Four Springs cooking up tasty wine sauces

When you make your way into Four Springs Winery in Seven Valleys, Pa., one of these next two weekends for Tour de Tanks, make sure you try the meatballs in wine sauce. It could be a white sauce or red sauce; they've made both for an event that drew more than 300 ticketholders the first week and 450 each the past two weekends.

The white sauce has been made with Four Springs Chardonnay and Rothchild Farms raspberry honey mustard pretzel dip. That creates a yellow sauce that's a perfect dipping agent for the meatballs. When they temporarily ran out of the raspberry honey mustard, they switched to a red sauce that featured Four Springs Chambourcin and some Aunt Mae smoked sweet chipolte oven and grilling sauce. Both of those companion items are available for purchase at the winery.

In either case, lay the meatballs in the bottom of the crock and let them simmer. Then go open some wine and snack.

Four Springs packed this afternoon

Stopped out at Four Springs Winery near Glen Rock, Pa., one of the 12 wineries along the Uncork York trail that's participating in the Tour de Tanks during weekends throughout March. Get your card stamped at each stop, with the chance to sample the wines, nosh a bit, and ask anything you want about the wines and what goes into making them.

The parking lot at the boutique winery was filled when I arrived during the early afternoon. I was told around 175 visited last Saturday, the Tour's first day, and over 100 last Sunday. They already had topped 100 card-carrying members today and another three hours remained.

Make sure you try the meatballs among the foods dotting the table across the winery from the barrels. They are cooked in the Four Springs Chardonnay; I could have nibbled on those all day. Hoping they'll send me the receipe and I'll add it to this post. Sampled the Niagara and both the unfinished and finished Chards, then headed into the tasting room to sample several of the reds, including the Chambourcin, Cab Franc and a Cab Sauvignon the winemaker feels might still be another three or four years away from its full potential.

Meanwhile, both rooms were packaged and folks were milling around, just exchanging their opinions on the wine or talking about other wineries on the trail they had hit last week or earlier today. One couple had visited Hauser Estate in Orrtanna and were raving about the view. I can vouch for that, having stopped last week.