WOW!!! There is no better word to describe Day 1 in
beautiful Lodi, CA at the Wine Blogger’s Conference. For those of you who aren’t
familiar with Lodi (this was my first time coming here), it’s located an hour
and a half northeast of San Francisco.
Lodi is a town steeped in agricultural history. Most farm
families in this area started out growing and selling fruit. Watermelon was the
first fruit of choice. As the demand for grapes to be processed in wineries on
the West Coast started to grow, Lodi farmers quickly realized that they had the
ability to produce high quality grapes in large quantities. Lodi farmers, under
the direction of very astute leadership, realized that they could not only
produce grapes for wineries outside of Lodi but, should also invest in their
own wineries, brands and labels. This created the Lodi that we know today. Rest
assured though, your visit to Lodi won’t be filled with large buses and limos
full of over-indulging people lining the main roads. Lodi is still a small
American farming town at heart. They have great hotel amenities, a few small
restaurants and a welcoming spirit that make a weekend visit here relaxing with
a chance to make new friends. I encourage wine lovers to make a trip to Lodi
(www.visitlodi.com).
Registration held an interesting twist – I needed to decide which one of 18
different excursions in Lodi would I attend on Friday evening. Now this wasn’t
an easy choice because none of the excursions listed the name of the vineyard.
All that I knew is that I would be served dinner and get to hang out with 10-15
of my new Wine Blogger buddies. With names like 99 Bottles and Clone Wars, I
didn’t have much in the way of hints. Since my children have referenced our
home as a chaotic symphony, I choose Three Ring Circus. The choice that I made
ended up being pretty special for me in my journey as a blogger.
"Three Ring Circus" - A Peak into the Evening's events
Day 1 at the conference started out with talks from Andrea
Robinson (
www.andreawine.com),
community farming leaders from Lodi and viticulturists. Check out Andrea’s
website. She is one of only 32 female Master Sommeliers in the world and she
graduated from SMU so there are Texas ties! I learned how to actually blend
wine under the guidance of Oakland Urban wineries Dashe Cellars (
www.dashecellars.com) and Periscope Cellars
(
www.periscopecellars.com). The
blending process was fun and I actually made a couple of wines that were well
balanced and tasted great! I’ll introduce you to blending in a future blog.
Perhaps the most engaging part of the day was a Speed
Blogging activity. Wine Bloggers sat at tables of 10 and local wineries from
Lodi, Livermore and surrounding counties had 5 minutes to present their wines
to us. I very quickly learned how to taste without drinking so as to be able to
stand up straight. In 5 minutes, I had the task of tweeting my impressions of
each wine. There were some pretty good ones with my favorite being the Sparkling
Brut Ros
é
from JWine (
www.jwine.com).
 |
JWine's Brut Rose
|
You can read each of my tweets by following my handle
@Positive_Vines on Twitter. You’ll see pictures and a snapshot of each sampling.
Now back to the twist at registration. When I chose Three
Ring Circus it was partially because my children believe that that’s what I run
in our home. Another thought that I had was that this may be a particular
winery that I have a special connection to. For those of you who have been with
me from the beginning of this journey you will know that I started my wine
demos with varietals from Lodi clearly through an act of divine providence. One
of my favorite Cabernet Sauvignons is Freakshow by the Michael-David Winery
(www.michaeldavid.com). If you go back to my blog post of June 24, 2015, you’ll
notice that the Freakshow label features a scene right from the circus – most notably
Barnum and Bailey. My guess paid off and I was part of a small group of 10 who
were hosted by the Phillips family – owners of the Michael-David Vineyards and
Winery. It was incredible!!!
I’ll end now with a picture of some of the vineyards on the
Michael-David properties. In a future
blog I will write about the Phillips family and their journey to wine making prominence
in Lodi. I will share this – I chose well and was treated to an evening with
new friends, good food and of course – great wine! I couldn’t have scripted it
any better. Stay tuned for Day 2.
Remember to drink what it is that makes you truly happy and always think positively!
Drink Responsibly!
Sherry is a fortified wine
made from white grapes in the Jerez region of Spain. The Palomino Fino Sherry
from Tio Pepe is a dry light variation with hints of almond, honey and apple. During
a recent tasting customers who sampled the sherry found that the almond taste
came through boldly. Fino is the driest and lightest of the types of sherry. It
is aged in barrels under a cap of yeast to prevent contact with air. The
alcohol content in sherry is higher than the average wine at 15% so adding this
to your Mojito mixture will provide extra punch to your cocktail.
