Day 17, Wednesday, August 1, 2018
I had not intended to see much of Minnesota on my road trip. I mean, in the perfect world, I would have visited much of Minnesota on my trip, as I had never been there before, but… it is not a perfect world, and there was not unlimited time on my trip to go everywhere. Sadly, I had to pick and choose. From Austin and the SPAM Museum, I headed east and then south to drop into Iowa. And found an unexpected gem.

Four Daughters Vineyard & Winery
The Four Daughters Winery is on Highway 16, one of the highways I traveled to get to Iowa. I wasn’t expecting to see a winery, and I hadn’t done any research on Minnesota wine, but there it was. I drove past it, noticing what it was, and ended up turning around to go back. A winery – with a restaurant, and it was lunchtime! It was clearly a sign.
I went in and chose a spot at the bar – the tasting included your choice of six white or red samples (not SPAMples this time) – I chose the whites. You could also select two samples of their ciders (but I was so very enthusiastic that she let me taste more).
The white lineup at Four Daughters
My tasting sheet
A few of my ciders
Four Daughters has some fantastic wines. Their sparkling Brianna is delicious, and their Tea Time Loon Juice, a black tea infused cider, is amazing. The sangria is a light, refreshing, summer time sipper. I bought all three, and I’m sad that Four Daughters doesn’t ship to Washington… I long ago drank them all… I am going to have to make it back to Minnesota. Not to mention I had their pork tacos for lunch, which were so delicious – and paired perfectly with the sparkling Brianna.

Pork tacos
That’s the thing about road trips – sometimes you just find a place you want to stop at and explore. I was so glad that I did!