![]() |
Meredith Test Kitchens |
![]() |
Meredith Photography Studio |
After the tour at Meredith, we had dinner at Jasper Winery that night. This winery is located in Des Moines and is described as “a hobby that went astray.” They bottled their first bottles of wine in 2003 in Newton, IA. They soon outgrew that space and opened up a new winery near downtown Des Moines in 2008. They strive to produce world-class wines using Iowa grown grapes. And I can vouch for them, that their wines were very good!
![]() |
Fermenting grapes |
![]() |
Bottled and cased wine |
The next morning after breakfast, we all headed to the Iowa Speedway near Newton, IA. Iowa Speedway is the nation’s most state-of-the-are motorsports facility. Racing great, Rusty Wallace, designed the track. For the past five years, the Iowa Corn Grower’s have sponsored the Iowa Corn Indy 250 race in June where the cars have ran on 100% corn ethanol as their fuel. We got a tour of the race track and then got to ride in a pace car that got up to 125 mph around the track!
After leaving the speedway, we headed to Ador Kitchens for a chef-guided meal. The menu for lunch was:
Cider sauced apple, walnut and bacon stuffed Iowa port chops
Three bean with sweet potato chili
Leek, cremini mushroom and roasted corn risotto
Warm spiced apple dumplings with vanilla bean ice cream
![]() |
Ingredients for the risotto |
![]() |
The finished product! Yum! |
![]() |
I forgot to take a picture of the apple dumpling dessert before I dug in and ate it all! It was delicious! |
After our lunch was over, it was the end of the 2011 Iowa Cornucopia Tour. We all had a fantastic time and learned a lot about Iowa and what it has to offer in regards to agriculture. I hope all the ladies enjoyed it as much as I did!
Leave a Reply