Hopland Passport Weekend this weekend, Oct 23 & 24

This weekend, Saturday, October 23 and Sunday, October 24, from 11:00AM to 5:00PM each day, the wineries of Mendocino County’s town of Hopland, located on Highway 101 less than an hour north of Santa Rosa, join together for the 2010 Fall Hopland Passport Weekend.

Participating wineries include Brutocao Cellars, Fetzer Vineyards, Graziano Family of Wines, Jaxon Keys, Winery, Jeriko Estate, McDowell Valley Vineyards, McFadden Vineyards, McNab Ridge Winery, Magnanimus Wines, Milano Winery, Nelson Family Vineyards, Patianna Vineyards, Rack & Riddle, Terra Savia, Saracina, and Weibel Family Vineyards.

I attended the Spring Hopland Passport Weekend, and wrote of my experiences, visiting each participating winery and tasting an even 100 wines – it helped that I could use both days.

Two day tickets are available online for $35, or for $45 at any of the participating wineries on the day of the event.

Saturday shuttles are available for only $15, picking up from and delivering to a host of Ukiah hotels. The shuttles run all day between the participating wineries.

Each winery puts their best foot forward; food treats are provided that pair well with wines served, live music, arts and crafts, artisanal honeys and olive oils are among the treats offered by the wineries. For two days, you get to travel from winery to winery, tasting wines, savoring tasty foods, surrounded by the beauty of Mendocino County’s vineyards and wineries. A wristband, tasting glass, and a map make for a weekend of discovery.

Tastings like this are one of the best ways to expand your wine tasting experiences, learn which wine varietals you prefer, and perhaps develop an appreciation for a wine region you aren’t fully familiar with.

Every person tasting in the spring version of the Passport Weekend was happy, smiling, enjoying themselves, and having a great time. I loved visiting all of the Hopland wineries earlier this year. I encourage you to come to Hopland this weekend, and hope you have as wonderful a time as I did.

 

Cooking Confession and Redemption

A couple of weeks ago, I attended an outdoor movie at Campovida in Hopland, enjoyed Mendocino Farms’ wine, and almost made a delicious picnic dinner for my son Charlie and myself.

I say almost, because while the apple slaw was perfectly delicious, I made a horrible error that doomed the main course, slow braised pork belly, to complete and utter failure.

I saw salt pork, and recognized it as pork belly, but having not worked with it before had no idea how irredeemably salty it was. I slow cooked the meat, taking over 4 hours to turn out something nearly inedible and totally unpalatable.

I mention this because I am ordinarily a very good cook, better than just about anyone I know, but when I screw up somehow it causes glee, or at least provides some twisted entertainment, for my friends. People like it when a a dose of humility comes around, and mine was self delivered.

I took the inedible meat, trimmed it to find the soft less salty inner meat, cut it up and used it, along with a host of fresh veggies, to flavor a mixed bean soup for the next day’s main meal. I was able to save a bad dish, or at least recycle, repurpose, reuse for a different, good, dish.

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The movie was absolutely wonderful. Outdoor movies on Summer evenings are one of my favorite things. Thanks to Campovida’s Gary and Anna, and everyone at Magnanimus Wine Company , for being such wonderful hosts.

Oh, one last note: a pair of bocce courts are being put in right outside the Magnanimus Wine art gallery and tasting bar at Campovida. I love bocce, and look forward to returning to play.

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Today, I am making the Banana Fritters that saw cheftestant Ed Cotton win the first half of the two part Top Chef finale in Singapore. Last year’s winner Michael Voltaggio recreated the dish in an online video. Here is the recipe as I transcribed it:

Ed’s TC Banana Fritters

Ingredients

2 Cups Flour

2 TBS Black and White Sesame Seeds

1 tsp Baking Powder

3 TBS Sugar

1 tsp Salt

1 TBS Honey

2 Eggs

2 Cups Beer

2 Cups Red Chili Paste

4 Bananas

1/2 Cup Sugar

1/4 Cup Cinammon

Directions

Add ingredients Flour through Beer, in order, to large bowl, mix with whisk for a few minutes until everything “hydrates into the beer,” taking care not to over mix.

Slice bananas into 3/4 inch medallions.

Skewer each medallion, using the large, non pointy end, for greater adhesion – skewers aid in adding paste, batter, and deep frying.

Brush each medallion with a little red chili paste.

Dip each chili pasted banana medallion in batter to coat.

Move to a 350˚ deep fryer, or a preheated small pot with vegetable oil at 350˚, letting the battered banana off the skewer.

Remove with small mesh strainer or slotted spoon when cooked, puffed and brown, to a paper towel covered wire rack to cool.

Dust with a 2 to 1 Sugar/Cinnamon mix.

Serve.

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I also bought a half flat of beautiful strawberries from a door to door fruit salesman today, and will be making homemade strawberry ice cream.

Here’s what I plan:

John Cesano’s Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream

Ingredients:

5 cups whipping cream

2 1/2 cups half and half

2 1/2 cups whole milk

2 1/2 cups plus 6 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 cups strawberries

3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

zest from 1 lemon and 1/2 orange

4-7 cups rock salt

10-15 lbs crushed ice

Directions:

1. Clean, core, and quarter the strawberries; cook down the strawberries with lemon juice, lemon and orange zest, and 6 tablespoons sugar, about 5 – 6 minutes, until soft. Refrigerate mixture.

2. Scald milk until bubbles form at edge of pan, remove from heat. Add sugar and salt. Stir until dissolved.

3. Stir in half and half, vanilla extract, and whipping cream. Cover and refrigerate 30 minutes.

4. Combine refrigerated apple and cream mixtures.

5. Place refrigerated mixture into cooled 6 quart ice cream can, filling ice cream can no more than 3/4 full as it will expand during freezing.

6. With 4 cups of rock salt for making, another 3 cups for hardening, and 15 pounds of ice cubes for both, churn ice cream 20-40 minutes.

7. Pack ice cream into containers, allowing 1/2 inch for expansion, and freeze several hours to ripen and harden home made ice cream.

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I will be serving the Banana Fritters with Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream on the side, and pairing it with a 2009 J. Lohr Estates Wildflower Monterey Valdiguie. I’ll let you know how that works out.

 

Free film in the field Sunday night 9/5 at sunset, Julie & Julia at Campovida in Hopland

Campovida is the name Anna Beuselink and Gary Breen gave to the 51 acre Hopland property that had once been the site of the Fetzer Wine Hospitality Center. The property was owned by Brown-Forman, and while in negotiations to buy the property, Anna and Gary met Owsley Brown III, a Brown-Forman Brown, and the owner of Magnanimus Wines.

Campovida means Field of Life, and when I visited this week, every field, vineyard, and garden was bursting with life.

From Campovida’s website:

Campovida is a family owned and operated rustic farm and working vineyard. This unique place offers deep connections with nature, wine tasting, a professional culinary kitchen, a 10-room retreat center and multiple spaces for conversations both big and small. It’s a place where you can relax, enjoy and create your custom gatherings.

Come. Play. Stay. Explore.

Anna and Gary are not just the owners of Campovida, but see themselves as stewards as well.

Anna and Gary invited Owsley Brown III to move his Magnanimus Wines tasting bar and art gallery to the building at Campovida that previously housed Fetzer’s tasting room.

Magnanimus Wines has four wine labels, Ukiah Cellars and Talmage are made using sustainable practices, Old River is made organically, and Mendocino Farms is made bio-dynamically.

In the California county best known for green practices, all four labels of Magnanimus Wines are verdantly green.

The marriage of wine to place, Magnanimus to Campovida, Owsley to Anna and Gary provides a perfect synergism, the whole much greater and more pleasing than the parts.

I visited and wrote about Campovida and Magnanimus four months ago, was met by Megan Metz and tasted wines poured by Josh Metz, during a soft open coinciding with the Hopland Passport Weekend.

Here are my tasting notes from then:

2008 Ukiah Cellars Chardonnay, Beckstoffer and McDowell Vineyards, $16 – Clear, brilliant, pale gold. Apple & pear nose, tart fruit, but not aggressively tart. Light cream and vanilla apple flavors.

2006 Old River Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon, Ponderosa Vineyard (near Grass Valley in the Sierra Foothills), $19 – Nice, lush fruit. Supple and complex, approachable black berry fruit.

2006 Talmage Collection Pija Blend, Mattern Ranch, $25 – A field blend, roughly 50% Zin and 45% Petite Sirah (with a smidge, about 5% Charbono from Venturi Vineyards). Bright, lush, bursting fruit of cherry and berry, with integrated acid, oak, and tannin.

2006 Talmage Collection Syrah, Maria Vineyard, $32 – Dark purple, chewy cherry nose gives way to more full flavors of cocoa, black berry and currant.

2005 Mendocino Farms Redvine Series, Heart Arrow and Fairbairn Ranches, $25 –75% Cab, 13% Petite Syrah, and 12 % Syrah. Cab fruit is obvious. Blackberry rich. lush, juicy, soft, and delicious.

2005 Mendocino Farms Syrah, Fairbairn Ranch, $32 – Delicious burst of fruit, black berry and raspberry mix. Berry fruit medley. Lush, more than the typical Syrah.

2008 Mendocino Farms Zinfandel (Barrel Sample), Dark Horse Vineyard. – Really nice round fruit, accessible dark berry fruit. Incredible potential.

I tasted these again this week with John March, and must say that I LOVE the 2005 Mendocino Farms Redvine, it drank well then, and again now. Lush, velvety, plummy oak fruit, smoky oak, delicious. With apologies to Bambi lovers, I would love to pair this wine with venison.

I tasted a wine this week that I did not taste previously, a 2007 Mendocino Farms Grenache Rose Dark Horse Ranch. First, because it doesn’t taste like it, a warning: this little blush wine is packing nearly 16% alc by volume! The flavors include strawberry, vanilla and cream, and reminded me of commercial candy strawberry taffy. Genuinely tasty, and charming for being unique.

The Magnanimus Wines tasting bar and art gallery does indeed have art. With an intention to rotate artists every three or four months, or so, the Art of Jack Stuppin currently graces the walls of the main room. Available for purchase at prices ranging from $3,200 for a 15 x 10″ acrylic on canvas Cottonwood Abiqui to $40,000 for 44.5 x 63″ oil on canvas Summer, Elephant Mountain, Stuppin’s paintings are beautifully contained bursts of color capturing nature.

Cottonwood Abiqui, 2005

Summer, Armstrong Woods, 2010

Summer, Elephant Mountain, 2010

In an adjoining room, I found a bookcase with books going back to the Fetzer days, including books that I sold to Fetzer eight or nine years ago. It was all I could do to not “merchandise” the books for Magnanimus.

Ken Boek took me on a tour of the 13 acre organic gardens at Campovida four months ago, and while beautiful, the gardens were being brought back from years of neglect. I walked the gardens by myself this week and was stunned at the transformation, the reclamation, and by the lush bursting growth of the plants.

The gardens are overwhelmingly lush, scented powerfully with floral and vegetal notes. Apples fallen on a path make me yearn for some flour, sugar and an oven.

A wet beautifully earthy smell enveloped me, and I stopped to savor the primal sensualness of the aroma.

Birds rustled in the foliage. Spiders cast webs between branches.

I tasted the tartness of morning side blackberries and contrasted that with the fall apart over ripeness of the blackberries grown on the afternoon sun side of the same plant.

I breathed in, broke off and tasted fresh basil.

I love to cook, and ingredients matter. I was near flush with desire as I imagined the food I could create with the bounty from Campovida’s gardens.

Ken Boek will be leading a 1 1/2 hour tour of the gardens this, and every, Saturday at 1:30 pm. I can not encourage you strongly enough to take a guided tour with Ken.

I am excited beyond telling that Campovida intends to share the fruits of their gardens through a Community Supported Agriculture program at some point in the future.

Last year I wrote about my trip to Oregon, and gave a paragraph to seeing the film Julie & Julia.

That Friday night, after dinner, I went to the local drive in movie theater to see Julie and Julia, a lovely film that blends food, blogging, and a little romance. I loved this movie; but really, I’m a foodie, you’re reading my blog, and I am a huge romantic.

I have seen the movie twice since then, I just love the title characters. Amy Adams as Julie Powell and Meryl Streep as Julia Child. I don’t cry often, but this movie usually leaves me with tears running down my cheeks.

Anyway, I have seen movies outdoors at vineyards in Sonoma and Napa as part of the Wine Country Film Festival, I saw Julie & Julia outside at a drive-in, I love Campovida and a bunch of the Magnanimus Wines, so you can imagine my delight when I heard that Campovida is hosting a free outdoor movie night this Sunday with Julie & Julia.

Come out to Campovida this Sunday, September 5, 2010 to watch Julie & Julia under the wine arbor, stars and moon. The movie will be starting at sunset, about 7 p.m.-7:30 p.m., show up early, meet new friends, get comfortable. Bring a low chair, blanket, plan on dressing warm as it might get cool-cold, and don’t forget to bring a picnic dinner. Campovida is providing the place, the film, and popcorn. Magnanimus Wines will be selling wines by the glass $5-$7 or bottle $18-$25.