I’m cutting it down to the wire here as it’s almost Thursday in NYC….busy busy week! While at home I managed to visit Farmstead, my hands down favorite restaurant, multiple times, discovering for the first time their amazing grower’s happy hour. From 4-6pm a great selection of wines, beers, cocktails and nibbles are $5!! Such a deal. On one night in particular, we decided on…
Wine Wednesdays – Spring Mountain Tasting
Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a fabulous holiday. I’m sorry for the lapse in posts, I was having too much fun in the California sunshine to spend any time inside on my computer. I figured I’d start at the end and work my way backwards….on my last day at home we spent the day tasting on Spring Mountain. We visited Guilliams and Sherwin, from…
Wine Wednesdays – Merry Christmas!
I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday full of family and friends; good food and good wine! I’m about to crack open this 4 bottle magnum, which will be put to good use in my XL Wine glass; a perfect Christmas in my eyes!
Holiday Windows
For those of you not in New York, below are the highlights of the 5th Ave holiday windows and the Rockefeller tree. I ran uptown last week to check them out as part of my NYC Christmas tradition. Bergdorf’s were my favorite; glittering scenes from holidays throughout the year. Saks were based on a fury yeti that comes to NY to make snow for Christmas…
Wine Wednesdays – Pause for Tequila
Happy Wednesday! I interrupt today’s normal wine Wednesday to bring you a festive cocktail to make for you holiday parties this weekend. I made the cranberry syrup (paired with a nice bottle of tequila) to give as my white elephant gift at my holiday party, and I must say it was the hit of the party (and stolen several times throughout the game!) It couldn’t…
Wine Wednesdays – Hendry 2011 Pinot Gris
Another post from my time at home, I told you we’d be drinking! On Saturday we went to the ranch with some friends for a picnic lunch and manzanita tree cutting. Instead of the standard Christmas tree, Laura and Frankie wanted a big manzanita branch to put in a wooden box and decorate with lights and ornaments. Jeffrey knew of a manzanita grove on the…
Chocolate Cookies Two Ways
As an alternative to pumpkin pie, I brought 2 versions of double chocolate cookies to our Thanksgiving. Both were naturally gluten free as they didn’t call for flour. I couldn’t resist sneaking in some pumpkin caramel to one batch which really gave the cookies a deep flavor with mild spice to balance the chocolate upon chocolate! They were such a huge hit, I made another…
Wine Wednesdays – Duckhorn Vineyards Tasting
The day after Thanksgiving, Mom and I decided to check out Duckhorn’s tasting room, located just north of St. Helena off of Silverado Trail. Our family has been growers for Duckhorn for many years but I’ve never had the chance to visit. Our wonderful host Luis gave us a great tasting, it could not have been a more beautiful day and the grounds were absolutely…
Home Sweet Home
Warning….this post is heavy on the food pics….clearly we ate, we drank, but we were active! A 90 minute post-Thanksgiving spin class, walks and a ranch hike. So much packed into a short few days. With temps in the high 60’s, it could not have been better. Can’t wait to do it all again in less than 3 weeks, I’ll be fasting until then! Hope everyone had a…
Wine Wednesdays – Friendsgiving Edition
This past Sunday I hosted my second annual Friendsgiving, and boy did we step up our game. While last year was great, this year we really took things to the next level, amazing new recipes, fabulous wine, and of course many laughs. Thanksgiving really is my favorite meal. This year feels particularly exciting as I missed out last year by going to Morocco instead of…