When a charity event celebrates 30 years, no doubt it’s not only been successful but has helped beneficiaries and local community along the way. That’s exactly what Winesong, the annual fundraiser on the Mendocino coast of California has done for three decades. “Over 30 years we’ve raised $6.5 million,” says Jeri Erickson, executive director of the Menodcino Coast Hospital Foundation. “Our beneficiary and our sole purpose is to support the Mendocino Coast Hospital, a 25 bed hospital. We service 70 miles of coastline over 540 square miles, as were are a remote region. The closest hospital is an hour away through windy mountain roads, so a hospital in our community is absolutely vital.” Jeri owes part of Winesong’s longevity to its unique location. “All of our events have a coastal view,” she says. Winesong is always the first weekend of September. The Friday afternoon event is the Pinot Noir Celebration…
What You Need to Know About Chilean Wines
The view at Viña Ventisquero Before I went on a recent wine trip to Chile, I had certain assumptions about both the country and its wines, things like all the wines are cheap (I mean good values) and it was more important whether or not wineries were in the northern or southern part of this long skinny country. Not only am I wrong, but I learned many fascinating things to share with you. Chile tends to get pigeonholed into the “inexpensive” wine category but that’s not a true reflection of what’s happening in wine there now. Carmenere may be the national grape of Chile, but Cabernet Sauvignon is king Don’t get me wrong, we had some beautiful fruity, spicy and earthy Carmenere (reference wines: Root: 1 Carmenere $12, TerraNoble Gran Reserva Carmenere $18) But there is more total vineyard acreage in the country planted to Cabernet, about 40% to…
New Kids On The Wine Block
The Santa Cruz Mountains American Viticulture Area (AVA), in northern California, running along the Pacific coast south of San Francisco to Santa Cruz, is one of the most diverse wine growing regions in the world. This wine country is also one of the oldest in California, dating back to the mid 1880’s when pioneers like Paul Masson were growing grapes and making wine here. There are nearly 70 wineries that call the Santa Cruz Mountains home, and a few new kids on the block are noteworthy newcomers. Silvertip Vineyards Silvertip Vineyards is what you would call a destination winery — but not because you’ll find a fancy chateau or Michelin-starred dining there. You have to work to find this Santa Cruz Mountains winery, tucked away among the redwoods, only a few miles as the crow files from Silicon Valley, but a world away in this forested setting. You do…
The Evolution of Sokol Blosser Wines
Alison Sokol Blosser is in Portland, Oregon at the Wine Bloggers Conference (WBC) instead of being on her honeymoon. She just got married on the August weekend before the start of the conference at her family’s winery in Oregon’s Dundee Hills AVA,which is about an hour outside of Portland. As the winery’s Co-President along with her brother Alex, she’s at WBC to pour for nearly 400 bloggers during an activity called live blogging, which is more like speed dating. Then she’s hosting a busload of bloggers from the conference at Sokol Blosser Winery for a dinner with several other local wineries pouring. With all that going on and with harvest underway, Alison says she’ll go on her honeymoon after the fall craziness is done.
EAT – A Thomas Keller Dinner at Home
On Sunday night my cookbook club took on the challenge of making dishes out of famed wine country chef Thomas Keller’s series of cookbooks. We divided up into teams of two and each made one course of a plated, sit-down dinner (usually everything’s served buffet-style.) We feasted on 6 courses, made from The French Laundry, Bouchon and Ad Hoc at Home cookbooks. At the end of the meal, we all agreed that while everything was delicious, the time involved — 8 hours for a quiche (Bouchon) 3 days for French onion soup (Bouchon) — was way more than we’d ever want to do on a regular basis. But we sure did gain an appreciation and understanding of why Keller’s restaurants are so darn expensive! To us, the Ad Hoc cookbook was the most approachable with recipes that aren’t as time consuming or complicated. Notice no one attempted anything out of…
DRINK – Mendocino wine
The Mendocino Crab & Wine Days festival is a great event in that you’re eating local Dungeness crab and drinking local Mendocino County wines with it. I tasted many of them as a component of the wine competition for the Crab & Wine Days event. The same five judges in the the crab cake cook-off sipped and spit 48 wine entries. Our mission: choose the wine best paired with pure crab meat. In the blind tasting lineup there were only white wines, except for one sparkling Rose. Lots of Chardonnays were entered, but many were over-oaked or butter bombs. The top three wines were #1 Graziano Chenin Blanc; #2 Navarro Vineyards Gewurztraminer; #3 Yorkville Cellars Sauvignon Blanc. At the public crab and wine tasting, my favorite discoveries were the wines from Toulouse Vineyards, and the wines from Elke Vineyards. I almost don’t want to tell you about Toulouse because he’s…