Monthly Archives: February 2011

Ventura’s Valentine n’Wine Weekend 2011: A Passport to Some Fine Wine Times!

What are your Valentine’s plans? Maybe a little sherry and Belgian chocolate like I suggested in yesterday’s post? I’ve got more ideas for you coming up! But in the meantime, you might consider checking out the following:

The Ventura County Winery Association invites you and your valentine  to a three-day wine tasting passport event to explore the wineries of Ventura County during Valentine’n Wine Passport Weekend.

Visit twelve participating wineries, taste award-winning wines and enjoy special food pairings at many locations from Friday February 11 to  Sunday February 13.

Each ticket holder will receive one regular wine tasting flight at each of twelve participating locations, during their regular operating hours.  Pay $45 online and pick up your ticket at one of several event locations; tickets may also be purchased at participating locations during the event weekend for $55 per person.

Find out which wineries are participating and more information about Ventura County’s Valentine n’Wine Weekend: http://www.valentinenwine.com/.

A Quest For Sherry (and love!)

A Quest For Sherry (and love!) my guest post for the Secret Sherry Society is up on their website–check it out! Thank you to the Secret Sherry Society for invited me to play!

Thank you also to photographer/blogger John Nichols who shared with me his sherry stories, one of which I included in this blog post!

PS Did you know sherry pairs well with chocolate and Valentine’s Day? Go read the post! And come back for more Valentine’s wines and tips!

Wine Blogging Wednesday #70: Wine from Spain for 2/16/11

After a hiatus, Wine Blogging Wednesday is going again with a theme of wine from Spain as hosted by Ryan and Gabriella Opaz of the award winning blog catavino.net. The prompt:

  • Choose a Spanish wine or wines to taste on Wednesday the 16th of February.
  • Seek out Spanish wines that you’ve never had before! Get creative! Hunt for unique styles such as a Sherry, Cava, Fondillon or Mistella; an unheard of region like Arribes, Txakoli de Alava or Extremadura; or a unique native grape like Prieto Picudo or Treixadura.
  • Write a post about the wine, flushing it out with life and subtle detail, then publish it on Wednesday, February 16th.
  • Tweet about it with the tag: #WBW70 thus creating a live tasting by time zone as we go around the globe!
  • Finally, send an email to us with a link to your article and include the subject line: “WBW #70 Submission

I’m already in the swim of Spanish wine as I’ve been working on my guest blog for the Secret Sherry Society, published today on their site! So follow my lead and do sherry or go for a distinctly Spanish varietal or style: with Valentine’s Day coming up a sparkling cava would be fun and they’re a great value too. Or do something different: some Spanish wineries are working to capture part of the American market by growing and making familiar wines like cabernet sauvignon and chardonnay to American palates at affordable prices.

No use crying over spilled wine–or blog posts!

Fellow bloggers, have you ever accidentally hit “publish” when you meant to hit “save draft”? That’s what happened with my Egypt wine post. So then I “unpublished” it by scheduling it for a later date–except then I got busy and lo and behold, I came back from a long weekend away and there was that blog post! Right there published on my blog, almost like it had done it by itself!

Part of the problem is how much changed in Egypt from when I started writing that blog post immediately on my return and the sudden turmoil that began a few days after I returned. With all the changes going on in Egypt, it just felt weird if not wrong to be writing about wine as if a revolution wasn’t going on.

Anyway, I have photos to go with the post and more that I want to add, so as soon as I can, I will get to it…