It’s crazy to me that it’s been a year since my husband and I got married! It has totally flown by. It was good timing though because a few months ago, I stumbled across an article about the most romantic getaways in Connecticut and found the Fitch Claremont Bed and Breakfast in Bozrah, CT. It’s a lovely bed and breakfast located on a small vineyard….and when I read that the room came with free bottles of wine I was in! It’s about 10 minutes to the two huge casinos, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, and it’s also about 15 minutes from 5 different vineyards! Sounded like the perfect romantic weekend getaway!
We arrived around dinner time on Friday and were TOTALLY starving. We checked in and quickly headed out to Mohegan Sun for dinner. We’ve always wanted to try Sol Toro Tequila Grill at Mohegan but I wasn’t sure if they had many gluten free options. Turns out they have tons!! I made our reservation online before we left and added a comment that I had Celiac. When we were seated, the waiter said “I’m having some tortilla chips baked instead of fried because I heard one of you has Celiac Disease.” How nice!? I haven’t been able to have chips and salsa at a Mexican restaurant in soo long. The waiter was fantastic and knew exactly what I could have that was gluten free and he won me over when he said “and the good news….tequila is gluten free” haha Whatta guy. So I ended up getting the beef enchiladas and they were to die for!!
The next day was the day we planned to visit all the vineyards! We had 5 in mind, but we ended up only making it to 4. We had dinner reservations at 6 and I wanted to actually still be awake for that haha The first vineyard we headed to was the Preston Ridge vineyard. It was absolutely beautiful and had delicious wine to boot! We did a tasting and then decided to share a bottle of the rose on their back deck. The view was stunning!
After this, we headed to the Jonathan Edwards Vineyard. It was totally huge and gorgeous! However, the wines that they had weren’t particularly unique, so we decided to pace ourselves and each just get a glass to try. We wandered around the grounds and then relaxed at a table for a bit. The grounds were really nice, but it felt big and less welcoming than a lot of the vineyards I’ve visited. We didn’t stay too long.
Our next stop was the Maugle Sierra Vineyard which was so unique! It had the feel of summer camp, kind of. Really tucked into the woods and beautiful. I sang the “Bug Juice” theme song in my head the whole time (anyone?). We shared a bottle of their Rendezvous wine, which was a mix of a few different white wines. It was perfectly in between not too sweet and not too dry. We also grabbed some cheese to hold us over until dinner. We headed outside and found a lovely little “table” made out of a stump surrounded by comfy Adirondack chairs to relax in. Heavenly.
Our last stop of the afternoon was Holmberg Orchards and Winery. This place had a totally different vibe! Since it’s an orchard, there were tons of families there to pick pumpkins and apples. It was really busy, but we loved it! Such a friendly and joyful atmosphere! They also had some great, unique wines to try! We tried an apple cranberry wine that was fantastic! But we ended up getting a 6 pack of their hard cider. It was one of the few hard ciders I’ve tried where genuinely all you taste is pure apple….it had the perfect amount of sweetness and tasted totally natural.
After this last stop, we headed back to the hotel to take a nap haha We were quite sleepy! But we were up by 6pm because we had dinner reservations that night at Modesto’s. The b&b has a deal where you pay $125 and you get a meal there with 2 appetizers, 2 glasses of wine, 2 entrees, 2 desserts, and 2 bottles of the Fitch Claremont wine. What a deal, right!? So that’s what we did.
I wasn’t sure how the gluten free options would be, but it turned out that they had a gluten free menu! I got shrimp cocktail for an appetizer, a flank steak/veggie/spanish rice dish for my entree, and caramel flan for dessert! I can’t even tell you how full I was…but it was so good! The restaurant is a little dated (they still used the dessert cart which had all your different options on it), but I didn’t mind at all. The food and the staff were all terrific.
After dinner we tried to venture to the casino again, but only lasted about an hour before we were both exhausted! All that wine and food caught up to us haha
So we went back and slept a solid 8 hours and woke up to the most amazing breakfast!! Nora, one of the owners, had made me a gluten free apple crisp! There are no words for how delicious it was. So perfectly sweet and crisp…and it was made from the apples on the apple tree in their backyard!
She also went through the trouble of making me gluten free mini-pancakes! As if that wasn’t enough, she also made eggs, bacon, and roasted potatoes. Plus a glass of strawberries and cream. I want them to adopt me and feed me every day….I never wanted to leave!! They also had a bottle of “breakfast wine” available every morning…that’s my kinda place!!
I couldn’t have asked for a better weekend getaway for our anniversary! I packed lots of food so I wouldn’t go hungry for breakfast or lunch, but I actually never even opened the bag 🙂 I was one happy Celiac.