Cider and Donuts…and Wine?!
Hi and welcome to the first Taste It With T blog post! What a great time of year to start sharing my food experiences…AUTUMN! Unless you are like my family and barbeque all winter long, (yes, we have grilled filets on the deck for New Year’s Eve despite winter’s frigid temps), this time of year sadly brings an end to BBQ season for most Midwesterners. However, this isn’t all bad because once Labor Day is over and the grills and boats are put away, the fall cooking season begins… and THIS is one of my favorite times of the year in the kitchen with all those savory, saucy comfort food options! Yes, I’m talking pot roast, baked breads, casseroles, oven roasted potatoes, mashed potatoes, squash, baked turkey, chili, hot soups and SOOOO many more delicious delights!
At my house, the autumnal cooking cycle starts with apples! With cider mill visits, apple picking hayrides, and most importantly, of course, the results…apple pie, apple crisp, and homemade applesauce! Heaven…I can smell the cinnamon now! Can you?
In order to get ALL those apples needed to make ALL that appliciousness, a trip to the apple orchard to pick apples is a traditional must! It makes the finished product taste that much better, too! While many cider mills are within close proximity to where I live, I decided to make the first cider mill visit of the year an adventurous one by going to a place about an hour away which also has the added bonus of an on-site winery… Yep, it doesn’t get much better than this!
Spicer Orchards was on my to do list for over a year and I can’t wait to go back!
There are so many things to do at an apple orchard…eat donuts, drink cider, get lost in a corn maze, and at this orchard…wine tasting. We started off by boarding the wagon to venture into the orchard to pick our own apples. This orchard offers the highly valued “Honey Crisp” apple for a premium bag fee. They actually have a guard out in the field checking for the special mark on the bag to allow premium pickers into the Honey Crisp rows and to keep others out! I’d NEVER seen this before, but I’ve never picked at an orchard that offered these PRIZED apples so maybe this is common practice. Either way I did encounter one “regular” picker who was a little miffed about this . We stuck with the REGULAR options and filled our bag with a variety of Red and Gold Delicious, Gala, Jonathan and Cortland apples.
After our apple adventure and a wagon ride back to the main area, we did a little wine tasting and chose a cranberry and a red to sip with our donuts. Since most cider mills usually only have cinnamon and sugar or plain donuts available, we were pleasantly surprised by Spicer’s scrumptious pumpkin donuts! A lovely terrace filled with bistro tables off of the wine room and a beautiful view of the horizon made for a peaceful and serene atmosphere to enjoy cider, donuts and wine. There was a hard cider tasting station that we skipped, but will certainly try on our next visit. Why I didn’t bring some cranberry wine that we were told can be mixed with vodka to make a Cosmopolitan home with me, I don’t know. Hhhmmm…maybe so I can go back to get it? Better do that before the holidays are here! For now, I better get in the kitchen with my apples!