Last week while my cousin from Seattle, Julia was in town we decided to try something new. One of her ideas was to go to a winery, and let me tell you it was a great one!

We chose the Sandhill Crane Winery; which is located in Jackson, Michigan. Only about 20 minutes from where I live.  It was a surprising beauty located in the middle of farmlands. The place wasn’t crowded but had a nice country, cracker barrel type charm about it. After entering the main building we were immediately greeted by the owner who couldn’t look prouder to be serving everyone.

We ordered from the café which has a very wide spread menu making it very hard for us to choose, so we all got something different so we could try three different things! I ended up with the Not just for Thanksgiving sandwich which had turkey, cranberry sauce and Brie on rustic Italian bread. My Mom had the magic mushroom sandwich, which had goat cheese, and sun dried tomato spread with sautéed Portobello mushrooms, artichoke hearts and fresh kale on rustic Italian bread. Julia had the black bean burger on toasted whole-wheat farmhouse with tomato, lettuce, guacamole and salsa. All of the sandwiches came with chips. You can check out the menu here.

The tasting special is only $5 and is custom to your liking. Personally I am more of a sweeter the better person so I started with the sweet wines. Where as Julia is more of a dry red person so she had the complete opposite section. If you wanted to skip a few you could and we were only done when we ran out.

Personally my favorites were, Blushing Crane, 2013 Riesling, Raspberry Rose and Blue Skies (tastes like blueberry pie!). I also found out that I like dessert wines! Especially this maple one called Annie’s MapleShine that has hints of bourbon!

The food and wine was wonderful and the company was special. We can’t wait to go back for a girl’s night!