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Join the Russian River Valley Winegrowers for a weekend of artistic passions as we celebrate the 15th Annual Grape to Glass weekend August 20-22nd! Three days of fine wine, food, music, art and recreation in the vineyards and neighborhoods of the Russian River Valley.
Featured events include In Concert with the Artisans and the Hog in the Fog A Festival of Plentry
Visit the Russian River Valley Winegrowers website fora full calender of events
When you think of food and wine and the combination of the two, for me only one publication comes to mind: Food and Wine Magazine. With a circulation of over 375,000 readers it is one of the most popular magazines for food and wine. Covering everything from restaurants, hotels, travel, wine, and recipes on an international level F&W has a little something for everyone.
Recently the Russian River Valley Winegrowers and Food and Wine teamed up to showcase some of the beautiful scenery and fantastic wines that the Russian River has to offer. The most recent promotion is in May’s issue and captures the breathtaking vistas of Westside Rd.
One of the wineries featured is us! John Tyler Wines is in good company with the names of Davis Bynum and La Crema along with other notable Pinot Noir producers. RRVG is an important partner in promoting the valley and its growers and helps to bring consumers and wineries together. Like they say “You can’t imagine a more beautiful place to grow great wine.”
Last night Nicci and I attended the Wine 2.0 event at
Crushpad in SF that was all about “blending wine and technology. It seems like in every business and industry, technology is often the driving forces behind advancement and expansion.
This theory can also very easily be applied to the wine world. New sites like
TwitterTasteLive, Open Wine Consortium, and
DrinkthisTV take wine and the wine tasting experiences to a whole new level. How would you like to swirl and smell an Australian Shiraz while the winemaker, who is in Australia talks you through his favorite characteristics?
This is now possible with more and more wineries using sites like Skype and
Tokbox to give consumers the ultimate wine tasting experience.….. one which brings dull tasting notes to life in an international way.
While walking around the tasting before the big rush I was lucky enough to try out this virtual tasting experience with Lisa Mattson from Wilson Daniels. Hooked up through Tokbox with headphones I spoke with Grant Burge the winemaker and owner for
Grant Burge in Barossa Valley and together we tasted his 2006 Shiraz . My reaction? Everyone has got to try this!!! Tasting notes have now taken a 3 dimensional form. Not only was it an awesome experience to taste wine with a winemaker half way around the world, this platform opens up so many doors for wineries that can’t afford to fly their winemaker out for such an event, but customers still get the opportunity to interact with the producer, virtually. So I guess the question is how “new” is all this technology really? Well for wineries wanting to take advantage of these trends I would advise to start now because as we know technology advances quickly so what’s hot now might be considered passe in no time.
Tokbox Virtual Tasting
Having never been to Crushpad before but hearing and reading information about it I was impressed at it’s size for being located in SF. Approx 1,000 people attended the event, definitely a large amount of them were “millennials” , people in the trade and those in online social network channels. Recently the thought came to me that you can sort of compare meeting someone that you are friends with from a site like Facebook or Wine 2.0 for the first time in person to a blind date. You’ve seen their photo, maybe sent them a message or two with casual conversation but the in person meeting and face to face contact can be a little unpredictable. For me there is often that moment of confusion. Why do I recognize you? How do I know you? All of these questions pass through my brain and within a few seconds I must try my best to make the connection. Nonetheless it’s always nice to put a name to a face, and a profile.
Overalll the event was really fun, people showed a genuine interest in the wine and we even poured our inaugural vintage; the 2002 Pinot Noir which for a 7 year old wine is showing fabulously! So if you love wine, technology and social networking, think about joining Wine 2.0; fun events, nice people and good vino….what’s not to like?
Let’s be honest, I am no Martha Stewart. A lot of the cooking talents in my family lie with my grandma and mom. While I am learning to host my own delectable flair I still don’t know that much about the names of ingredients, spices ect. So imagine my surprise when my family and I attended the 6th Annual Russian River Valley Winegrowers Crab and Fennel Fest to find out the fennel is actually a very fibrous plant and a seed. I had always thought that Fennel was a seed but I learned that Fennel is also a hardy herb that when cooked is aromatic and flavorful. Crab and Fennel were the guests of honor and the event included all you could eat Dungeness crab with fennel, pasta and salad. The food was great but the best part was of course, the WINE! What makes this wine tasting unique is the emphasis put on vineyard designate wines. An entire table was dedicated to tasting vineyard designates from all over the Russian River Valley and allowing the public to meet the winemakers and growers behind these wines. There was no shortage of noteworthy producers including those of Williams Selyem, Merry Edwards and Papapietro Perry. This was Pinot Noir heaven!
Following dinner was the much anticipated spirited and fun-loving hermit crab races. 5$ gets you a ticket to bet on your own hermit crab from “Crabby” Chardonnay to “Zinful” Zinfandel you could chose which varietal hermit crab would wine the race. The winning ticket holder received great auction items such as dinner at Dry Creek Kitchen and an overnight stay at Hote
l Healdsburg. Wanting to support my favorite varietal I placed my bet on the blue hermit crab representing Pinot Noir. Sprayed with a little “go juice” the crabs were slow to move at first but slowly crawled out of their shells. I’ve never been so intrigued by hermit crabs before! It was a long, well fought battle but in the end ”Crabby” the Chardonnay crab prevailed as the winner and I accepted defeat.
For an auction donation John Tylerdonated 6 bottles of wine as well as a tour and tasting of Bacigalupi vineyards, including the famed Paris Tasting block. The lucky winners will spend a day with the family sampling our latest vintages and paired with an artisan cheese selection.
What a great Sonoma County event, looking forward to the next one. And now I know what fennel is so no big surprises next year. Hey, you learn something new everyday!
The ZAPtasting for 2009 at Fort Mason has come and gone and what a good time it was. From several perspectives and from someone who has been to her share of wine tastings both as a producer and as a consumer I have to say that this was a pretty great tasting. In the past ZAP has gotten a bad rap as a tasting focused on Zinfandel but at the end of the day turns into a “drunk fest”. Now with 275 wineries pouring Zins you can see how this would be an easy thing to have happen. This I would have to say that this is actually true for some of the past events but there seemed to be a different vibe among the 8,000 plus people that attended this tasting. There will always be that small group of people who don’t know when to put the wine glass down but this year, that group was much smaller then it has been in the past. With the exception of the guy who grabbed the wine bottle off our table and started pouring it for himself people where generally well behaved.
For once I noticed a much higher presence in the 20-30 something age category. We all know that this age bracket has become a big percentage of new wine consumers and drinkers in the past few years. Being someone who falls into this category I also know that they are stereotyped into the group of wine drinkers who want to taste but never buy. This year I would have to say that there were more 20 something’s actually genuinely interested in the wine, our family story and signing up for the mailing list. Wineries are more and more looking for new ways to pull in that millennial purchasing power and I think that tastings like these are a great place to start, especially in a city like SF. We poured both the 2004 and 2005 John Tyler Zinfandel (our new release).
Tasting events like these are great opportunities for wineries to talk directly with consumers about their products. For smaller wineries who don’t have a tasting room, these venues are often the only time they get direct to consumer contact. After the success at SF ZAP we will also be heading to Austin, Texas for their ZAP event in May. Watch out Texas, we’re coming to your city!
VERY early Monday morning my mom; Pam and I took a little road trip to our state’s capital to attend the Family Winemakers of California’s annual meeting. For those not familiar with the organization FWM was founded in 1991 to give a voice and presence to small family wineries in the public policy arena. At this particular meeting many important items were discussed that affect wineries and growers including new and current wine regulations and labor laws. Representatives from both the ABC and the TTB spoke and let me tell you… after their presentations it is no longer a mystery as to why most wineries employ a full time staff member to keep abreast of all the new laws as it is truly a daunting task.
After the meeting we headed over to a cocktail party at Spataro Restaurant to mingle with some legislators and members of congress. Rest assured I felt out of place (and under dressed) at first since my knowledge of state politics is very limiting. But low and behold a familiar face in the crowd; Anne Vercelli an extraordinary chef and friend of my mom’s was in town for the Unified Grape Symposium. Anne is the nicest women you could ever hope to meet and has created several unique recipes to pair with our wines. She introduced me to her friends Gordon and Anita Murchie. They were out in California representing the
Atlantic Seaboard Wine Association, one of the oldest wine organizations on the east coast, established in 1973. Gordon is President Ameritus of the Association and his wife Anita is secretary and treasurer.
After a little more circulation of the crowds I met an Assembly woman and several representatives from the Congress. It was interesting to hear their perspectives on the current economic situation as well as how they are focusing their efforts in protecting agriculture and supporting the wine industry in California. I enjoyed the experience and “rubbing elbows” with some well known politicians although I don’t envy their jobs, I am very content right here…. in Sonoma County.
San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition
Our 2005 Pinot Noir was awarded a Bronze Medal in the 2009 SF Chronicle Wine Competition. This is considered the largest competition of American wines. Held over a period of four days at the Cloverdale Citrus Fairgrounds in January, this exclusive event has once again broken world records with 4,235 wines entered into the 2008 competition, all of which were evaluated by an elite panel of more than 60 professional wine judges from across the country
It is always so surreal to realize that the year has come to an end and another year is just beginning. 2009 is going to be a very exciting year for John Tyler. We have several big plans in the working for the next year…
1. Probably the most exciting of the year will be the opening of our Russian River Valley tasting room in the fall of 2009. This project has been in the works for the past 2 years and the Grand Opening promises to be like no other!
2. 2008 saw our first public event here at the vineyards at Grape to Glass as a part of the Russian River Valley Grape Growers. 12 visitors indulged in a gourmet lunch cooked by famed Sassafras chef Jack Mitchell as well as a gondola tour of our vineyards and a flight tasting of all our library wines. 2009 will bring more events with fun themes, great food and of course fantastic wines.
3. The launch of our new, interactive 2.0 website. This winter we will be launching our new, totally redesigned website with new photos, videos and the ability for you to post your thoughts about our wine right on the site.
4. The release of our 2005 vintage. Here at John Tyler we know that producing a great wine takes time and patience. 2005 was one of the larger harvests in recent years. With an additional two years of ageing both the 2005 Pinot Noir and 2005 Zinfandel are ready to go!
5. We are all looking towards the 2009 harvest with anticipation and the apprehension of the unknown. it is still to early to tell what the 2009 growing season will bring but we are planning to harvest our first vintage of Chardonnay this year. Also in the working will hopefully be a late harvest Zinfandel port.
So lots new and exciting things are in store for 2009 with John Tyler. Stay tuned for updates on all these plans for 2009 and more!
Questions? Comments? Let us know!
This is a computer model and Lindsay, our architect did for us of the outside of building and it’s natural surroundings.
TR plans, originally uploaded by johntylerwines.
For the past year plus our whole family has been working on plans for a tasting room for our John Tyler brand. Our familiy has been growers for over 56 years in Russian River Valley and we felt it was time to progress into a new venture. Although it sounds quite easy, considering we already make wine and have the property with which to build on, the task of buildling this tasting room has been so much more than I could have ever imagined. December 2007 we took a trip down to the Sonoma County permit and resources department to file for our use permit. After handing over a hefty check and filing a few papers I emerged feeling so great. Now December 2008 a year later, we still have yet to break ground thanks to all the hoops the County makes you go through.
Thankfully we have hired a fantastic architect named Lindsay and what you see here is a rough sketch of what the outside of the tasting room might look like. As a family we decided to have a simple, functionaly yet charming building. We are set back into a scenic corridor out in Russian River Valley on Westside Road and have so much pure beauty surrounding us .With mile high redwoods, large oaks trees and a calming creek we really want the ambiance to be the focus of the setting. So far we a working on getting the building permits going and once the weather is a little better we hope to begin the septic system. I never would have thought I would be so excited about a septic system!
I will keep you all posted on the project.
Written by: Nicole Bacigalupi, project manager for John Tyler Wines tasting room
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