006 In The Dark Now Available

The 2006 In The Dark is now available but we recommend that it be allowed to settle down for a month or two before consumption. It is suffering from bottle shock. This is the result of the agitation that accompanies packaging. We’ve found that with other dry red wines that even four weeks is enough to allow tannins to become less bitter and astringent while allowing the wine to open up. When you do open the bottle, plan to pour it into a decanter and let it breathe for about an hour before serving. You’ll find the 2006 In the Dark to be a big, dry red that compliments steaks and elegant meat based meals.

Price: 2006 In The Dark in 750 ml bottle is $20.

See our full wine list: www.tasselridge.com/wines.htm

Are You Planning Receptions and Parties During the Next Few Months?

New Items in Gift Shop

Candlelight Chardonnay Wine Brittle

I am not usually a big fan of peanut brittle but this is really good. Maybe it is because it is made with Tassel Ridge Candlelight wine! 

Price:  Candlelight Chardonnay Wine Brittle 8 ounce bag is $7.95.

Candlelight Caramel Sauce

This caramel sauce is also really good. It too, is made with Tassel Ridge Candlelight wine. 4.8% alcohol by weight.

Price: Candlelight Caramel Sauce 9 fluid ounce jar is $8.50.

Tassel Ridge Truffles

Our new chocolate truffles include an assortment of five different flavors: Chardonnay, Winter Cabernet, Mimosa, Tart Cherry, and White Chocolate. They are packaged in a clear plastic sleeve.

Price: Tassel Ridge Truffles 2.5 ounces total is $9.50.

Suggestions for using Tassel Ridge Sweets

My first suggestion has absolutely nothing to do with wine but it sounds so good to me that I am planning to make this at home sometime in the next couple of weeks. Put a couple of big scoops of Vanilla Bean Ice Cream in a bowl. Then carefully heat up the Candlelight Caramel Sauce and pour some on the ice cream. Finally, top it all with some mashed up Candlelight Chardonnay Wine Brittle. Is this a Candlelight Sunday?

The Tassel Ridge Truffles make a nice complement to a bottle or two of Finalé Premier Red. There is nothing nicer after dinner than Finalé and chocolate truffles. If you are organizing a gift, consider including two bottles of Finalé Premier Red, a Tassel Ridge wine glass and a package of Tassel Ridge Chocolate Truffles all packaged in a monogrammed pine box. The approximate price is $70.00.

New Tassel Ridge Winery Catalog is Now In the Mail

If you have not yet received your copy of our new 32-page full-color catalog, please request one by emailing Brian Babcock at info@tasselridge.com with your name and mailing address. We will send it immediately. The catalog contains information on all of our wines and many of our gift shop items. 

Do You Want To Ship Wine Out of State?

We can now ship to the following six states: 

If you’d like to be able to ship wine to other states not mentioned above, please let us know and we will investigate what kinds of licenses and permits we need to ship there.

Would You Like To Carry Wine On Your Next Flight Out of State?

We can provide you with a cardboard carton and the protective bottle carriers for either two or three bottles.  This packaging material is free of charge with the purchase of the wine. We can seal it up for you and then put your business card on the outside of the carton. The TSA will not allow you to carry the wine on board but you can check it with your baggage. I have taken wine on several occasions both domestically and internationally and this packaging has worked every time.  

What’s Happening in the Vineyard?

The first winter storm of the season has brought vineyard work to a standstill for now.  Nonetheless, we’ve fertilized the vineyard, wacked the weeds down, tied up the vines, and applied the pre-emergent herbicide. Our vineyard workers are now helping out in the cellar where it is warm with bottling and other packaging tasks. 

We normally start pruning our vines in March when chances of a severe cold spell below 0°F are slim. The reason that we don’t prune in November as soon as the vines go dormant is that a severe freeze can do damage to whatever we have not pruned from the vines leaving little wood to support a recovery later in the season. By pruning in March, we can shape the vine and control the total production so that we don’t over crop while still providing for a good harvest of high quality grapes later in the season. And we minimize the risk of freeze damage to the vine.    

For the past two years, we’ve noticed that the Foch in our Meadowcreek North Vineyard looked particularly anemic. After performing soil nutrient and petiole analysis, we decided that the problem was with the vines themselves. We decided to excavate alongside the roots of one vine to see what was happening. We found out that the roots grew out from the original cutting to the limits of the 12 inch diameter hole we’d augered when the vines were planted and then turned back inward. The soils are heavy and the roots were not vigorous enough to push through the soil. Foch is not particularly vigorous anyway and we concluded that we’d planted it in the wrong place. Fortunately, we don’t really need the Foch. We’ve decided to pull it all out next spring and replace it with Steuben.  Steuben is a vigorous hybrid with a lot Labrusca in its parentage so we think that it will work well in this soil. We make a popular sweet Rosé with the Steuben and it sells out quickly each year. 

We also decided to remove the Norton that is also planted in Meadowcreek North. In this case, the vine is very vigorous and really looks great. The problem is that our growing season is not long enough to reliably ripen Norton. We will pull this variety too and replace it with Steuben. 

Pulling out vines is an expensive and time consuming project. It guarantees us that we won’t have fruit from this part of the vineyard until 2010. But, the alternative is to leave the vines and suffer with very limited poor quality fruit for years to come. Grape growing is not all easy!  

What’s Happening in the Cellar?

Almost all of our tanks are still full. In fact, we had to rent four tanks just to get us through the bottling season. We are currently doing a lot of packaging work and soon we will switch to bottling another batch of Twilight. We will follow that with several different red wines. Before we bottle, we have to clarify the wine by running it through our cross flow filter so each bottling session takes at least two days. As soon as the barrels are empty, we will move red wine from the tanks into the barrels to start barrel ageing. Our red wines will spend anywhere from 3 to 18 months in the barrels. Finally, we have over 30 different batches of wine that need to be moved along so that we can get them bottled. 

Gift Ideas:

When you are selecting a hostess gift, consider giving a two bottle set with one dry red and one semi-dry white. Our recommendations are:

2005 Twilight is our beautifully balanced dry red wine made entirely from Cabernet Sauvignon grapes grown in Lake County, California. We aged Twilight in American and Eastern European Oak for 14 months and then blended and bottled. This wine displays jammy fruit and vanilla on the nose with plum and spice on the palate. Serve at room temperature. Store at 55º-60ºF. Great with fully flavored foods such as steaks, prime rib, and spicy pasta dishes.

Price: 2005 Twilight  in 750 ml bottle is priced at $20.00.

2006 Candlelight is our fruity semi-dry white wine made from Chardonnay grown in the Central Valley of California.  Because it has not had a malolactic fermentation nor any ageing in or with oak, the fruit is right up front. With citrus and green apple notes on the nose and palette and nice acidity, 2006 Candlelight will complement Asian stir fries, fish, and chicken. It will also work very successfully as an aperitif. 

Price: 2006 Candlelight in 750 ml bottle is priced at $13.00. 

The next time you are in our gift shop, take a minute to check out the new shirts and sweat shirts.  Some of the shirts have our In the Dark label on the backs while the ladies fitted shirts carry the Group Therapy, Wine (Tassel Ridge), and Wine Diva logos with sequins and other decorations.

Read About Wine

I’ve recently read three books about wine that might interest you or someone on your holiday gift list. We don't sell these books. I puchased my copies from Amazon.

Robert Mondavi, Harvests of Joy – This is the fascinating story of one of the giants of the American wine industry. In these pages, Mondavi tells his story, and it is quite a story!  At the same time, it is self-congratulatory. But, it is an autobiography. This book ends before the Mondavi Wineries are purchased by Constellation.

Julia Siler, House of Mondavi - This brand new book takes a pretty balanced look at Robert Mondavi, the Mondavi family, and Mondavi wine interests. Siler was very thorough in her research and I came away feeling that I understood the acts and forces that ultimately cost the Mondavi family their namesake winery. 

Don and Petie Kladstrup, Wine and War – Another page turner, Wineand War addresses the steps taken by French wine makers in Champagne, Burgundy, and Bordeaux to survive the Nazi occupation and preserve some of their oldest and most valuable wine.  This is a quick but fascinating read.

Tassel Ridge Wines Now Appearing in Retailers Near You

For a complete list of retailers, click here.
In the past few weeks we have added the following retailers:

Fairfield • Fairfield Arts & Convention Center
Fort Madison • Meier’s Den
Grinnell • Hy-Vee Food Store
Muscatine • Hy-Vee Food Store
Waterloo • Lillie Mae Candies

We have extended our retail service range from Central and Southeast Iowa to include North Central and parts of Northeast Iowa along I-35, U.S. Highways 18 and 218, and I-380.  We will soon be adding retailers in Mason City, around Clear Lake, in Cedar Falls, Waterloo, and Cedar Rapids. 

Selections of Tassel Ridge Wine are now available at the retailers and restaurants listed. Note that most retailers do NOT offer all of our wines, but rather focus on those wines that sell the best. Ask your retailer or contact us directly for other wines.

If you have a favorite retailer where you’d like to purchase Tassel Ridge wines in the future or a restaurant where you’d like to consume Tassel Ridge wines, please e-mail me at bwersen@interpower.com and we will arrange to contact them. 

Wine Tastings in Retailers

Complete list of local wine tastings

Our Hours:

Effective December, 2007, we are open for tours, tasting, wine, and gift shop sales as follows:

We are now open seven days per week!

Our Location:

Tassel Ridge Winery is easy to find. It is just south of State Highway 163 on 220th Street in Leighton. From Ottumwa and Oskaloosa, drive northwest on 163 to 220th Street and turn left towards Leighton. From Des Moines and Pella, turn right at 220th Street. Drive west on 220th about 0.7 miles from the Highway and right into the Tassel Ridge Winery parking lot. view maps

Email Brian Babcock at info@tasselridge.com to sign up a friend for our enewsletter.

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--Bob Wersen, President