For weeks now, the wine bloggosphere has been dizzy with recommendations for wines to pair with Thanksgiving meals, especially how to find wines that will work with everything from appetizers to turkey to pecan pie!

The answer is: bring a bunch of different wines!

As you can imagine, I am the wine person in our gatherings. I usually bring something bubbly and festive for before, a reisling or a gewurtraminer for those who want white, a zinfandel for the red drinkers, and a port. Personally, I don’t get the pinot noir and turkey dinner pairing; maybe I just haven’t found the right pinot…

The past two years, I was fortunate enough to have a stash of excellent sparking shiraz from Grateful Palate warehouse sales, so before dinner I opened a “white” sparkler as well as a “red” one. I plan to pick up a bottle of sparkling J plus a sparkling shiraz today at the Ventura Wine Company. I’m also bringing an unusual white aromatic, 2006 Rkatsitelli from Dr Konstantin Frank.

For reds, I’m bringing two Eberle zins (2006 and 2007) plus Twisted Oak’s Torcido, a grenache that I think will go really well with turkey also and is just an all-around scrumptious wine, plus “Potty Mouth” Red for giggles (well, and it’s good!).  If I can find a bottle of the Bianchi Zen Zin I had with turkey on Sunday, I may pick it up too!

For dessert, I’ll buy a bottle of Jonesy Port (amazing for under $10) and following the advice of Rick Bakas, a bottle of the best madeira I can find (they don’t always have any at all so that’s actually kind of a joke).

Want to read more about what wine people are bringing to dinner? Here are two blog posts I’d recommend checking out for some unusual yet available choices.

Here’s what social media wine guru Rick Bakas is bringing and why.

Here’s what my friend and wine pr pro Jo Diaz has chosen to share at her Thanksgiving feast.

What are you looking forward to trying? If you discover a special pairing, let the folks over at Ridge wine know about it–they’re running a contest which closes Dec. 6! I’m going to submit our beer butt turkey recipe–just need to decide which Ridge zinfandel would be best!