San Francisco Vintners Market 5 Comes Alive! (Big Discount!)

I attend a large number wine events. That might even be an understatement, to which my fine readers can attest! Thus, I feel that it's saying something to describe an upcoming wine event as one of my favorite series of wine events, ever. The San Francisco Vintners Market (Twitter, Facebook, WineLog) wine tastings are those exact events: totally fun, onsite wine purchasing available, and of course, fantastic wines to taste in unlimited amounts. And lucky readers, for round 5 (DING) of the #SFVM, I now have a fat discount so you cats can partake!

Slingin' the Pinot [for] Days

7th Annual Pinot Days 2011I don't know if my life has turned the speed of time to 11 or what this year, but it's already time again for one of the best SF wine events of the year: 7th Annual Pinot Days 2011 (Twitter). Last year's event was a must attend and this year Lisa and Steve Rigisich et al, have added a slew of additional events for the entire week of festivities and have expanded many wine regions to make this one even mo' betta. How can such a fine vino event get any better, you ask? Try upping the number of producers over the 200 mark (over 400 Pinot Noir), organizing "the largest presence of Oregon producers ever gathered outside of Oregon" [I'm excited about this one], a fantastic online charity auction and a new Burgundy Corner to showcase the birthplace of this finicky but fine grape variety.

Kia Ora está en La Mar

Nobilo - Marlborough SoundsOK, so they don't speak Spanish in New Zealand...they speak Kiwi English. I know this, but based on my love of Spanish food and my experiences along the coasts of both Spain and Portugal (diff language, I know!) last Summer, they might as well speak that Romantic language, what with the bright, quality wine that they put out with each vintage. Seafood is the phenom pairing for the vast majority of these wines and I'm happy to throw them together on the regular. Now clearly, I've always been a fan of NZ wines, so let's just get that experiential bias right out in the open. So when I heard that would soon be a winemaker dinner that not only paired some classic NZ winemakers alongside some fervent wine bloggers, but also some extremely tasty Peruvian seafood with said winemakers' wines...I said [frak] yeah, I'll come!

The Renaissance of Huge Bear & Knights Bridge

Huge Bear WinesDespite the 460+ years that separate modern times from what many scholars consider the end of the Italian Renaissance, we still hear the term "Renaissance Man/Woman" tossed around with great regularity. Heck, running around learning stuff, spouting verse with a paintbrush in my hand sounds great. Luck in love aside, I had a chance to share some food and wine with a fascinating man for these modern times and one whom is a true Ren-man: Timothy F. Carl, Ph.D, Co-Founder of both Huge Bear Wines (WineLog, Twitter) and Knights Bridge Winery (WineLog).

In Pursuit of Balance: Pinot in the Spotlight

Pinot Noir grapes at Chehalem Ridgecrest Vineyard, Newberg, OregonFollowing on the heels of my panel workshop at the very successful 9th Pinot Noir Summit this past month, I'm involved in another new, rather exciting Pinot adventure this month. California Pinot Noir: In Pursuit of Balance (Twitter) is a revolutionary new partnership intending generate dialog about balance in Cali Pinot. The partnership was founded by Jasmine Hirsch (Twitter) of Hirsch Vineyards and Winery (Twitter) and Rajat Par, longtime wine director for the Michael Mina family of restaurants including his own Rn74 (Twitter). As a well-respected family winegrower and an international restaurant wine director respectively, they are knee deep in the world of Pinot each and everyday. It is through this dedication to a single varietal that they realized a conundrum: is California Pinot becoming too big and unwieldy?

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