Davenport Orchards and Winery 2012

Some of you may remember my trip to Davenport Orchards and Winery last year the weekend I went to pick grapes.

Well I went back for more again this year. And this time I dragged the Scotch Man along with me.

Here we are at the vineyard!



We spent about three hours picking grapes off the vine with the other volunteers and seasonal workers. Look at all the grapes we picked!

Ok, so the Scotch Man and I didn't pick all of these. We probably only contributed three or four bins out of the total forty-nine.

After they fed us lunch (along with a complimentary glass of wine!) we got to watch them load all of the grapes into the de-stemming and crushing machine. They put us back to work helping out. I got to swap out bins to catch all of the stems and other trash came spewing from the back end of the machine.

I got a little messy.

Ok, so this might be a bit embellished for effect, but I did get pretty messy. The guys working there took some extra gunk off the machine and made me rub my hands in it before we took the picture, hehe.

After we finished working, we went back to the tasting room and tried all of the different wines they had for tasting. The Scotch Man bought a bottle called Jazz Man, and I got one called Matrot - which is made with Norton grape, the same type of grape we were picking today.

Overall it was a long, exhausting day, but the weather was amazing, I got to see a lot of awesome stuff, and I  got to spend the day with my man. He did a good job helping out. Here he is helping mash the skins back down into the fermenting liquid.

I can't wait to drink the bottles we got today. And I can't wait to go back in a couple of years to get a bottle made of the 2012 Norton we helped pick this year.

Davenport Mandolin

A friend of mine took me on the 2011 Kaw Valley Farm Tour back in October. It was a gorgeous fall day, and I got to spend a lot of it outdoors while we explored farms and local groceries. And, amazingly, Davenport Orchards and Winery.

Believe it or not, there are vineyards and wineries in Kansas. I was a bit surprised by this information, myself. When I discovered that there was one just outside of town, I got pretty excited. I was just starting to get into my wine tastings when I was introduced to this tidbit.

Dozens of people were milling around when we arrived. We made our way inside and pushed through the crowd up to where they were giving out free samples. They let us sample five different wines, from their driest to their sweetest, and my favorite was dead center: the Mandolin.

This wine is made from sweet red grapes, and definitely is more of a dessert wine than one you'd have with a meal. It was even too sweet for me to drink while writing. It has a pretty robust flavor, and might be a good choice for those who don't normally like red wine.

After the tasting, we listened to a talk about how they process the grapes, and then went on a hay rack ride around the vineyard. It was so beautiful and peaceful out there. Our tour guide mentioned that they took volunteers to help pick grapes when they were ready, and that their last batch of the season would be ready the following week.

I was out there the next weekend to pick. It was a perfect morning for it. The weather could not have cooperated better. I tagged along with a couple and we chatted while we snipped plump bunches of shiny purple grapes and plopped them into huge tubs. I stayed long enough to prune two long rows. I was scraped and sticky and sunburned by the end, but it was a fabulous feeling of accomplishment. It's exciting to think that someday the grapes I picked that Saturday will be turned into wine.