Studio 707 Blog
December 19, 2008
The Very Last Minute Holiday Gift Guide Part 2
by guest writer, Brooke Cheshier
Unless you plan to make it a Very Wal-Mart Christmas, you only have six shopping days left. Seven maybe, but you’re re-heally pushing it. Before you panic and start stuffing your sweetheart’s stocking with those mini bottles of airplane liquor you stashed away for a “special” occasion, we have a few more gifts for you to consider. Because trust us, your honey deserves more than a holiday cheese ball and a hangover.
Get Cultured: As in bacterial cultures and cheese curds. The premiere issue of Culture: The Word on Cheese landed on my doorstep this month. Since its arrival, I have been dreaming blue cheese and barley wine dreams.
This new magazine from cheese aficionados Lassa Skinner (Oxbow Cheese Merchant) and Kate Arding will introduce your friends and family to cheesemongers around the world. They will learn how to store, serve and even eat cheese. They’ll also increase their cheese IQs and meet a few happy Normande cows (whose rich, rich milk is a delectable favorite among cheessmakers). Cheese pros and renowned authors like Janet Fletcher and Laura Werlin are contributors to this new, protein-rich magazine.
This magazine isn’t just about making and eating cheese. It’s also about tradition and culture and embracing a richer way of living (cheesy pun intended). After reading one issue I wanted to drown myself in triple-crème and truffles. And have an Irish cheddar affair.
- Take a sneak peak at Culture’s inaugural issue at www.culturecheesemag.com. Once you’re hooked by the rich, creamy prose, simply click on the Subscribe link and fill out the form. If you want to order an extra copy for yourself, I won’t tell anyone.
Feed Your Inner Literati: People think everything we do out here in wine country centers around eating and drinking. It’s a common misconception, and it doesn’t hurt our feelings. Really. You should know, however, that in between all the fabulous imbibing (and it’s all fabulous), we find plenty of time to feed our minds and souls, too.
That’s where The Threepenny Review comes in. This large format, newspaper style magazine has it all: criticism, fiction, poetry and that not-yet-lost art form, the essay. Some of the literary world’s best authors use this quarterly journal as a creative outlet.
This holiday season, give someone you love a collection of beautiful words. A pastoral from Louise Gluck may be one of the most underrated gifts of the season, but it won’t be underappreciated. The editors and authors of this nonprofit publication will appreciate your contribution, too.
Max Beerbohm once wrote that, “To give and not feel that one has given is the very best of all ways of giving.” He’s a little verbose, but you get the idea. Give something that gives back. You won’t regret it.
- To subscribe to The Threepenny Review, go to www.threepennyreview.com. Take the concept of “giving back” a step further by making a donation to this unique publication. A hundred dollars makes you one of the nonprofit’s beloved Silver Bells. Five hundred grants you entrée into the prestigious league of The Golden Bowl.
Engage in a Little Frivolity: Doug Biederbeck’s philosophy in restaurants and in life has always been high-low. The owner of San Francisco’s Bix restaurant has never believed in doing anything lukewarm. Which is why Bixology, a sexy, leather-bound guide to cocktail culture and the good life is such an intoxicating gift.
In Bay Area circles, Doug is known as the ultimate guy’s guy, but Bixology isn’t just for the boys. In fact, this alcoholic version of Schott’s Miscellany will appeal to anyone who believes, “If it doesn’t taste like alcohol it’s not a proper cocktail.”
This slim, 156-page volume is about more than just getting a bit gin-y. It’s about embracing life with style. It’s about polish and class and not just “doin’ it well,” but doing it right. Don’t worry you’ll still learn how to shake – and strain – a genuine, honest-to-God Martini. And raise your glass in a proper toast.
Bixology is a contagiously fun read (don’t skip the chapter on Five Essential Jazz Albums). But don’t worry. As Beerbohm also once wrote, “Nobody ever died of laughter.”
- Bixology will be available through normal channels (i.e. Amazon and national booksellers) in March. Until then, you can order your copy on the Bix Restaurant website, www.bixrestaurant.com. Secrets for great living for only $16.95? It’s the ultimate bargain gift. You might even have enough left over to buy a copy for yourself, too.
Brooke Cheshier spends most weekends watching SEC Football and stealing blackberries from the neighbors. She is the wine correspondent for G -The Magazine of Greenville, where she makes heavenly matches between southern eats and the world of drinks. Visit her blog at: http://aficionada.squarespace.com.
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December 18, 2008
The Very Last Minute Holiday Gift Guide
by guest writer, Brooke Cheshier
Maybe you didn't know your brother was bringing his fiance home for the holidays. Or maybe, like me, you looked up from your overstuffed desk and realized - oh s#@$! - it's December 18th. Before you rush out and spend your hard earned money on a dozen iTunes gift cards, check out our last minute gift ideas. Not only do they seem thoughtful. they actually are.
Re-Consider the Catalog. All I want for Christmas is ANYTHING from Corti Brothers but, especially the rare shoyus (soy sauces) and deep sea salts. And the stamped pasta cutters, the Luxardo Box of Cherry Delights and the 750 mL bottle of Hayman’s Old Tom Gin…
If this were Japan, Darrell Corti would be a living national treasure.
He is also a walking encyclopedia when it comes to culinary culture, which is why every item in Corti’s food and drink web catalogue will engage your senses and please your palate. Darrell seeks out only the very best producers. As longtime customer Pam Hunter says, “You can order any product from this catalog knowing you will come to love it.” Food Blogger Elise Bauer of SimplyRecipes.com says her father has made daily pilgrimages to Corti Bros, for as long as she can remember.
If your holiday budget took a hit this year, don’t underestimate the value of a Corti Brothers newsletter subscription (It’s FREE!). The prose alone is enough to make your mouth water, although I’m personally dreaming about a stocking stuffed with sherries from Garvey Sacristia’s bodega in Jerez. Just In case anyone was wondering.
- For subscription and ordering information – and to pick up the recipe for the Martinez Cocktail (the ancestor to the martini and a classic Old Tom Gin concoction)– go to www.cortibros.biz.
Give the Gift of Knowledge. Everyone’s got to eat, right? Now everyone –well, everyone you love in NoCal– can know how and where to fill their bellies with the Bay Area’s juiciest brisket, beefiest meatballs, and leafiest vegetarian cuisine. All you have to do is give them a subscription to "Unterman on Food."
Patricia Unterman has been publishing her bi-monthly newsletter on food, wine, dining and travel for five years. It is safe to say that the restaurant reviewer for the San Francisco Examiner and chef/co-owner of Hayes Street Grill knows a thing or two about eating and drinking. And where to go to do the best of both.
With Unterman as their guide, your friends and family will find real joy at Five Happiness (where a banquet for 10 could cost less than $200) and superior pisco cocktails at the Embarcadero’s La Mar Cebicheria Peruana. Unterman is also an expert on where to find the best West Coast version of an East Coast crab shack, the cheapest 7-course beef Vietnamese beef dinner and the most comforting fusion of Indian, Chinese and Southeast Asian flavors.
This is one of those gifts you send out that comes back to you threefold. Karma, baby. Karma.
- A subscription runs about $32. Send checks to Unterman on Food, c/o Hayes Street Grill, 320 Hayes Street, San Francisco, CA 94102. Unterman is also the author of the San Francisco Fooder Lover’s Pocket Guide, which makes a sweet little stocking stuffer.
Go to http://www.hayesstreetgrill.com/uof-newsletter.html.
Embrace The Pleasure Principle: If there’s one wine that will spice up your life, it is petite syrah. It’s important to remember, however, that not every petite syrah is created equal. On a bad day, it’s baggy, flabby and way out-of-proportion. But on a good day – and with a great winemaker behind it, every day is a good day– it’s rich and voluptuous, even slightly zaftig.
That’s right, we said zaftig. As in erotically ripe and round. Think Botticelli’s Birth of Venus, Elizabeth Taylor at her peak ripeness, or Quixote Winery’s 2004 Petite Sirah and you’re on the right track.
The Doumani family has always believed in making wine with both structure and personality. At first glance, this petite syrah from Napa Valley’s Stags’ Leap Ranch Vineyard is a hedonists’ dream. It’s all satin and silk, blackberry brambles and earth-covered fruit. And yet, it possesses a robust tannin structure and enough acid for some quality aging.
In other words, a bottle (or a case) of the ’04 Petite Syrah has the potential to keep on giving for years to come. Since Quixote made less than a thousand cases of this wine, the gift has the added allure of being precious and rare. It tastes mighty fine, too.
- To order the 2004 Quixote Petite Syrah, visit www.quixotewinery.com and click on “Purchase Wine.” If you love the flavor and patina of older red wines but don’t have the patience (or the cellar) to wait for them to properly age, Quixote’ also has an incredible selection of library wines. They sell out quickly, however, so don’t hesitate too long to scoop up some of these juicy treasures.
Brooke Cheshier spends most weekends watching SEC Football and stealing blackberries from the neighbors. She is the wine correspondent for G -The Magazine of Greenville, making heavenly matches between southern eats and the world of drinks. Visit her blog at: http://aficionada.squarespace.com.
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December 15, 2008
SF Urban Holiday 2008
by guest writer, Brooke Cheshier
Book Review; Seeing Through The Fog: A Gateway to San Francisco
What to do When the Fog Clears
Forget Citywalks. If you want a real San Francisco experience this holiday season, let the 72 voices of this inspirational anthology guide you through the beloved Bay Area metropolis known as Fog City.
Pulitzer Prize finalist, ace raconteur, accidental parent, and the man behind McSweeney’s. Over the last decade the many, slightly manic, personae of Dave Eggers have manifested themselves for readers through personal works like A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and magazines like The Believer.
Now meet Dave Eggers, the tutor and mentor to high school kids in San Francisco and across the nation. The founder of a nonprofit writing and teaching organization called 826 Valencia, he is the man behind this combination city guide, historic chronicle and inspirational memoir. Well, he and three high school teachers, 82 tutors and 72 high school students.
>A collection of essays written by seniors from Gateway High School, Seeing Through the Fog is one of several books created by 826’s Young Author’s Book Series, an annual project that allows students to serve as both editors and authors as they learn the ropes of the publishing industry. The results of the series are timely anthologies like Seeing Through the Fog, one of the most original and moving San Francisco “travel guides” in the market to date.
Comprised of 72 surprisingly astute perspectives on life, travel and passion in the Bay Area, these essays will lure you off the beaten path and introduce you to some of the city’s most delicious pleasures. We’re not just talking about the pink popcorn at Stow Lake. Although it is a treat.
This holiday season, why don’t you let the kids of Gateway High be your guide through the neighborhoods, bridges and back alleys of San Francisco. Set off on madcap adventures through Chinatown’s Pacific Fish Market, take archery lessons in Golden Gate Park and learn to survive in the Mission on just $22 a day. You won’t want to miss Conor Murphy-Hoffman’s poignant take on the neighborhood's gentrification.
Of course, seeing the city from these young, animated perspectives may just inspire you to look at San Francisco with fresh eyes. Once you feel steady, you can take off the training wheels and do some creative merry-making of your own.
Christmas Bonus: You can find copies of Seeing Through the Fog on Amazon.com and on Valencia.org , but don’t buy it used! Proceeds from the sale of new books go toward free student programming at 826 Valencia, an educational nonprofit serving the Bay Area and with satellites across the U.S. For more information go to www.826valencia.org. Remember, giving to others is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself.
Continue reading "SF Urban Holiday 2008"
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November 19, 2008
Gold Alley Delights
by guest writer, Brooke Cheshier
Like the snaking streets and bridges of Venice, San Francisco’s cross-hatching of alley streets makes the idea of getting a little – or terrifically – lost seem truly promising. Last week, I took a day to get intimate with Gold Alley, one of the most delicious cobbled back ways in North Beach.
Tucked behind Montgomery Street and just below Broadway – the strip that’s home to Little Darlings, The Condor Club and the Roaring 20s – Gold Alley is a neighborhood within a neighborhood. Reminiscent of the glamour of the 1930s (minus the unsanitary row and slum housing of the alleys of the same decade), it is the yang to Broadway’s “ladies of the night” yin. Here, amid the exposed red brick and mortar, fresh new galleries and luxury boutiques bump up against restaurants and shops that have had their doors open for over 30 years.
I was instantly smitten with this diverse micro-community. Gold Alley isn’t big, and I had no idea so many goodies could be folded into such a tiny space. Bix Restaurant, Hedge Gallery, William Stout Books, and Japonesque are the alley’s mainstays, along with the neighborhood’s youngest addition, Carrots. With its artist’s soul and aesthetic, it’s a community worth getting to know. Here are a few highlight’s…
William Stout Books: You don’t have to be an architecture buff to fall in love with Stout Books, which has been a Montgomery Street bastion for over 30 years. This jewel box bookstore flanking Gold Alley smells like printed paper and dust-covered book jackets (although there’s hardly a speck of dust in sight) and is full of towering metal shelves dedicated to rare, out-of-print books and current releases in architecture, urban planning, interior and graphic design, landscaping, and fine and decorative arts.
The airy, two-story space holds over 20,000 hardbacks and paperbacks, including a collection of graphic design volumes which were, to me, the visual equivalent of a Shakespearean sonnet or a Miller Williams sestina. In other words, pure poetry. Since I had set a budget for the day’s adventure, I resigned myself to a single purchase – a beautiful anthology of Jazz Album cover designs – and then beat a hasty retreat before I changed my mind and bought the entire section.
804 Montgomery Street 415.989.2341
www.stoutbooks.com
Mon- Fri
10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Saturday
10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Japonesque: I found refuge at Japonesque, a unique, soul-renewing gallery and the other entryway “flank” to Gold Alley. Spending a few minutes at this Zen-like gallery was as mentally and emotionally revitalizing as a day spent at Japantown’s Kabuki Springs.
Proprietor Koicha Hara loves art that seems to breathe, and every piece on Japonesque’s gallery floor, from the graphite wall panels by Hiromichi Iwashita to the glazed porcelain by Masamichi Yoshikawa, seems to possess movement and life. That’s because Hara serves as both curator and artist at Japonesque, and he works hard to maintain a harmony between his own works and those of the artists his gallery represents.
As an artist, Hara often combines recycled materials with freshly plucked organic matter. As a curator, Hara travels to Japan twice a year and hand selects woodwork, ceramic sculpture, shaped paintings, glazed porcelain, Japanese calligraphy and other pieces by artists like Masatoshi Izumi and Morino Hiroaki Taimei to showcase alongside some of his own pieces at his deceptively large, two-story showroom.
824 Montgomery Street
415.391.8860
Tues – Fri
10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Saturday
11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Continue reading "Gold Alley Delights"
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November 3, 2008
Napa's Pro Attitude Director Announces
Spring Release of New Book, Mystic Cool
Human performance expert and author Don Goewey’s new book, “Mystic Cool,” will be published by Simon and Schuster / Beyond Words in April of 2009. Goewey heads the Napa based office of ProAttitude, which he established in 2006 with Bonny Meyer, co-founder of Silver Oak Cellars. ProAttitude is a corporate training and coaching service helping businesses and individuals discover the transformational power of “neuroplasticity.” Neuroplasticity is the scientific term for the brain’s ability to rewire in ways that allow us to fully tap our creative intelligence. He can be reached at: 866.448.1001 at don@proattitude.com
Mystic Cool shows us how we can rewire our brain to make us immune to stress, gaining higher brain function to turn work into the joy of excelling. It shows us how to change our brains to sustain more enthusiasm, resilience, and positive emotion at every level of life. All these qualities are actually neurological properties activated by a dynamic shift in attitude. As we make this shift our brain wires to generate the new experience. Mystic Cool is the first to provide a proven approach to actualizing this enormous power. It is simpler than most of us might think.
Don Goewey’s career has focused on the innate potential in human beings to transform their lives. He has worked with pre-eminent leaders in the field of human potential including Carl Rogers, Ph.D. and Gerald Jampolsky, M.D., and helped advance a school of psychology based on attitude. Currently, Don is president of ProAttitude, a human performance firm with the mission of ending stress in the workplace.
Links :
ProAttitude website
To pre-order Mystic Cool
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Art and Wine in Yorkville Highlands
One of California’s last and most lovely frontiers can be found off Hwy. 101 between Cloverdale and the Mendocino Coast. It is Yorkville Highlands where several very nice wines are being made including Matt and Karen Meyer’s Meyer Family Cellars Syrah. There is also a diverse art community that includes glassblower Ferdinand Thieriot and Antoinette von Grone, among others. Have a look at Fernand’s propeller-inspired decanter and glass, an interesting gift idea for the season.
Links:
To purchase this holiday special.
To visit Meyer Family Cellars and Yorkville Highlands.
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Ron Wornick, pictured here with winemaker Aaron Pott, travels to NY this week for Wine Spectator's California Wine Experience.
October 14, 2008
Wornick’s Seven Stones Named Rising Star
Ron and Anita Wornick, of St. Helena and San Francisco, traveled to New York today for the California Wine Experience where their inaugural release from Seven Stones Winery, a 2005 cabernet sauvignon, is being featured by Wine Spectator editors James Laube and Harvey Steiman, on a program entitled, “Rising Stars.”
Seven Stones was chosen among just five California wineries deemed by Laube and Steiman to be among the hottest properties on the West Coast. Seven Stones 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon was awarded 94 points by James Laube. The entire 2005 production was sold to the mailing list in just under five hours on release day late this summer.
Rising Stars Tasting. A tasting from some of the hottest new wineries on the West Coast—five from California, three from Washington and two from Oregon. Onstage, James Laube, senior editor, Wine Spectator and Harvey Steiman, editor at large, Wine Spectator, lead the tasting with the winemakers and/or owners. The wines are:
* Linne Calodo Problem Child Paso Robles 2006 (95 points)
* Londer Pinot Noir Anderson Valley Londer Estate Grown 2005 (92 points)
* Relic Syrah Mendocino County Alder Springs Vineyard 2006 (NYR)
* Saxum Paso Robles Booker Vineyard2005 (95 points)
* Seven Stones Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2005 (94 points)
* Côte Bonneville DuBrul Vineyard Yakima Valley 2005 (NYR)
* Gorman Syrah-Cabernet Sauvignon The Evil Twin 2005 (95 points)
* ZanZibar Sandra Horse Heaven Hills 2005 (93 points)
* Penner-Ash Pinot Noir Willamette Valley Shea Vineyard 2006 (93 points
* Roco Pinot Noir Chehalem Mountains Private Stash 2006 (94 points)
Link to the Seven Stones winery information summary.
Link to Ron Wornick's biography.
Link to Aaron Pott's biography.
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September 22, 2008
Serial Entrepreneur Launches Napa Wine
AOL-TIME WARNER FORMER CEO, BARRY SCHULER,
ADDS NAPA WINE TO ENTREPRENEURIAL PANOPLY
Barry Schuler has worn his reputation for pioneering new territory from his alma mater, Rutgers, to Silicon Valley. So, last week when he proudly announced the inaugural release of his 2005 Meteor Vineyard Estate and Special Family Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, no one was surprised to learn that his 22-acre vineyard was located in the lesser known southeastern hills of Napa County.
Planted in 1998, Meteor's highly sought after fruit has sold to a handful of high-profile properties including: Arietta, Etude, Lail, Favia and Vineyard 29. Rocky soils, Meteor's undulating topography and the cooling influences of nearby San Pablo Bay give Meteor fruit slow, even ripening in the most challenging of years.
Meteor's first offering is being sold principally through the mailing list with a small allocation reserved for restaurants frequented by the globe-trotting Barry and Tracy Strong Schuler. To purchase 2005 Meteor Vineyard Estate Cabernet Sauvignon or the 2005 Meteor Vineyard Special Family Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, call 707-258-2900 or email info@meteorvineyard.com.
Continue reading "Serial Entrepreneur Launches Napa Wine"
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We think our wine is all about terroir, manifesting the tremendous complexity of this appellation. Internationally acclaimed photographer Lewis deSoto shares these images of our Stags Leap Ranch from his appellation series to be unveiled sometime next year.
September 9, 2008
Indian Summer BBQ
September announced itself with 100-degree temperatures here in Napa Valley's Stags Leap district. We'll finish off the month with plenty of Indian Summer barbecues tossing quail, garden vegetables and, our personal favorite, lamb, on the grill.
Lamb and Petite Syrah contitute one of those peerless food and wine pairings. We hope you'll stock up on Quixote Petite Syrah and the best lamb you can find to fortify both cellar and larder for these last days of outdoor entertaining before welcoming the crisp days of autumn.
Here's are a few links to create your own Indian Summer BBQ:
Sonoma Direct - Grass-fed, family farmed and sustainably raised lamb.
Quixote Petite Syrah - Organically-farmed Stags’ Leap Ranch estate petite syrah.
Posted by Pamela at 10:58 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Cabernet Sauvignon , Napa Valley Wines , Petite Sirah , Quixote , Stags Leap Wine
Paul Martin's hospitable interior(left) and menu favorite, Hill Farm Pork Chop(right).
August 20, 2008
Paul Martin's American Bistro Named
Sacramento's Top New Restaurant
Congratulations to Paul Fleming, Brian Bennett and Chef Kevin Rose. Paul Martin’s American Bistro in Roseville, Ca. has been named by Sacramento Magazine as the best new restaurant in Greater Sacramento. This resourceful restaurant team manages to deliver mostly organic and local fresh fruits and vegetables as well as local meats and poultry on their deliciously affordable menu. For out-of-towners, the restaurant’s proximity to Interstate 80 makes it a convenient place to stop for lunch or dinner on the trip to Lake Tahoe.
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August 12, 2008
Yountville "Facebook" Installed This Week
Pacific Northwest urban planner- turned- sustainable developer, Phil Sherburne, collaborated with San Francisco photographer Christopher Irion this month to rally people who live or work in the small Napa Valley town of Yountville for a community portrait. Monday night the two men hosted a block party to celebrate the installation of the portrait, a composite of hundreds of large-format individual and group images that stretches along a sidewalk in the town center.
(Left to right) Alexander Treu of the Di Rosa Preserve and Ashley Teplin, Studio 707, work with photographer Christopher Irion to mount the 215 images he took in his PhotoBooth for Yountville’s Community Portrait.
“I’ve been thinking about Facebook and what it means to the people who participate,” said Sherburne. “I’ve decided this is the facebook of Yountville,” he said, gesturing toward the images of locals. Both Sherburne and Irion said they consider the wall to be a celebration of community here and everywhere. “It’s not about the art,” said Irion. “It’s about all of you. Thank-you for taking the risk to participate.”
Phil Sherburne introduces townspeople to Arborica’s Evan Shively who not only sourced and milled reclaimed lumber for the Bardessono inn and spa, but arrived with his wife, Madeline and Chef Annie Gingrass and his portable, wood-fired oven to create artisan pizzas for the block party.
Irion has now traveled across the United States carrying his portable, handmade PhotoBooth in a Volkswagen Eurovan documenting communities from coast to coast. Sherburne, who underwrote the project, founded an even smaller community than Yountville on Decatur Island in the San Juans 25 years ago. Next winter, he will open a new inn in the Town of Yountville he hopes will achieve Platinum LEED Certification.
Yountville’s block party drew several hundred locals who enjoyed pizzas created by Madeleine and Evan Shively and Ann Gingrass in Evan’s portable wood-fired pizza oven. Shively is the owner of Aborica
The Community Portrait wall will be up until Yountville’s November Festival of Lights installation.
Click here for images of the PhotoBooth installation party from Monday, August 11.
Photos by Ashley Teplin
Click here for images of the PhotoBooth installation.
Photos by Ashley Teplin and Pamela Hunter
Click here for the PhotoBooth picture taking day in Yountville on July 10 and 12.
Photos by Ashley Teplin and Christopher Irion
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Yountville resident and teacher, Chuck with son James and Bouchon Bakers Annarose and Maika were photographed by Christopher Irion for the Yountville Community Portrait.
August 8, 2008
Yountville Portrait Project Unveiled
At Monday, August 11 Block Party
AUGUST 7, 2008—YOUNTVILLE, NAPA VALLEY, CA.—On Monday a 72’ long, 10’ high wall constructed by the Bardessono, an environmentally sustainable inn and spa slated for completion this winter, becomes home to a portrait of this community of 2,900. Former urban planner and committed community builder Phillip Sherburne of Decatur Island and Seattle, WA., underwrote the project after he was introduced to San Francisco photographer Christopher Irion and his work documenting communities all across America.
Sherburne’s vision intersected with Irion’s and in just a few weeks after meeting, the two men laid plans to bring the townspeople together to experience themselves as a community in the same way others have over five years and 20,000 miles of Irion’s travels with a handmade PhotoBooth packed in his Volkswagen Eurovan.
Long a photographer of celebrities and prominent figures whose work is seen in books and high-profile publications as well as museums and gallery shows, Irion determined it was community that most interested him. He began five years ago with a project in his neighborhood where he created 500 portraits of the people who frequented Farley’s Café. The photographs were taken over several months with each individual entering the PhotoBooth and Irion positioned outside, his camera lens poking through the booth wall.
Continue reading "Yountville Portrait Project Unveiled
At Monday, August 11 Block Party"
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From top left to bottom right: Bryant Terry, award-winning eco chef, food justice activist, and author hosts the 'Seeds' group; Barry Schuler, serial entrepreneur and Meteor Vineyards owner; Taste3 host Margrit Mondavi with Gordon Heuther on her insider tour; Chef Chris Cosentino prepares beef heart carpaccio for the audience to taste. (Photos by Elise Bauer and Ashley Teplin)
July 24, 2008
Report from Taste3
Last week Robert Mondavi Winery hosted the third annual TED-inspired TASTE3 at COPIA in Napa’s Oxbow District. For us, this super-charged brain spa is an annual ritual around which we will juggle work, vacations and pretty much anything else. In other words, it’s a must. In fact, we suggest you register now for next year’s TASTE3 , scheduled to run for three days beginning May 31, 2009.
To give you a taste of what to expect, here are a few things I learned at TASTE3 2008:
Continue reading "Report from Taste3"
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July 16, 2008
Mapping the grape genome
Tomorrow through Saturday TASTE3 brings together 40 writers, thinkers, chefs, winemakers, artisans and executives to join 400 attendees who are every bit as tapped-in. The TED-inspired event is staged at COPIA and Cuvee in Napa with smaller, break-out functions staged in Napa Valley Wineries. TASTE3 promises to thrill, tantalize, engage, intrigue, provoke and inspire. And, for the past two years, this event has delivered in spades.
Friday morning at 10:45 award-winning eco chef, food justice activist and author Bryant Terry will host a session entitled, “Seeds.” In that session, serial entrepreneur Barry Schuler will share his ideas for mapping the wine grape genome. Schuler, who made his reputation and his fortune in Silicon Valley launched a pioneering interactive multimedia company with his wife Tracy in 1989. One of their first clients was “a little company called America Online” which Barry ultimately led following the Time Warner merger in 2000.
In 1996 Barry and Tracy bought a 35-acre hilltop parcel in Coombsville, east of the city of Napa. There they planted a 22-acre cabernet vineyard and eventually began to produce their own wine—made by Dawnine and Bill Dyer, partners in the enterprise—under the Meteor Vineyard label.
If you’re interested in joining the 2008 TASTE3 community, visit www.TASTE3.com to see if late registrations are being accepted.
A few friends of Studio-707 who’ve signed on this year include: Elise Bauer, blogger; Virginie Boone, journalist; David Darlington, author; Carl Doumani, vintner; Katherine Doumani, free-lance writer; Dawnine Dyer, vintner; Aaron Pott, winemaker; Margrit Biever Mondavi, Robert Mondavi Winery; Gwen McGill, Marketing Director, Quintessa Winery; Garrett McCord, blogger; Heather Irwin, journalist; Cristina Salas-Porras; Phil Sherburne, eco-developer; Rives, performance poet; Gianni Stefanini, miller-owner Apollo Olive Oil; Dan Barber, chef; and Andrea Robinson, broadcast journalist.
Posted by Pamela at 4:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Meteor Vineyard , Non-wine activities in Napa Valley
July 9, 2008
Thursday at the Jug Shop Wine Bar
Yorkville Highlands Winemaker Tasting
with Yorkville Cellars, Wattle Creek, Bink & Meyer Family
"Down-home and largely undiscovered, the tiny appellation evokes images of a time gone by." Virginie Boone, Savor Wine Country
Since the mid-1990’s, California has witnessed a dramatic increase in the number of wine-growing regions designated as American Viticultural Areas, or AVAs. With ten of its own sub-appellations, Mendocino County is an increasingly important region in the North Coast, particularly in light of the wide range of grape varieties planted in the county. A proportional number of microclimates support the efforts of the county’s grape growers, from the warm inland corridor that runs from Hopland north to Redwood Valley, to the cool-climate Anderson Valley just north of Sonoma County.
Tucked in the wild, picturesque hills that separate the Alexander and Anderson Valleys, the decade-old Yorkville Highlands AVA is one of Mendocino's most exciting appellations, if one of its lesser known. On Thursday, July 10th, four of Yorkville’s top wineries will introduce you to this extraordinary spot on California’s wine map. As a San Francisco preview to the annual Yorkville Highlands Festival which takes place in August, the owner-winemakers from Yorkville Cellars, Wattle Creek, Bink Wines, and Meyer Family Cellars (the festival’s host) will pour a diverse lineup of their current releases, including sauvignon blanc, syrah, pinot noir, and cabernet franc.
More than many viticultural regions in the state, the Yorkville Highlands represent a coming-together of factors that allow for the production of elegant, balanced red, white, and rosé wines: the Highlands’ continuous string of elevated benchland vineyards; proximity to the nearby Pacific Ocean, which moderates the climate and provides for an extended growing season; and ancient, gravelly, and well-draining soils that comprise many of the AVA’s best vineyard sites. Not to overlook the human factor of dedicated Yorkville growers working in tandem with winemakers whose collective goal is to produce elegant, food-friendly wines.
We hope you will be able to attend this unique tasting of wines from one of Northern California's up-and-coming regions!
Yorkville Highlands Winemaker Tasting
Thursday, July 10th, 2008
6pm to 8pm
$10 per person
Posted by Pamela at 2:17 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Meyer Family Cellars , Yorkville Highlands
