On the way down to the Wine Bloggers Conference in July, the 7th annual one of these, we decided to stop in the Santa Lucia Highlands (SLH) and do some wine tasting. In the past, every time we drove down the 101 highway we would drive by this area and say “Some day we need […]
When bringing a bottle of wine to a restaurant, what wine should you choose? We recently went to dinner with some friends of ours and wanted to bring a bottle of wine. To choose the bottle, we considered – how much our friends appreciate and drink wine – did we have a bottle with a […]
Merlot has an interesting history. Most closely related to Cabernet Franc, Merlot is extensively planted in the Bordeaux region, and is the predominant grape in the so-called “Right Bank” area, particularly in the regions of Pomerol and Saint-Émilion. One of the reasons for having so much Merlot planted in France is that Merlot typically ripens […]
Being at the Wine Bloggers Conference in the Santa Ynez Valley (Santa Barbara County) this past weekend got me thinking about our long ago time living in the area and tasting Santa Ynez Valley wines. Lori and I lived here from 1982 – 1985, and again 1990-1991. We came here with one son, born just […]
I thought I’d died and gone to Pinot Noir heaven! A few nights ago during the Wine Bloggers Conference, I got on a bus with 20 other bloggers for a journey to an unknown destination. 15 minutes later we were at the Melville Vineyards and Winery estate, for a few hours of Pinot Noir heaven. […]
My head is still spinning! We are back in Dublin, getting back to our regular routine after having a whirlwind 5 day trip down to the Central Coast wine region. We left last Thursday morning and drove about 2 hours south and found our first winery in the Santa Lucia Highlands wine growing region of […]
Every year around Valentine’s Day the Petite Sirah organization, P.S. I Love You, puts on an event called Dark and Delicious. It takes place at Rock Wall Wine Company in Alameda. Tickets cost around $63.00 per person and it starts at 6pm. This event is to celebrate the grape Petite Sirah and the wine that […]
There are 275 wine bloggers in one room here are the Flamingo Hotel. We just finished lunch and are eagerly awaiting the “speed blogging” to commence. How this works is that for 6 minutes we have a winemaker come to our table. We taste the wines, learn about the wines and the winery and winemaker’s […]
I’m back from a week in Palm Desert. For those of you who don’t know, Palm Desert is about 5 miles due east of Palm Springs, which is about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. If you like the hot dry desert weather, then you would love it. If you’re like me who likes it […]