On Wednesday, June 10, The Region 5 ( Lauren and Hannah) and Region 1 ( Cassie, Sara, and Mackenzie) interns traveled to Inwood to take a tour of Calico Skies Winery and Vineyard. We learned how Will and Ashley developed a passion for vineyards and knew they wanted to start their own business close to home. We then moved the tour inside where the bulk of the production happens, the making of the wine! Calico skies has dry, semi-sweet, sweet, and fruit wines. Lastly, we got to try a few samples of the semi-sweet, sweet, and fruit wines. We found it very interesting they make blueberry, raspberry, and cranberry wine. You can purchase Calico Skies wine at their location in Inwood as well as local grocery stores.
Earlier in the week, on Monday, We all also toured C. Brown gardens outside of Le Mars. This farm had multiple high tunnels with a variety of peppers (green and purple!), jalapeños, tomatoes and cherry tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, radishes, peas, and green beans. After walking through the gardens and looking at the beautiful produce, we went inside where Audrey let us sample a variety of her homemade jams and jellies from sweet to spicy. A few of the unique flavors were: Strawberry Margarita, Sunshine in a Jar, Fiesta (a mix of all the peppers), and Cherry Almond. Each one was amazing! She also shared with us that she has made up to 10 dozen jars of jam in one week! It was a great learning experience to hear about what it takes to grow mass produce and taking it to the farmers’ markets to sell.
We're excited to see what else Northwest Iowa has in store for us during the rest of the summer!
~Cassie