We were up in Mammoth for a holiday weekend ski trip where I also had a twitter tasting with Steven Kent Wines and Jim Demetriades, owner of Rafters hosted me! And what a gracious host! I was able to use a beautiful side room for the tasting, sommelier Chip Irmish set me up with the correct glasses I’d need as well as a dump bucket, and an ice bucket. Staff brought water, and either Chef Kerry Mechler or various staff brought out the six dishes that chef had chosen to pair with the six wines.
Here in Part 2, I’ll move from the whites on to the Pinot Noirs, one from Carneros and one from Santa Lucia Highlands, near Monterey. (Want to read about the Lola and the Dutton Chard?)
“Congratulations! You’re a Finalist!” said the email.
All I have to do now is convince YOU to choose me, Gwendolyn Alley, the Wine Predator, as the one lucky writer to go on a Guided Culinary Tour of Chile!
Please choose me as the winning blogger who takes tours and participates in tastings at vineyards, olive groves, and fruit plantations. Who better than a wine blogger to wax eloquently about wine and food?
Please choose me to meet with local Chilean exporters and producers, and to eat specially prepared meals at the restaurants of local Chilean chefs. I love all kinds of seafood and shellfish, I love game, beef, fowl, pork, vegetables and fruits! My Wine Predator and Art Predator blogs and my twitter and facebook feeds are full of photos of fine food and wine that I share with my followers and friends.
Please choose me to visit the Mercado Central in Santiago, one of the world’s
top food markets, to see cultural heritage sites in Santiago, and to attend the Nam Santiago Food Festival where I will taste of the culinary innovations of Chile.
I, Gwendolyn Alley, Wine Predator, am the right blogger to write about the food AND the wine of Chile!”
So that’s the script I chose to produce for the video above instead of this one with seven reasons why Foods from Chile should choose me. And sometime in the next 24 hours I will find out whether my video submission and this blog post convinced the powers that be to send me to Chile as the one lucky writer who will go on a Guided Culinary Tour of Chile with members of top media publications from April 7th to April 13th 2013 –flight, transportation, and accommodations all included!
Yes, as you can imagine every few minutes I am obsessively checking my email just in case they decide to pick me and let me know early!
Regardless of whether I win the contest and get to go to Chile in April or not, we had a great time shooting the video–as you can see from the video I submitted as well as the out-takes video below! Continue reading →
For my birthday in 2011, I was in Egypt. Last year, I had a huge party. This year, I wanted something more quiet.
On the eve of my birthday, we drove late into the night to arrive in the first few minutes of my birthday at Benton Hot Springs Bed and Breakfast in eastern California near the Nevada border. Appropriately, we stayed in the “Cowgirl Room”!
Because of a reservation mix-up, for our accommodations the rest of the weekend, Tamarack Lodge upgraded us to a luxury two bedroom cabin where this exquisite bottle of Roederer Champagne waited, chilled, which we enjoyed with oysters I brought from the Jolly Oyster in Ventura plus some rosemary crackers and goat cheese. It was worth every penny (and since it was room service, I’m sure that was a pretty penny!)
That night, we had dinner at the Lakeside Restaurant (review to follow!). While they have a nice list, I had brought something even better, a Marilyn Remark 2003 syrah that fellow wine blogger David Rodriguez (aka @zensolo on twitter) had given me in November (review to follow!) All in all, it was a perfectly incredible day!
On Saturday we skied all day and we cooked dinner in: arugula salad with portabellas cooked in a 30 year tawny port and fresh manila clams from the Jolly Oyster with an amazing chardonnay from Ojai Vineyards (review to follow!). For dessert, we had the 30 year tawny and salted chocolate almonds.
Sunday morning as we were packing up, I realized there was one glass remaining of the Roederer. I’d never tried the spoon trick before–imagine my pleasure to discover that it works perfectly and the Champagne paired delightfully with my bagel and lox!
Thanks to Mammoth, Tamarack, The Lakeside, The Mill, Zensolo, Tony, Benton, and my family for such a wonderful birthday weekend!
PS Do you like the daffodils? Believe it or not, I brought them from home!
How did I get from Idaho and Walla Walla back to California for the Petite Sirah Symposium? By way of some Oregon Pinot Noir of course!
Read on to get a taste and see where I went and what I did; more in depth blog posts to come about my stops in Willamette Valley AVAs including Barrel Fence in the Dundee Hills (pictured) and Coleman Vineyards in the McMinnville AVA (photos below).
When I last checked in from my road trip, I had arrived on the coast of Oregon following a few days in the Walla Walla AVA (American Viticultural Area) and around Boise (the Snake River AVA)… Read More
After over three weeks on the road, and tasting wine in Idaho, Walla Walla Washington and the Willamette Valley in Oregon, I made it Monday July 25 to Jim Concannon’s birthday dinner to celebrate his 80th and Petite Sirah at the PS I Love You Petite Sirah Symposium Tuesday July 26 at Concannon Winery in Livermore. (Links to participating wineries and those discussed below the jump; here’s a blog post by Jo Diaz about the events. Pictured below is Jim Concannon’s son John honoring him; pictured above is Karen Leslie who sat next to me).
What to eat with your Petite? If a summer time dinner or lunch outside under the table grape arbor at Concannon is any indication, it’s barbeque tri-tip, chicken, and beans!
But there is more to life than barbeque, so at Tuesday’s Petite Sirah symposium, Ellen Landis,Sommelier, proprietor of Landis Shores Luxury Inn, and author of Ellen on Wine shared some of her ideas on which foods pair best with Petite Sirah. I tried valiantly to take notes which she spoke; unfortunately, many of them were lost when I lost my internet connection! But basically, her main point was:
Drink what YOU like.
Since there are different styles of Petite sirah, the question really is which style goes with which food.
A basic rule of thumb is to match or contrast–match heavy meals with heavier wine styles, match flavor profiles or contrast them. Avoid pairing delicate dishes (like sole) with a powerful wine like Petite.
Here are some specific ideas:
How to gain creaminess with Petite Sirah? Landis suggest beef stroganoff paired with Rock Wall 2009. She also had specific suggestions of which Petite Sirah would go best with beef or pork tenderloin. At lunch I sat with Rock Wall winemaker Shauna Rosenblum (and yes I will be blogging about her soon! What a great story!) and tasted her Rock Wall 2009 Gamble Ranch that afternoon. This wine retails at $30 and is very rich and creamy in a cream soda or root beer float kind of way, very spicy, maple syrup, and chocolate malt.
Ellen Landis noted that the French pair red wines with fish–so don’t be afraid! She says try a blackened salmon with a PS; Ellen paired hers with a fruity Michael David PS which is 50% PS with 50% Petite verdot.
While most of us think of Petite Sirah as going with meat, vegetarians can enjoy PS with eggplant parmagiana with a variety of petite sirah styles. PS stands up to the fullness of the sauce and the creamy mozzarella allows the tomato sauce to work well and not clash.
Cheeses with Petite Sirah are great as a dessert course. For most palates, the wine should be as sweet as the dessertContinue reading →
Yesterday, Tuesday July 19, I spent the morning at Dunham Cellars with Eric Dunham then tasted through a number of wines including two reserve wines and a wine that Eric is making with actor Kyle MacLaughlan.
Then as a huge windy rainstorm rolled in, I did some writing at Walla Walla Roastery including the post that follows which I published at my The Write Alley blog. In it, I share two stories from the road–one about synchronicity and one about doing what you love which came from my interview with Eric.
My last stop in Walla Walla was to taste the wines and learn more about Amavi Cellars; pictured above is the beautiful new tasting room. There I met with Eric McKibben, son of Norm McKibben who was one of the first people to plant wine grapes in the region which he subsequently made into wine at Pepper’s Bridge (Amavi’s sister winery).
Now, after a day of soaking at Bagby Hot Springs, I’m staying with friends on the coast in Newport, Oregon and gearing up to visit more wineries and learn more stories! I’m off to McMinnville tomorrow afternoon!! I’m ready for some Oregon PINOT NOIR!
Yesterday, Tuesday July 19, I spent the morning at Dunham Cellars with Eric Dunham then tasted through a number of wines including two reserve wines and a wine that Eric is making with actor Kyle MacLaughlan.
I have more stories to tell about these wineries in a subsequent posts, but in the meantime, here’s the post with two lessons from the road accompanied by photos of Eric Dunham with paintings that grace his reserve labels.
I’m writing to you from Walla Walla Roastery, located not in the cute Main Street downtown of Walla Walla but out at the airport, home to a multitude of wineries! I spent the morning at Dunham Cellars interviewing winemaker Eric Dunham for my Wine Predator blog and a bigger wine writing project about family and sustainability. I’d like to say that I’d planned on talking with Eric but it just happened that way. I’d actually gone out there to talk … Read More
In part one in this series of posts, I review two white wines from Steven Kent Wines, the luscious LaRochelle Chardonnay (pictured) and the lively Lola, a Bordeaux blend, and I wax enthusiastic about Rafters Restaurant, which is one of three restaurants and four bars at the Sierra Nevada Resort in Mammoth Lakes CA.
wine predator.............. gwendolyn alley 