Wine Yakima Valley is a large conglomeration of wineries and vineyards in the eastern side of Washington State. Every year for Valentine's / President's Day weekend, they host Red Wine + Chocolate, an extraordinary wine tasting experience. This year over 52 wineries participated. For $30, you get a wine glass, a wrist band, and entry into the wineries for all the chocolate and wine tasting you can handle.
My brother-in-law and sister-in-law and big wine fans, so they co-coordinate this trip each year. This year our group was 47 strong. We all met up in Tri-Cities, WA and climbed aboard 2 stretch Hummer limos (our tour bus broke down as we were about to load, so we improvised) to tour some of the wineries. (If you go wine tasting, please be safe. Arrange to a designated driver. You won't be sorry!)
Our first stop was Goose Ridge Winery. We picked up our passes, glasses, and began the consumption of goodies!
Lots of yummy chocolate! They had a dark chocolate fudge that was to-die-for!
Our next stop was Kiona. Last year the group spent over $2,000 at this winery alone. We LOVE Kiona! J and I are white wine drinkers and Kiona has many whites and reds to choose from. Lots of the wineries in the area do mostly reds, so it's nice to find a winery that has a large white selection, and at reasonable per-bottle-prices. We bought bottles of Kiona's Vivacious Vicky-White and Late Harvest Riesling (which is a dessert wine).
J in front of the winery.
View of Kiona's vineyards. I bet they're gorgeous in the late spring!
Kiona's award-winning wines.
Is this not the coolest wine label? Jill Haney-Neal is the incredible local artist who created this label. Check out her amazing work!
Our next stop was a doozie. The Port of Benton: Prosser Wine & Food Park houses multiple tasting rooms. Most of the actual vineyards are off-site. Our favorites here were Hogue (which is fairly main stream), Kestrel, and newcomer Heaven's Cave.
We fell in love with Heaven's Cave's Nobility Riesling and bought 3 bottles. However, proceeds go to charity. From their website:
"Heaven's Cave Cellars is a for-benefit winery that chooses to donate a portion of its profits from wine sales to cover 100% of the operating expenses of the Make the Dash Count Foundation...dedicated to developing the next generation of community leaders and benefitting at-risk youth."
We also had the opportunity to tour the barrel room at Kestrel with their vitner, Dirk. He tapped some of the 2009 barrels for us to taste. I think I prefer the finished product!
Bottle labeling equiment
J "tapping" the barrels
Using a wine thief to taste from the barrels
Our final stop was also to another grouping of wineries, but this grouping doesn't have a conglomerate name. The main winery that we visited here was Airfield Estates Winery. We did some tasting and posing here before visiting Thurston Wolfe to try out some port wines (and eat red velvet cupcakes). After this stop, we headed back to the hotel for some R&R.
The Airfield barrel plane. So cute!
Our entire group in front of a Hummer.
We are so excited for next year!
Are you a red or white wine fan? Favorites? Ever been wine tasting?
1 comment:
Looks like you had so much fun!
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