Loess Hill Vineyard and Winery

I spotted this place while driving back from ziplining and decided to give it a try. The tastings were only $ 5 and you got to keep the glass, so I went that route. I usually like about 2 (at most) wines during tastings, but I liked every single wine on the list. Even the sweet wine which usually isn’t my thing. This isn’t a super swanky vineyard but that’s fine. I prefer good wine to swank.

We happened to stop in here on the way back from a hike. We did the wine sampling — $ 5 for 6 generous samples. The owner was the one leading the tasting, which was neat since he was the one doing the entire wine-​making process, from growing the grapes to the making of the wine. We started with the dry wine. SBP was a dry red which was decent, but didn’t care much for the Loess Hills Blanc (dry white). We started moving into the semi-​sweet and sweet wines, and mentioned that we didn’t care much for sweet wines – we were dry wine people. He immediately put his wine glass down, grabbed a small measuring cup/​pitcher and went to the back room. He came back with a 6 month old Chambourcin for us to try. He repeated going to the back, getting us a dry red that he was aging, telling us the backstory, etc. two more times. It was a pretty neat experience and his passion for wine-​making was evident. Worth a trip.
Pros: Owner is very friendly, entertaining to listen talk about the wine
Cons: the sweet wine wasn’t great

I had a friend in from out of town and we thought a picnic and winery trip might be fun. This place is only 20 minutes north of Omaha or so, so we decided to give it a try. It turned out to be a little bitty tasting room. The tasting deal: for $ 5, you get a souvenir glass, the tasting is free. What that really means is, it must be a way to get around the liquor license or something. You «pay» for the glass and not the wine. But what would you taste in if you didn’t buy the glass? Clever. ;-) Anyway, the tasting meant you could try 8 of their 10 wines — not bad for $ 5. Except that, well, it was. It was bad, I mean. There was only one we would have considered drinking. Most of the wines were terribly, terribly sweet. Bleh. But, we bought a bottle of the Pinot Grigio because how can you not buy a bottle when you are the only one in the tasting room and you’ve met the owner, his wife, and his son? (Bottles of wine range from $ 8-​$ 14, maybe? They are definitely on the cheaper side.) The upside was that they had a great grassy area out back that is perfect for a picnic. Very, very sweet people. Unfortunately, it was also very, very sweet wine and I’m not a sweet wine fan. Maybe if you are though, this is your place!