I bet you’re dying to know what I drank the other night with my New York Strip steak–which wine took the prize so to speak. Let me give you a hint:
Day 2 Itinerary: Food & Wine Pairing at Ste. Michelle–The first stop of the day will take place at Chateau Ste. Michelle, Washington’s original Chateau and founding winery. Following a guided tour, our guest bloggers will enjoy an informative food and wine pairing experience.
Yes, you guessed it, I went with the wine selection from Washington State to add to my collection of posts about Washington State wines to compete in the WBC-or-Bust contest. And like I said in the previous post, it’s the one Washington State merlot the grocery store had–a 2005 Chateau St. Michelle. Makes sense for my first WA wine to write about it the first stop on the bus, yes? Maybe this will be a trend–or a direction on where to go with this series of posts!
The 2005 Chateau St. Michelle merlot is soft, supple, smooth and easy to drink; in fact I drank most of the bottle last night save one large glass to enjoy today as I write this post! The alcohol is a reasonable 13.5 so it didn’t knock off my socks (or any other clothing items!)
The color of the merlot is a deep concentrated plummy red while the nose is cherry and cola with some berry, plum, and licorice: typical, not surprising. It’s got lots of nice friendly fruit flavor, mostly cherry and other dark fruits; again, to be expected. At first I thought it too flabby, lacking structure, but the wine grew on me and it nicely complemented my steak with stilton crumbled on top. It did NOT go with the leftover potatoes from Wednesdays corned beef (ohh, but with the black and tan I enjoyed on Wednesday they were scrumptiously delectably matched!)
According to the Chateau St. Michelle website, food styles that match well with Merlot include
Mild to Intensely Flavored: Grilled salmon, roasted lamb, wild game, and balsamic or tomato-based sauces work well with the jammy flavors of Merlot.
Chinese: Merlot has a softer taste that lends itself to the flavors of Chinese food. Peking duck, mu shu pork, braised soy pork.
I can totally see this pairing nicely with the plum sauce and flavors in mu shu whether it be chicken, pork, duck, tofu or beef! They of course suggest one of their cabs to go with the steak!
The following day I had it with some crackers and cheeses included aged gouda and an aged goat cheese gouda. The merlot paired well with both and was a terrific way to celebrate what my grandma Gwenn called “Wine-Thirty.”
Overall, while merlot isn’t my favorite varietal, I’m not one to turn up my nose just because it’s merlot; I’m willing to give it a go and I’ve had some good ones. This 2005 Chateau St. Michelle is a great value on sale at $10. Bring it to a party and everyone will enjoy it. It’s a terrific, mild, juicy red wine for the white wine drinker.
Now to find another Washington Merlot to taste by Thursday! And guess what we’ll be having for dinner? That’s right–I’m going for Chinese take-out of Mu shu pork!
(This post clocks in at over 550 words–nearly 4 posts for the price of wine! Ummn, one! I’m thinking instead of number of posts, the contest should go with number of words!)
Thursday, March 25, I will join in on the third Twitter Tasting event: Washington Merlot. The first one focused on California Cabernets and I tweeted enthusiastically about Old Creek Ranch’s Napa Valley Cabernet. For number two, my friend Tim Cabrera and I went to Summerland Winery where we tasted and he bought a bottle of their sauvignon blanc which is one of his favorite summertime wines (and I could sure see why!)
And since I am going on a Washington Wine tasting and blogging binge in order to compete in the WBC-or-Bust contest, it’s a no brainer that I will be participating in Thursday’s live Twitter Tasting for Washington Merlot.
Trouble is, I live in California, in a town some of us call “Ventucky.” It doesn’t boast much in the way of wine stores–although some people here do boast about our wine BARS. Granted, Nick’s Cave and the Ventura Wine Store is a wonderful place; however, he specializes in California wines, particularly local ones, and especially those that the distributor will give him marked down lower than some wineries are comfortable going.
So I went to Vons. We have five Vons in our small town, and fortunately for me, two of them have a decent wine selection. One of them, on Seaward by the beach, sells the most wine out of all the stores in California I’ve been told and makes the most money per square foot out of the whole chain. Probably because they carry and sell a LOT of pricey wine. CALIFORNIA wine.
I went to the Vons on Borchard. On their clearance shelf I got lucky and found one of my favorite inexpensive pinot noirs, Wild Rock, for 50% so I picked up two bottles for the price of one ($15) plus a 2006 Babich unoaked chard for $5 and a Napa Valley White Oak Syrah for $13.
Unfortunately I could only find one Washington merlot, a 2005 by Chateau Ste. Michelle on sale for $10.
Since I bought six bottles, they took another 10% off. In addition, the other day I picked up two bottles of Ravenswood 2007 Vintners Blend at 50% off (two at $12), and I walked out of Vons with a 2008 St. Francis Chardonnay for $9!
This state of affairs is going to make it very very difficult for me to write much about Washington wines in the next month in order to be competitive in the WBC-or-Bust contest. I just bought nine bottles of wine and even at discounted prices, I spent some money, and I only ended up with one from Washington! And my Twisted Few wine club shipment just came in to my cellar up at my mom’s house!
One last dilemna: what to drink with the beautiful New York steak I bought for tonight? Do I drink the Chateau St. Michelle Washington merlot and get started on my challenge and prep my tastebuds for Thursday? Or do I drink one of these other fabulous wines I bought in the past 72 hours? I hope the suspense doesn’t get to you!
This month’s Wine Blogging Wednesday’s host Wine Girl asks:
“Even if you’re in warm sunny Florida or Los Angeles,” writes Wine Girl in her announcement of WBW #65, ” I want you to look out your window and imagine Snow. Snowmen, snow balls, igloos, snow trucks, snow … cold, cold snow. Then I want you to imagine what that makes you want to drink. Do you want to curl up in front of your fireplace with a port? Maybe you want to pull out a cabernet sauvignon or a big juicy zin and then put on your snowsuit. Are you a glutton for punishment and you’re pulling out a chilled riesling before heading out to build a snowman? Are you inspired by vintners who are braving frigid temperatures to make icewine? In this particular instance, I’ll even allow you to branch a little away from wine if you want. With a valid story behind you, there’s no reason you can’t pop open a cognac, a brandy, or even bourbon. Imaginary “bonus points” for anyone with a wonderful Snow Day story of their youth, a great photo of snow and wine, or even a Snowman and wine!”
This prompt is too cool for school if you ask me! I just wish I’d known LAST weekend when we broke into two different bottles of port and we could have tried a third I brought to snowy Flagstaff. Fortunately, we’re heading to the snow again this weekend to celebrate my birthday–now certainly with some fortified wines! I’d love to find an excellent madeira or sherry which is really tough around here, but I will likely do some ports–maybe one each from three continents–Europe, Australia and here: I have a tempting Kachina port that was in the gift bag at the Wine Bloggers Conference last summer.
Want to take part in WBW 65: Snow Day? It takes place Weds. Jan 20. Send links to wbw65@wine-girl.net.
Let’s toast to 2010! And to YOU! Thank you for being a reader of Wine Predator in 2009!
What a year it was! I mean, gosh, I went to PORTUGAL as a wine blogger thanks to Enoforum Wines and Jo Diaz at WineBlog.org! How can 2010 be better? That’s absolutely the best thing that’s happened to me as a blogger–that and meeting fabulous people like Jo, and everyone at Enoforum, and Twisted Oak’s Jeff Stai, and Marcy Gordon, and oh, so many more wonderful wine bloggers and wine folks here in the US and in Portugal! Drinking lots of wonderful wines has its rewards as well!
As Wine Predator/Art Predator, I frequently participated in Wine Blogging Wednesday each month and
–blogged about Macworld in January on a press pass,
–submitted a video application to blog about the Great Barrier Reef in February,
–kept rolling in March and April including a trip to Yosemite
–attended WordCamp SF in May,
–submitted a video application to blog as the Murphy-Goode Lifestyle correspondent in June
–attended my second North American Wine Bloggers Conference in July
–helped people prepare for Burning Man in August
–went to Burning Man for the 17th time in September and blogged about tastings I held there with wines from Michel-Schlumberger, Twisted Oak, Bonny Doon, and Vino V (watch for another blog post about this escapade soon!)
–attended my first European Wine Bloggers Conference in Portugal in October thanks to Enoforum,
–blogged about the Alentejo region of Portugal in November
–and kept on keeping on in December!
So, let’s have another toast (with a nicely balanced brut J cuvee 20–a not sweet, fresh crisp gently bubbling Sonoma County sparkler from the Russian River Valley!) to the New Year, a new blog URL (http://winepredator.com) and YOU! (Because without YOU, it would get rather boring just sitting here writing to myself…!)
And one last toast–to more adventures in wine! What will 2010 bring for the Wine Predator? And you?
As others might be interested in hearing some notes comparing and contrasting the various blogging and tech conferences I’ve attended in the past 18 months, I thought I’d expand a little, edit a little, and post those notes here–with an emphasis on the three Wine Bloggers Conferences I’ve attended of course.
Overall I suspect what’s MOST IMPORTANT to me and to many of my fellow tech oriented conference attendees is reliable wireless–being able to get on-line to tweet, blog, facebook, all that fun social media stuff when we want, are inspired or have the time.
The Wine Bloggers Conferences have failed on this three times now. Thankfully, at the EWBC, my host Enoforum Wines came through by providing Jo Diaz and I portable wireless devices which come with minutes. Jo used hers extensively; I had better luck getting on-line in my hotel rooms then she did–I admit I wasted way too much time on it, especially at the hotel where the EWBC was held. Too often I was trying to get on-line when I would have preferred attending the conference. I did end up paying for internet my last night in Lisbon: 12 hours for about $25 US.
At MacWorld in SF last January 2009 I found it was somewhat reliable around the Moscone conference center but my best bet was getting a press pass and getting online there–they knew enough to make sur ethat if anyone could get on-line it should be the press! I imagine they’ll ahve it dialed in for 2010–not sure yet if I’ll be there to see.
SF WordCamp 2008 and 2009 had PLENTY so we could all have as many windows open doing as much as we wanted all at the same time. Somehow they’ve been able to handle the needs of 700 tweeters blogging and bloggers tweeting; unfortunately, LA WordCamp did not quite have enough but the main problem was that we got kicked off if we didn’t upload anything after 10 minutes. I tracked down someone who could address that so the wireless worked much better in the afternoon.
IN DEPTH ED: At EWBC, I loved the day where we went on the cork forest tour with lunch and tastings followed by a visit to a cork plant. The day offered less drinking and tasting but lots of learning and camaraderie. This intensive, deep learning experience that really stuck with me, and others as well.
GRAND TASTING: As I mentioned in the video, I loved the grand hosted tasting Charles Metcalf did at EWBC. This should be a part of every WBC. Since the next WBC is in Walla Walla Washington, maybe they should have someone who really knows Washington and/or Oregon and/or Canadian wines. Or hey, why not Metcalf and Portuguese wines? Metcalf was fabulously entertaining…and I’d love to taste more Portuguese wines!
SESSIONS: At the EWBC 09, I admit I was very jetlagged Saturday morning and trying to get on-line in my hotel room, and so I missed the first morning sessions Saturday. I missed Friday’s sessions completely as I arrived Friday evening for dinner (about 11pm). I feel like I got more out of the conference sessions themselves at the NAWBC. I think they were more sophisticated, but then again I could have been too jetlagged to get much. I learned more from the sessions in 2008 but then I was still very new to blogging, social media, and wine back then (I’m still new but not nearly!)
SESSIONS 2 I missed Wine Academy of Spain Esteban Cabeza’s sherry, port and madeira tasting on Friday at EWBC as I was enroute but he kindly gave me a brief tutorial. These wines blew my mind. The NAWBC should definitely consider having him do his presentation at the NAWBC in WA as these wines are unknown and unappreciated by many in the US. I am still puzzling over madeira and sherry. Maybe if they were more appreciated here, good ones could be found more easily. (I just found an excellent Solera 1847 oloroso sherry from a local Henry Wine Group distributer. He admitted I couldn’t even buy it around here–I was able to buy it via a tasting at a local restaurant). It’d be great to have some American examples as well–I’d love to try Twisted Oak’s Pig Stai with a Port from Portugal.
KEYNOTES I loved the NAWBC keynotes in 2008 (Alice Feiring and Gary Vaynerchuk) and 2009 I enjoyed having a lunchtime keynote or morning like in 2009–Barry Schuler was unexpectedly brilliant.
BEST? I appreciated in 2009 just relaxing and enjoying the incredible dinner and wine and more intimate gathering and company at Pine Ridge after a long stimulating day instead of having a keynote! The meal at Pine Ridge was one of the best I’ve had in my life.
GIFT BAGS The gift bags at EWBC were slim compared to NAWBC but a lot of the stuff in the NAWBC bag was just “stuff” that I basically recycled.
BRINGING IT HOME 1: Since I live in California and can drive there and back, I’ve been able to bring lots of wine home, open bottles to taste with more leisure and samples. At EWBC I didn’t know how to get any of the wines and bring them back. I went to a grocery store and was overwhelmed and didn’t see much that I had tasted. While in Portugal, I tasted all these amazing wines that now I can’t find in my hometown in California!
BRINGING IT HOME 2 One of the best things a winery did in my three conferences: Michel-Schlumberger gave bloggers who went there on the wine hike a 50% discount; most people on the tour took them up on the offer. I’d encourage the wineries to go even deeper with discounts knowing that we’ll tweet, talk, taste, blog about the wines. So in the gift bags, maybe have a coupon code for deeply discounted wines. Not everyone is swimming in free samples (or wants to be).
BLENDING: This didn’t happen at EWBC or NAWBC but I’ve noticed a lot of interest in blending and blending activities on twitter. I know some WBC participants went to Twisted Oak to do some blending before the conference and that sounded like great fun. I think it would be a blast to do a blending activity/exercise/tasting as an official part of a WBC and EWBC too. I think I would learn a lot about wine/winemaking in the process and it would be fun. We could do it as teams–not self-selected teams but random so we’d meet new people–then we could try and rate the other team’s wine and figure out what was in it!! It would be even better if we could get a bottle of the blend to take home (for free or discounted). Maybe a few of the area wineries would be interested in hosting something like that.
I sent along some other ideas as well but I think 1200 words is enough on this subject!
Ryan Opaz of http://www.catavino.net is moderating a panel on “Social Media Brand Future: New Technologies, New Media, and Publishing” with Esteban Cabezas, Marcio Ferreira, and Evelyn Resnick.
It’s a time of disruption, certainly, as marketing professionals and the products they represent try to find their way in a topsy-turvy world where they no longer get to tell consumers what to think about a product and what to do. Consumers can find out for themselves and expect to be part of a conversation. But how can, how will this all play out?
With help from folks like Ryan Opaz who is bridging the gap by organizing events like the EWBC, suggests Esteban Cabezas of the Wine Academy of Spain. And more people like him (and Esteban too!). We have to get personal, he also says. And that can be uncomfortable for businesses.
Consumers go to the net looking for help in finding find their wine nirvana. Wine bloggers help them do this, points out a woman in the audience.
What’s the role of the wine writer versus the role of the wine blogger? Both are “publishing.”
Big debate raging on who is a professional wine blogger and what that might mean.
As Jo Diaz put it in a tweet, “wineries are having a hard time making sense of all of this media power. Who owns the rights to tell consumers what they’ll like?”
Check out @wineblog.org which is Jo Diaz on twitter for more of her tweets about this session and others. She’s a great tweeter and caught some of the finer points of today’s discussion. She’s also blogging from the conference so go to Jo Diaz’s blog what she’s seeing and saying!
How can you bring quality traffic to your site by assisting search engines in finding it? That’s the topic for the next session at the European Wine Bloggers Conference with Doug Cook of Able Grape’s presentation on Search Engine Friendliness conveniently available for you to see on his site, Able Grape. I will be live blogging as best I can depending on my access to the internet.
Is more traffic better? Doug Cook asks.
No. Traffic that engages your site is better. Does your audience see what you offer as adding value to the web or spamming you?
So how can you reach the people who want to hear what you have to say? How do you connect with people who want to connect with you?
First you have to understand the “long Tail” of search. Lots have been written about this concept. That’s because it really is key and important. When people are searching for something, they will each use a combination of terms which they think will get them what they need. When they land on your site with their search, if they don’t see what they’re looking for, they’re gone, onto the next site which may offer them their holy grail. They are NOT going to search your site to find what you know is there but they don’t know how to find.
So if you want good traffic with meaningful interactions what do you do? Continue reading →
wine predator.............. gwendolyn alley 