Archive for the ‘Events’ Category
In today’s SF Chronicle Janet Fletcher relates a wonderful tradition that occurs in the German Allgauer Alps. Apparently every fall there is a festival celebrating the cows’ return from the mountains where they’ve spent their time since spring feeding on the mountain grasses. These cows are the source of the milk that is made into the region’s Hirtenkase or "Herdsman Cheese". According to Janet, on September 18 the people of the region line the streets and watch the cows come…
It occurred to me as I watched Wynton Marsalis’ Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra offer a musical history of Duke Ellington’s ballads that there is a distinct lack of exploration into wine’s history and traditions here in America. Is this because there is no interest in such a thing, because there is no money in it or because there is very little tradition and history of American winemaking to warrant the effort? Marsalis will certainly go down as one of this…
One of the very best wine events I went to in 2007 was "Dark & Delicious". Organized by PS, I Love You, an association of Petite Sirah producers, the event was absolutely killer. You just don’t see that many Petite Sirah’s in one room very often. Even better, there was copious amounts of great food paired with each Petite Sirah producers. This was the event that taught Ginny, my wife, to LOVE Petite Sirah. Since then our collection of Petites…
The Art of Drinking on New Years Eve First let’s begin from the premise that New Year’s Eve is, or at least has become, an accepted excuse to indulge. Now, let’s change the traditional understanding of the idea of "indulging" from meaning excessive consumption of drink and make it mean excessive consumption of good drink. This change is meaning is important because it’s necessary to justify opening absurd amounts of very good wines and spirits and also assumes a certain…
If I could choose to get paid to write professionally about any topic I don’t it would be wine. It would either be a career writing about playing pitcher for the San Francisco Giants or about spending time on sandy beaches. The fact is, if I did write professionally about wine, it’s likely I wouldn’t be able to spend much time even casually researching the intensity of sunshine on sandy beaches. It’s just too damn hard to make a good…
