This is the time of year when we collect petiole samples (stems of leaves) and send them to a lab for analysis. We collect the stems of certain leaves because the stems are the pipelines of a grape vine. All of the nutrients in the vine travel
Read more →We’ll be doing some cleaning and equipment maintenance before we bring our hopper, fruit elevator, destemmer-crusher, and must pump from the warehouse to the crush pad. Then, we’ll get that equipment cleaned and ready. We have a bit of wine in the tanks that we’ll be moving
Read more →We will bottle our last wines for this season: 2019 Iowa St. Pepin and 2019 Iowa Louise Swenson. Both of these wines are new for Tassel Ridge and we’ll be excited to release them in the Fall. Batches of American Steuben and Cranberry Wine have finished fermenting.
Read more →Veraison is an annual milestone in grape ripening. It is when the red/purple grapes change from a hard, milky-green to purple. That process started late last week in our Marquette and Frontenac. St. Croix, Sabrevois, and Foch will follow soon. Veraison also happens with white grapes. They
Read more →We will get our 2019 Iowa St. Pepin and 2019 Iowa Louise Swenson filtered this week so we are ready to bottle both wines next week. We are monitoring the fermentation of another batch of Cranberry Wine. Fermenting cranberry is a slow process. We are also getting
Read more →On Wednesday, we will bottle another batch of our very popular Blackberry Wine. If you like a really smooth sweet wine, you should try Tassel Ridge Blackberry Wine. We are fermenting batches of Cranberry Wine and American Steuben so we’ll be monitoring those fermentations. We will be
Read more →We Finish Tying and Suckering New Vines at Maple Woods and Make this Season’s First Harvest Estimate
We have a lot of new vines at our Maple Woods vineyard and we will finish tying them to the pencil rod and top wire and also remove any suckers. We have more fungicide to apply. Because of our high humidity right now, this is really important.
Read more →Jake Peterson is the Assistant Tasting Room Manager at Tassel Ridge Winery. He moved from North Carolina about seven months ago and started at Tassel Ridge in February. He is still getting used to the wide range of temperatures we have in Iowa. Jake worked for a
Read more →Tying Vines, Removing Suckers, Spraying Herbicide, and Mowing are All Seasonal Tasks in the Vineyard
This week, we will finish tying Sabrevois and St. Croix and removing suckers. We will finish hedging the Marquette in Meadowcreek West and work on the Marquette trellis. Mowing never seems to go away. We will be spraying some herbicide at Tassel Ridge and at Meadowcreek. And,
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Tassel Ridge Greek Beef Pockets make a tasty, light, summer meal, and Tassel Ridge Iowa Cuvée 220 is a perfect pairing. It has enough body to complement the bigger flavors from the beef, onion, and feta without overwhelming the fresh flavors in the cucumber sauce.
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