Tassel Ridge Winery

Tassel Ridge Winery–February 2008

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Announcing Sweet Roxie Red

Our newest wine is Sweet Roxie Red. It is sweet and fruity and displays cherry and green apply notes on the nose with cherry and plum on the palate. It is best when served chilled. Sweet Roxie Red is great as a sipper but it will work well with a variety of foods. 

In fact, this new wine was suggested by our customers who told us that while they really liked Red, White, and Blue, they wanted a wine that was fruity but not so sweet.

Sweethearts and Chocolates and the Heart of Iowa Wine Trail

Treat yourself and your sweetie by participating in this first-ever Heart of Iowa Wine Trail event. With your Sweethearts and Wine ticket, visit as many of the participating wineries as you wish and enjoy quality chocolate treats paired with Iowa wines. You also will receive a chocolate recipe from each winery to complete your own Chocolate and Wine recipe file. The second weekend of the event is February 16–17. Be sure to check the individual wineries for their operating hours at www.heartofiowawinetrail.com. The cost is $15 per person. The tickets you purchase at any member winery are good at all other member wineries.

Celebrate Valentine’s Day at Tassel Ridge Winery

Are you looking for that special way to celebrate Valentine’s Day with your sweetie?  Treat your sweetie this Valentine’s Day with a Prime Rib Wine and Food Pairing Dinner at Tassel Ridge Winery. Choose from two dates: Thursday, February 14 or Saturday, February 16 at 7:00 p.m. (menu will be the same for both dinners). You and your sweetheart will be serenaded by live music while enjoying a romantic multi-course dinner paired with select Tassel Ridge wines.

Menu includes:

Come at 7:00 for wine tasting and appetizers; dinner will be served at 7:30. Advance reservations and payment are required; $50 per person. Space is limited! To make your reservations, call Tassel Ridge Winery at 641.672.WINE (9463) or e-mail Sarah Thompson at sthompson@tasselridge.com. Reservations for the February 14 dinner will be accepted through Monday, February 11, and reservations for February 16 will be accepted through Thursday, February 14.

Oskyfizzante Red

We had to temporarily withdraw our Oskyfizzante Red from the market. We discovered that we’d made a mistake on the label and must now resubmit the label for TTB approval. This process will take us about five weeks. We plan to reintroduce this wine as soon as we have the approval. 

Heart of Iowa Wine Trail 2008 Passport

Heart of Iowa Wine Trail passports are being discovered! People are taking advantage of the fact that there are now fifteen wineries within a 60 mile radius of Des Moines and each offers a different wine experience. They’ve recently organized the Heart of Iowa Wine Trail with a Passport that guides you to each of the wineries. The passport is available at each winery for $25.00. As you visit each winery, you will have the appropriate page in your passport stamped.  When your passport is full, one page is removed and exchanged for two elegant commemorative wine glasses. 

Each of the fifteen member Heart of Iowa Wine Trail wineries offers a different visitor experience. In most cases, the visitor can expect a tour that will include a view of the cellar where wine is made. Some wineries are in unique old barns while others are in brand new, beautify structures. In some cases, the owner is the wine maker and tour guide while in others, the staff is big enough to be specialized. Some wineries will have a band playing while you visit while others will offer vineyard tours or bocce ball and croquet. Member wineries make wine from locally grown grapes, grapes imported from out of state, fruit and fruit juice. Their wines range from dry food pairing wines to sweet fruit wines and Port-style dessert wines. Some wineries even make and offer sparkling wine. 

Purchase your 2008 Heart of Iowa Wine Trail Passport at Tassel Ridge Winery. Price is $25.00, the experience is priceless!

For more information about the Heart of Iowa Wine Trail, visit our website.

Featured Wine

Our Twilight dry red wine is mellowing nicely in the bottle. It is made entirely from Cabernet Sauvignon grown in Lake County, CA and was aged in American and Eastern European Oak barrels for about 15 months. The tannins and vanilla from the oak are integrating nicely making this a great wine to serve with prime rib, steak, and other fully flavored, elegant meals. 

Price: Twilight is $20.00 per 750 ml bottle.

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

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.

What’s Happening in the Vineyard?

If our vineyards had some snow on them in January, they are buried now that we’ve had twelve inches on each of two days in less than a week. But, the vines are dormant or sleeping for the winter and they don’t care. The energy in the vine is all in the roots now and the snow provides insulation from the cold.

What’s Happening in the Cellar?

The cellar is going to be busy in January as we do lots of bottling. Watch out for one or two special editions of the Tassel Ridge Winery e-letter as we announce several new wines later in February.

January and February are traditionally the months during which the wine industry conducts seminars, exhibitions, and meetings. Our Tasting Room Manager attended seminars on wine club operations and tasting room management in mid-January while our cellar crew headed out to California the following week for the Unified Grape and Wine Symposium in Sacramento. We also took time to visit several wineries Sonoma, Napa, and Eldorado Counties in order to learn how they do things. In early February, the Iowa Wine Growers Association will have its annual meeting in Ankeny. Tassel Ridge Winery invests in attending these programs so we can learn how to make better wine and offer our customers a more enjoyable winery experience. 

Our Hours:

Effective February 2008, we are open for tours, tasting, wine, and gift shop sales as follows:

We are 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