Spring was in the air as we approached the exterior of James Arthur Vineyards. A tree adorned with white flowers grew beside the path leading to the entrance with a quaint bench nestled underneath. Tulips and daffodils sprung up from the earth and a chorus of frogs filled the air with their...
You can do it your way, or my way, said Dale Lilyhorn, as he explained his tasting method to us. I don't have a way, we each thought, but we humored the big man all the same. Your way, explained the owner and winemaker of Windcrest Winery, just north of Lincoln near Raymond, Nebraska, is you...
Everyone from Billy Joe Armstrong to Adam Duritz has done a rendition of Big Yellow Taxi, and yet there is little evidence to suggest that the message, You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone, has ever truly set in with us. Or so it felt as we covered nearly eighty miles from our home in...
We pulled off of the gravel road a half hour outside of Lincoln, Nebraska, where Mark used to live, and examined the odd juxtaposition of items: outside a large, corrugated steel building, in which one might store a tractor or other similar implements, was a gorgeous hillside vineyard and an...
Winemaker Jennifer Reeder takes a lot of pride in her work, producing the award-winning wines of her family-owned, historic Nebraska vineyard. After driving several miles of country roads east of Lincoln, visitors pull into a farmstead-like facility that may very well evoke nostalgia for many on...
Makovicka is a name that I, like so many Nebraskans, grew up with in the 1990's, though I grew up far from the little Hamlet of Brainard from whence the family hails. The Makovickas I knew from television were fullbacks for the Cornhuskers and helped to power my beloved alma mater to three...
Just outside of Hartington in Nebraska's upper east corner, along Scenic Byway 12, better known as The Outlaw Trail, a somewhat grandiose new tasting room sits atop a hill, overlooking a lush green vineyard and several neighboring farms. Planted in 2003 and first opened in 2006, the Nissen...
Ed Swanson, the founder and owner of Cuthills Vineyards located in Pierce, Nebraska, has easily forgotten more about viticulture than the majority of people will ever know. Ed is a pioneer; he planted Cuthills Vineyards in 1985, and opened the doors to his winery in 1994, years prior to any...
Independence Day has always offered us interesting wine experiences. Our first July 4 together, Sonja spilled no less than three glasses of wine, breaking one glass and only managing to actually imbibe about one glass from the entire bottle. (She also spilled one of Mark's beers that night.)...
Clay and Heidi Schultz had been wanting to open their own winery for a while when a small, established one came on the market in 2014. Pooling their resources, they took a leap of faith and purchased Cedar Hills Vineyard and Gardens, a tiny boutique winery known largely for their fruit wines...
Though we have needed its heat and light for thousands of years, fire is often a destructive force, engulfing homes, forests, and the occasional winery. In the dry summer heat of 2012, Miletta Vista Winery, located just north of St. Paul, Nebraska, succumbed to the flames, extinguishing five...
Superior, Nebraska, is an awfully long way from South Africa, and yet Dominic Burke, winemaker for Superior Estates and a certified oenologist made the journey from his home country years ago, in order to share his knowledge and passion for winemaking, and to craft the absolutely excellent wines...