Happy Lunar New Year!

Who on earth would argue with the profound observations that are oft contained within the American fortune cookie?  Not me.  Besides, I think this crunchy-prognostication is spot on.
I would love to be home (England) right now, being festive and enjoying big plates of braised chicken feet and char siu cheong fun with my sister-in-law.  One slightly stale fortune cookie is not an adequate substitute for a butt load (technical term) of delicious dim sum.
Gung hei fat choi to you all!

An urban winery.

Today is Vinomaker's birthday.  Whoo hoo!
I actually managed to get Vinomaker to take some time off work to go and do a quick wine tasting with me, something we haven't done for a couple years.  And we didn't even have to go very far, just a quick drive into downtown Napa.
St. Clair Brown Winery is located in a light-industrial area of the city of Napa.  Surrounded by sheet metal fabrication shops and auto repair businesses, St. Clair Brown is truly an urban winery.  Currently, the winery produces about 200 cases each of nine different wines of which Vinomaker and I tasted four (their 4 Wine Sampler).  The winery has a permit to serve food and I originally had intended to have lunch there, but with a fairly tight schedule we decided to just do a tasting.  The wines were all very pleasant; a 2011 Coombsville Chardonnay (a tad too oaky), a 2008 Coombsville Syrah, a 2010 Oak Knoll/Atlas Peak Merlot and a 2010 Oak Knoll/Atlas Peak/St. Helena Cabernet Sauvignon.  Our host, the son of one of the owners, was delightful, the wines exhibited a distinct winemaking style, the urban environment was fun and a chat with owner Laina Brown was interesting - an enjoyable experience.  The winery does not, however, offer complimentary tastings to the other wine industry folks.  Now, I'm not cheap, and I was only too happy to pay the $20.00 tasting fee, but I do believe it is a little short-sighted of St. Clair Brown. What better marketing/advertising is there than to make other winery personnel ambassadors of your brand?  It is my belief that a 2 fluid ounce pour can go an awfully long way in promoting a winery.  On to dinner.
Vinomaker had not been to R&D Kitchen in Yountville, so that is where I decided to take him for his birthday dinner.  R&D does have a rather limited menu, but I sort of like that about this restaurant.  More important to Vinomaker, perhaps, was R&D's 'wine by the glass' wine list. I just had one glass of Schramsberg Brut Rosé because I was driving, but Vinomaker had a glass of white wine and a glass of red wine.  The white was a 2013 Cowhorn Spiral 36 (Applegate Valley AVA, Oregon), a blend of Viognier, Marsanne and Roussanne, (the Marsanne really popped in this wine). The red was a 2012 Page Wine Cellars/Revolver Wine Company 'The Fury' Cabernet Franc (Napa Valley AVA), really nice, lots of dark berries, dried flowers and dried herbs on the nose.  And that's it: yet another anniversary of Vinomaker's birth done and dusted.  Oh, and Gung hei fat choi!
Happy birthday Vinomaker!

Happy birthday Tigger!

Today happens to be my English-family's pony's birthday.  Tigger is a lovely, mellow old soul and is well into his twenties.  So happy birthday Tigmeister.
It also happens to be Chinese New Year (well, I'm a day late), so gung hey fat choi!  Incidentally, it happens to be the year of the horse, so Tiggs is doing double duty.  (Yea, so OK, pony, horse - let's not split hairs here.)  Fittingly, I read in yesterday's paper that China is now the world's largest red wine consuming nation - ahead of France and Italy - according to a survey done by Vinexpo, the international wine and spirits exhibition organisation.  The Chinese were responsible for downing 1.865 billion bottles of wine in 2013.  Part of red wine's allure for the Chinese is said to be it's actual colour, as red has great symbolic importance within the Chinese culture.  I'm thinking they may just like the way it tastes too.
It also happens to be St. Trifon's Day, so glad tidings to all grape-pruners out there...which reminds me that I need to get started pruning soon.
So happy, happy, happy day!

Happy Chinese New Year!

Happy Lunar New Year!
Once again, deprived of the opportunity to celebrate Chinese New Year in any meaningful way (read here, eat copious amounts of English Chinese food), I improvised by whipping up a batch of Chinese Five Spice Brownie Cookies.  Paired nicely, I must say, with a glass of Napa Valley Syrah (Black Cat Vineyard) all of a sudden I felt quite festive. Yum!
I digress.  
Gung hei fat choi to you all!

Food Truck Fridays.

Every now and again, impromptu food and wine events pop up in Napa and quickly acquire a healthy following of fans. That is until such events hit the city's revenue radar and the powers that be, unable to fiscally benefit from such an event, decide that the location isn't ADA compliant or some other such nonsense.
Food Truck Fridays (FTF) is one such improvised food event held in a downtown car park/dirt plot on the first Friday of each month. FTF had it's inaugral event last November and in just 3 months, with the growing trend towards mobile food, it has become quite the Friday night destination. Forget Napa's $200 degustations (think Morimoto), Vinogirl was in search of just one particular food truck - Dim Sum Charlies.

One of the things I miss most about no longer living in Liverpool is the easy access to great Chinese food, so when I heard about Dim Sum Charlies I was very interested to try what they had to offer. So, Vinomaker and I, accompanied by a few good friends, as many bottles of good wine, and the disliked (but in this case necessary) Go Vino glasses, headed down to First Street to see what all the fuss was about. Sure enough, in the advertised location, we found a bevy of food trucks all, incidentally, offering a dish containing rabbit in honour of Thursday's Chinese Lunar New Year.

Oh fun! Tables, outdoor heaters, good company, lots and lots of people, a crystal clear star-laden sky, and scrumptious dim sum served from a converted Airstream trailer (I want an Airstream), the event was a hit with one and all. Yes, our dim sum order was wrong twice and one order of sui mai never even appeared, but overall the food was delicious and reminded me of home, so these little hiccups can be overlooked. Besides, by then the wine had worked it's magic and all with the world was good.

Whilst dining alfresco, we mused about our friends in Wisconsin with their newly fallen 18 inches of snow and 5 foot drifts...the February weather in California is more often than not a treat.

A belated gung hei fat choi to you all!