Omaha Crush 2014

Disclaimer: Visit Omaha and Omaha Crush reached out to me and offered me two tickets to attend the event and two tickets to give away via Instagram. This post is not sponsored, and all thoughts and opinions are my own.

My friend Erin and I had a wine date this weekend.

It was a wine date in Aksarben with some of the best wines in the country and food from the best Omaha restaurants. I know how to treat my dates right. 😉

The premise was simple. One ticket ($60) got you unlimited sips and samplings from 1-5pm and a Riedel wine glass. There was also live entertainment and the ability to peruse art while you eat and drink.

The event was kicked off with an almond champagne toast. It was fabulous and I felt incredibly fancy. It was also by far the best champagne I’ve ever had.

I had done two workouts before the event so I arrived hungry. After toasting with our champagne we made a beeline for the food. I was so excited to see Kitchen Table there. It’s one of my favorite restaurants and is owned by some of the nicest people. They make healthy dishes that use quality ingredients that don’t skimp on flavor. They had a fish dish (steelhead trout I think) that I was a little nervous to try. (I am not a big fish person.) But I decided to be brave and it turned out to be delicious. It also tasted nothing like fish (or that fish-y taste I associate with fish) so I was very, very happy. 😀

It was so great to get to walk up to the different booths and chat with the vendors about their businesses. I learned about so many new-to-me restaurants that I need to try.

Oh man the food. There was so much good food. Something I loved was that all the restaurants were so accommodating with veggie friendly options. Booths were more than happy to make a piece without bison or ham so I could enjoy the samples to my hearts content.

Speaking of veggie friendly, Isa Chandra was there sampling food from her new vegan restaurant Modern Love. It opens today and Hannah, Joanna, Jordan and I already have reservations for next week. I can’t wait!

I was so excited to see Oliverde had a booth at Omaha Crush too! I first met them at Toast Nebraska and they  quickly became my favorite oil and vinegar store. Their flavors are unmatched. I use their vinegars every day on my lunch salads. I was excited to get to introduce Erin to the world of delicious flavored vinegars. It’s addicting.

We alternated our eating with drinking. I loved the layout of Omaha Crush. Every few wine booths there was a food booth interspersed so you could get some food in your belly to soak up some of the booze.

Erin was the best date because aside from being super cute and a good conversationalist, she also knows her wine. I’m a foodie, not a wino. I know I like wine. I know if it’s sweet I’ll typically drink it faster than I should and wind up talking too fast and a little too loudly. Erin was able to add some education to our day drinking and point out things about the drinks I otherwise wouldn’t have known.

I still drank too fast and started talking too fast and a little too loudly. To Chef Clayton Chapman of Grey Plume. Maker of the world’s best veggie sandwich. I’m pretty sure I went on for a good five minutes about how I want to spread the word about the perfection that is the secret bar menu veggie sandwich to the world. I die.

Maybe the awesome live performances drowned me out and he was just nodding along to the beat of the song? I’m going with that.

Moving on from my mortification… it was so great to get to chat with the wine vendors! I loved that they were all more than happy to answer my many wine questions. They didn’t care that I couldn’t tell the nuances of one bottle from another. They just love wine and wanted to share that passion with me.

I learned a lot of new things and got to try some fun flavors. I hope to go to some wine classes around Omaha in the future. One day I would love to travel to Napa to stomp grapes and taste wine fresh from the vineyard.

The biggest thing I learned is that the wine community is an awesome bunch. We struck up so many conversations with complete strangers and had an absolute blast. It was a great afternoon with great company.

Questions of the day: Do you know a lot about wine? Have you ever stomped grapes? Are you a red or a white wine fan?