Now that summer is over, and it’s cool enough to accept shipped wines for review, the first two bottles I received were super welcome. I would be able to taste a Sicilian wine grape I can’t get enough of from six years ago to six months ago: Nero d’Avola. I also had an opportunity to…
August of 2019 was the last time my husband Eddie and I visited Santa Barbara, and I wrote about it for SCV Elite Magazine here. Fast forward to this past August and finally being in Santa Barbara again and we didn’t have as much time as our last visit. However, we did get some time…
Local favorites and newcomers take home a variety of awards at expert-judged competition Rogue Valley wine country by David Ledger MEDFORD, Ore., /PRNewswire/ — The winners of the inaugural Savor Southern Oregon wine competition, sponsored by the Coquille Indian Tribe, are announced today at an industry awards ceremony and are now available on savorsouthernoregon.com. A panel of expert judges, including Dr. Liz…
Winemaker Gerard Zanzonico may very well be the first winemaker I interviewed when I began writing about wine in February 2012. I had sent an email to the winery he was with for many years, Del Dotto in Napa, and someone agreed to let me meet with him. From our first meeting to what I…
Have you had a wine tasting with a winery’s president and winemaker…and the birds of prey that guard their vineyard? We did when Bouchaine Vineyards in Napa Carneros offered a “falconry in the garden” experience – here in Las Vegas! (You can visit Bouchaine for your falcon experience, details are at the end of this…
It seems fitting to finish up this short series on Mendocino County and Coro Mendocino wines by going back to where it started at Jaxon Keys when winemaker Antoine Favero first showed us a bottle of Coro a couple of years ago. Since that trip was all about the brandy and we hadn’t reported on…
Driving from our base in Hopland (more about that in our next article) to Greenwood Ridge Vineyards in the Anderson Valley, it became evident that Mendocino County is not your typical wine country. Taking the winding roads to the small town of Philo provided a breathtaking scenic experience of beautifully forested mountain driving. The Greenwood…
Part coffee table book, part textbook, I wanted to read Rosé Revolution after I received this teaser: Rosé Revolution [Interlink Books, November 2024] is the ultimate coffee table book for wine lovers, celebrating the rise of rosé over the past 20 years. Written by wine enthusiasts Rasmus Emborg and Jens Honoré, it explores the stories of…
As covered in our previous article, we initially connected with Hoss Milone, winemaker for Brutocao Family Vineyards, for the purpose of learning more about the Coro Mendocino organization. But we learned very quickly that, wonderful as Coro Mendocino is, Brutocao has a lot more to offer than just that. The Brutocao family emigrated from Italy…
A couple of years ago we were sitting with winemaker Antoine Favero on the tasting patio of Mazzocco Sonoma winery in the Dry Creek Valley discussing the winery. As our visit was wrapping up, Antoine asked us if we’d like to accompany him the next afternoon to Jaxon Keys Winery & Distillery in Hopland to…