Weekend re-cap: Tino's, Moose & Goose, Dancing Bee, Bent Oak, Growler Room

It was the end of a week where I spent a lot of time feeling down in the dumps...so I really looked forward to our exploring last Saturday!  We made plans to meet my sister and BIL at Moose & Goose Winery in Temple.  We enjoyed some Greek food at Tino's for lunch, then headed about an hour north of Austin to the winery.

We got there early, so we grabbed a spot by a window just in time to see car loads of folks drive up - apparently a wine trail was happening!  It was a dreary day, but inside the tasting cottage it was cozy and cheerful.

We were almost done with our tastings when they arrived, so we stayed awhile longer and waited for them to finish up while we enjoyed the rest of some really unique and delish fruit wines.  We loved the Dry Red in particular - the taste was similar to smokey Sotol!  The owner told us that you either love it, or you hate it.  {the trailgoers seated next to us said it tasted like burnt firewood}  More for me.

The owners {nice couple} were super friendly and spent loads of time chatting with the four of us.  I hung around when we finished and got a photo of them to include in an article about their winery and they invited us to come back and enjoy a couple of bottles with them.  We are looking forward to visiting again - we may have to do that wine trail next January, too!

Next stop was close by: Dancing Bee Winery in Rogers.

It is a honey farm, and they make mead, melomel, metheglin, and wine.  We enjoyed a tasting, then bought some mead {Stay Awhile, Winter Spice - both very good!} to have alongside some ridiculously delish fries from their food trailer, drizzled with honey salt.

Stay Awhile had flavors of apple, cherry and cinnamon.  Winter Spice was like Christmas in a can!  Sorry - no pics of the fries as we were too busy scarfing them down...We sat in the tasting room for a bit, socializing.  

Then we took silly pics outside and looking at them later made me laugh so hard!  It was getting close to closing time, and dark outside, so we said our goodbyes.

 But not before we saw amazing giant swaths of birds flying overhead.  Thousands of birds!  Now that is a Winter sky!

We headed home to make a pork chop with mushrooms, and a side salad.  And I have to say, I am really loving my cast iron grill pan that I can use right on my cooktop.

  On Sunday, we had a pick-up to attend at Bent Oak, which was fun as usual!

It had a Super Bowl theme this time.  They always do up the outside patio to reflect the theme and are super fun folks.  The winemaker usually does the pouring.  He was throwing flags and calling fouls on people who were taking too long to pick what wine they wanted - so funny.  With our wine we enjoyed a nacho bowl with Chicken Tinga and black beans - really good!  I might also have enjoyed a slice of Italian Cream cake...

We were there about an hour, listening to live music and eating lunch.  Then headed home to: cut Hubby's hair, walk and wash Teddy, and clean out the truck.  Afterwards, we headed to The Growler Room with Firstborn and LA to drink a beer and play darts and cards.  {and of course I got no pics of that!} After I made us some turkey pasta soup for dinner, we CRASHED on the couch and watched a silly Scottish comedy until we could no longer keep our eyes open.  Ha!  High life of the Empty Nesters, right?

Gina