Today we celebrate Valentine’s Day. A day where we pop corks and toast the ones we love. Well, around here, on Wine Predator, we love women in wine, and today, we toast Alice Paillard, daughter of Bruno Paillard, who is a key member of Champagne Bruno Paillard and who I met via ZOOM in December 2021. In fact, we love Women in Wine so much, we are inviting Winophiles to write about one or more women in wine for Women’s History Month for the March 19, 2021 #Winophiles! Scroll down for all the details!
Only a handful of independent, family-owned houses remain in Champagne. Bruno Paillard turned over day to day management to daughter Alice Paillard who serves as CEO. Growing up in a Champagne house like Bruno Paillard was mysterious and fun, and Alice Paillard loved it: Continue reading →
The Federalist Lodi Cab with Goldbelly’s Junior’s Grill Day burgers
Ah, SPORTSBALL. If it’s not one game, it’s another. That’s what it seems to me at this point. But not to my dad… and not to me growing-up. Living in the greater Los Angeles area, my dad was a lifelong Rams fan who loved grilling meat, and later in life, loved red wine. Back when I lived at home, I would often watch football with my dad — which meant he would be in the living room enjoying the game and I’m be doing the weekly baking — cookies and other desserts for him to have in his lunch box that he would take with him to his work as a plumber. And then I’d hear him whoop and holler and “come see this! you’ve got to see this!” and I’d hustle out to the living room from the kitchen to see a spectacular play.
My dad would have loved today’s Super Bowl game where the Rams won– and he would have loved the food and wine we paired with it.
Field Number Fifteen offers wine made with estate organic grapes
What’s the “easy” way to get certified organic? Forty years ago, Kenyon Elliot’s uncle by marriage planted 11.5 acres of wine grapes plus fruit trees on his 20 acres. Years later, the opportunity arose for Kenyon to purchase and revitalize the abandoned vineyard, fulfilling a lifelong dream: Field Number Fifteen, a small 600 case winery outside Placerville, CA in El Dorado County in California’s Sierra Nevada Foothills located at a 2500′ elevation.
Because the vineyards had been neglected, Kenyon could easily attain CCOF organic certification prior to releasing the first wines in 2020.
When the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians invested in Kitá Wines, they became the very first Native American tribe to have a Native American winemaker, vineyard and winemaking operation run solely by their own people. Winemaker Tara Gomez was there from the beginning, masterfully managing every step and blending the wines. “When we embarked on this journey in 2010, my mission from the very beginning was to approach these wines the same way I approach life: with a heart full of gratitude and a healthy appetite for adventure,” says Tara on Kita’s Facebook page. “There wasn’t a lot of discussion happening around Native American-made wines when we first started, and I am so proud to be part of the movement happening around the world as people look toward the original stewards of the land for unique and amazing wine, beer and spirits.”
Chumash Winemaker Tara Gomez
“Every step of the way I have been grateful for the opportunities provided by my tribe; both through the education and experience they have made available to me, and by being entrusted to share the story of our ancestors through wine cultivated from our ancestral land.”
NFL Super Star’s Intercept Pinot Noir Paired with Smoked Ham
In football, it’s all about the team, and how well they partner together. For the Super Bowl, it’s 53 players on a team, offensive and defensive, working together to make plays that win games.
Wine also is about team work: growing grapes, harvesting them at the right time, making them into wine. For Intercept, wine aficionado, television personality, retired football superstar, and one of the all-time leaders in NFL interceptions, NFL Super Star Charles Woodsonpartners with O’Neill Vintners & Distillers.
When I think of wine made from the Pinot Noir grape, the regions of Burgundy in France, New Zealand’s South Island, Oregon’s Willamette Valley, and California’s Sta Rita Hills in Santa Barbara County come to mind. So I was quite surprised to learn that the third largest region (not country) in the world planted for Pinot Noir production is Oltrepò Pavese! Located in the Lombardy region of Northern Italy, Oltrepò Pavese sits on the 45th parallel, the same place on Earth where we find the Willamette Valley, Burgundy, and Marlborough. Continue reading →
wine predator.............. gwendolyn alley 