Saturday, March 16, 2013

Wine and Strawberries

(Avon Park, FL) Hi 81 Lo 41 -- We ran the furnace for one cycle to warm us up this morning. But it warmed up quickly so we needed the a/c in the afternoon.

We went on a day trip today. Jim purchased a Living Social coupon online for Keel and Curley Winery in Plant city. We had reservations for a 2pm tour, but for some reason Jim thought it was for 2:30, so we got there about 15 minutes late. No problem, they just moved us to the 3pm tour, and we got to do our tastings before the tour rather than after. Which was better because we got to "walk off" the effects of the wine before we left. Keel and Curley is a family winery, very small. They specialize in blackberry, blueberry, and strawberry wines, and they're very good.

We rode on this trolley to the processing area.
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This is the fermenting room. Each tank on the right holds about 1,000 bottles of wine.










Don, our tour guide.
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To illustrate how small the operation is, this is the entire bottling line, only about 10 feet long. They produce 40-50,000 bottles of wine a year.










We bought three bottles of wine and a small bottle of blueberry syrup. We got two bottles of their delicious Key Lime Sauvignon Blanc.

We were only a few miles from Parksdale Groves, my favorite place to get strawberry shortcake. We discovered this place last winter, and I'm sure we'll be going there at least once each winter we're down here.
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As usual there was a long line, but it moves very fast. They have their service down to a science.
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Jim’s not fond of strawberries (I know, crazy!), so he had a bowl of ice cream. But here's what I had:










We got home around 6:00 and settled in for the evening. Quite a fun day!

6 comments:

Mike and Terri said...

Oh boy, does that look yummy!!

Chuck and Anneke's RV travels said...

Wine tour and desert-a perfect day:)

KarenInTheWoods said...

WOW.. that strawberry dessert looks delish-ious!!!!!! Your winery tour looked fun, I had to sit with Steve and Sam through a beer tour! (and I don't drink beer!)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Karen and Steve
The USA Is Our Big Backyard
http://kareninthewoods-kareninthewoods.blogspot.com

Dan and Tricia said...

Parkesdale is great! Their strawberries are wonderful!

Jim and Sandie said...

Not a wind drinker but the blueberry syrup sure sounds good. And that strawberry shortcake - out of this world.

owensontheroad said...

I would definitely do both, wine, and strawberries :)

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