This story is part of Food Routes, a Harvest Public Media series about local food.

In northern Iowa, the morning sun lights up a vineyard surrounded by corn fields. The grape harvest is well underway with a machine pulled by a small tractor.

Anne Zwink sips on coffee as she watches the harvester comb trellises, shaking grapes loose from the vine. Zwink is Soldier Creek Winery’s award-winning winemaker and president of the Iowa Wine Growers Association.

“We’re actually harvesting four varieties today because everything became ripe all at once last week in the heat,” she said.

The machine tips 600 pounds of La Crescent, a cold-hardy and disease-resistant grape, into a large bin. The harvest has been lower than average this year, Zwink says. The vines are still recovering from a f

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