February Fun Part 1: A Valentine’s Gift of Moscato Allegro

  • Tue. Feb. 12 Fat Tuesday
  • Thu. Feb. 14 Valentine’s Day
  • Thu. Feb. 14-18 Valentine n Wine, Ventura County
  • Fri. Feb. 15 Twitter Tasting 4-6pm PST Steven Kent Winery
  • Sat. Feb. 16 Garagiste South Tasting, Solvang
  • Thu. Feb. 21 City of Bordeaux Twitter Wine Party
  • Fri. Feb. 22 Dark and Delicious Petite Sirah Tasting, Rock Wall, Alameda

Happy Valentine’s Day! Unless you’ve spent your life under a rock, you know that Thursday February 14 is Valentine’s Day, a day when young and old celebrate love and friendship.

Last Friday, I received an unexpected early Valentine’s gift from the fine folks at Balzac Communications: two bottles of Martin & Weyrich 2011 Moscato Allegro: one rose, one white to make my Valentine’s Day even sweeter! Although now that I think about it, I remember last year, Balzac sent me a bottle of the Crusher Rose and a box of truffles–yum! As if my life as a wine blogger wasn’t already overflowing with benefits!

While I haven’t opened either yet, with residual sugars just above 6%, I know they will have a nice sweet character, yet the Muscat Canelli grape from which the Moscato Allegro is made is reknowned for retaining its acidity so it should have a good balance without being cloying. The rose, as you can see from the photo I posted on twitter, is a deep salmon color which comes from a “kiss” of red wine (instead of having the color from a red grape that didn’t have contact with the skin which is what makes red wines red).  The high residual sugars also means these wines are lower in alcohol–only 8.5% instead of the more typical 12-14% –a great wine for dessert on a school night or to mix in a cocktail or with St Germain! The screwtop has me thinking about bringing one along on romantic picnic. Retails for $12. When I get a chance to open them, I’ll let you know what I think!

Tue. Feb. 12 is Fat Tuesday! We’ll celebrate Mardi Gras Sat. March 2 in Ojai. Will you be celebrating? How? What wines do you enjoy with New Orleans style cuisine? I’m thinking this Moscato Allegro might be a good choice for that spicy cuisine and good times!

To be continued with details about the events listed above!

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Foods from Chile + Chilean Wine

When I was a poor college student (except for the year I worked at Ridge!), and then a student loan paying underemployed thirty-something artist/poet/writer, my go to wines were from Chile. My friends and I knew that with Chilean wines, we could get the best bang for our buck!

8465982902_0ea11ce421_mLast fall, I had the opportunity to taste four wines from Concha y Toro’s Gran Reserve Series with TasteLive  and we were happily surprised to find that you still get a BIG BANG for your buck with Chilean wine. Since Foods from Chile is hosting a contest to take a blogger to Chile (!!), I figured I’d throw my hat into the ring and turn my notes into a long over due blog post and submission. (UPDATE: Vote for me here please!! http://promoshq.wildfireapp.com/website/302/contests/310099/voteable_entries?page=1)

Plus there’s ANOTHER contest that you can join in! Celebrate the “Affordable Luxury” of the Gran Reserva Serie Riberas reviewed below: enter their photo contest for chance to WIN $1,000! Extra points for mentions of these wines, wine, cameras, and rivers!  http://ow.ly/hjsCr Here’s my submission: chileFoodWine Continue reading →

Happy Lunar New Year! Wines to Celebrate & Pair with Asian Cuisine

chinese new year prayerMay you be happy.

May all your thoughts be positive
and your experiences be good.

May you be free of problems, sickness, and sadness.

May your life be long and peaceful
and may you quickly reach enlightenment.

–Metta prayer

The year of the Black Snake begins on Sunday February 10, 2013  with the new moon rising in Aquarius–and I’m celebrating with an Italian wine!

BuddhaTet2013smAccording to Geomancer and Philosopher Paul Ng, the year 2013 is “Mountain-Thunder Rhythm”– a year of conservation, a year of rebuilding, and a year of changes.

Han-Ban.com says that “the year of Snake is meant for steady progress and attention to detail. Focus and discipline will be necessary for you to achieve what you set out to create.”

The Snake is “enigmatic, intuitive, introspective, refined.” Hmmn, I wonder which wines are SNAKE wines??

If you will be celebrating with Chinese or another Asian cuisine, you might be wondering what wine to pair with the complex, often spicy dishes. Continue reading →

“Spoon Trick” Saves Birthday Bubbles!

For my birthday  in 2011, I was in Egypt. Last year, I had a huge party. This year, I wanted something more quiet.

EgyptBDayCakeOn 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”!cowgirlBenton

In the morning, we soaked in an outdoor hot springs fed pool, enjoyed a delicious breakfast, packed up and put on our ski clothes, and drove 45 minutes to Mammoth Mountain in the Sierra Nevada where, at lunch, we met up with Tony Fletcher, a dear friend of ours from Burning Man, a fellow wine enthusiast and music buff who was in California on tour for his book about the Smiths and who joined us for a weekend of skiing. Tony even bought me a birthday beer of the local Mammoth brewing IPA which went perfectly with my pulled pork sandwich at the Mill Cafe on the mountain. (Read about Tony’s epic powder day at Mammoth the day before–possibly the best day of skiing in his LIFE!)

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 hamammothbirthdayd 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!

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Wine Country Gangnam Style at Sonoma’s Jordan Winery

Once a week, Jordan Winery posts a new video on their youtube channel. Yesterday, award winning Jordan blogger and PR person extradinaire Lisa Matttson and her team at Jordan went “Gangnam Style” and posted this parody of PSY’s K-POP youtube megahit that has had the most views of any video ever. While the Jordan video may not hit the million mark, it went from 250 yesterday to nearly 1000 views today and is sure to bring a laugh to wine drinkers familiar with the images in the original.

There are a number of parody videos out there; some like Jordan’s, parody the images but others also change the lyrics like “Annoying Orange’s Nya Nya Style” which is a favorite of my son or my personal favorite, NASA Style which combines intelligent lyrics with an amazing location–the Johnson Space Center!

Cheers!

PS Time for bubbles! Tomorrow 12/16 is the Ventura Wine Company’s Champagne tasting and Weds 12/19 is Thirsty Girl’s tasting of bubbly from Chateau Ste Michelle!

End of the World Ventura County Wine Events + A Twitter Tasting!

December kicks off with a bang in Ventura County with the Third Annual Winter Wine Walk in downtown Ventura. The rainy night and a friend’s party kept me away this year, but you can read my thoughts about the 2011 and the 2010 Winter Wine Walks. I know one friend who had his car hit by a drunk driver tonight; I hope the damage this year is minimal because I like the idea of the event and I’d like to see it be successful. Until someone pays for a stronger enforcement present like that required at the beer festival, I fear that people will continue to take advantage of the “wild west” atmosphere that prevails and drink to excess.

Both Saturday Dec. 1 and Sunday Dec. 2 join a Holiday Open House from noon – 5:00 p.m. at the Camarillo Custom Crush Winery
300 South Lewis, Unit C. For a cost of  $20, you can get a taste of what Ventura County winemakers are up as winemakers will pour their juice. Check out the local wine gifts for the holidays, too.

You can also help celebrate the holidays at Vino V‘s Annual Open House Continue reading →

Not your average pony: 6 Don & Sons Appellation Driven Wines

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BEFORE

Yesterday, 20 other wine bloggers and I cracked open six tiny bottles of Don Sebastiani & Sons Appellation Brands wines during a Virtual (Twitter) Tasting hosted by winemaker Greg Kitchens and Donny Sebastiani on a live video and audio stream from Sonoma, California.

I know Appellation isn’t a type of HORSE or pony, not even a Shetland Pony like these cute little 50ml bottles Don and Sons sent us.

Appellation is the terroir–where the grapes were grown. In this case, for this tasting, we traveled all over California: from Sonoma to Napa to Paso to Clarksburg.

So we could really get a sense of the various appellations, Don and Sons sent 20 of us bloggers a collection six 50ml bottles from TastingRoom.Com instead of only 3 or 4 full-sized ones. Continue reading →