TOYS FOR TOTS Toy Drive & Wine Tasting at McFadden tomorrow, Friday, December 12 from 4-7pm

John On Wine – TOYS FOR TOTS Toy Drive at McFadden tomorrow, Friday, December 12 from 4-7pm

Originally published in the Ukiah Daily Journal newspaper on December 11, 2014

It is December and the holidays are coming. Like my friend Chuck, the first person to invite me to a dinner of Jewish food, you may celebrate Hanukah, or like my friend Susan, a Jehovah’s Witness, you may not celebrate the holidays at all, but they are coming just the same.

My last name is Cesano, which is Italian, and it would be a pretty easy pair of guesses to come up with my being raised Catholic and celebrating Christmas.

I love Christmas. I love the decorations. I love the sentimental magic of the best Christmas movies, old and new: It’s a Wonderful Life to Elf and Miracle on 34th Street to The Polar Express, and I often find a tear or stream of tears rolling down my cheeks with the best as the wonderful magical Spirit of Christmas is captured.

As a child, I loved Christmas; the putting out cookies and milk for Santa and celery for his reindeer and, of course, the opening of packages on Christmas morning. Every child should know that joy.

I moved north to Ukiah to be closer to my son, leaving a salaried marketing position in the wine industry only to find that there was no such position waiting for me in this county. I was unemployed for two years before falling into my job as the manager at the McFadden Farm Stand & Tasting Room in Hopland. While unemployed, things got tighter and tighter financially, as I ran through savings and then survived by going into credit card debt. That last Christmas before starting work was pretty slim for my son.

As dire as my situation was, there are people who have things tougher, and some children do not get to experience the joy of Christmas. Given the opportunity, I decided to do something to help change that in some small measure.

I asked my boss, Guinness McFadden, in 2012 if I could use our tasting room to host a TOYS FOR TOTS event, giving away a bunch of his stuff to get people to bring toy donations; not a giant sales revenue producing event, but more a charitable event, and he gave me permission to do so.

That first year, KOZT mentioned our event many times each day and the Ukiah daily Journal gave it a nice push, and we ended up with a donation box overflowing with new unwrapped toy donations. Last year, I wrote about the event here in my column and we saw a doubling of donations. This year, I would love to double last year’s donations but, really, any number is helpful, welcome, and enormously appreciated.

Tomorrow, Friday, December 12, 2014, after work from 4:00 pm to 7:00 pm, you are invited to the 3rd annual McFadden TOYS FOR TOTS Toy Drive and Wine Tasting event at our McFadden Farm Stand & tasting Room, located at 13275 South Highway 101 #5, Hopland, CA 95449.

Bring a new unwrapped toy donation and you’ll receive a drawing entry for an assortment basket (over $200 value) of assorted McFadden Farm retail goods, and raffle win or not everone with a donation will receive a box of McFadden Farm Wild Rice. There will also be a tasting of all our current release wines and we’ll offer up a food pairing taste of a McFadden Wild Rice stuffing. During the event, our California State Fair Wine Competition Best of Show awarded sparkling wine and our almost sold out Pinot Noir, both available only to our wine club members will – with a toy donation – be available to all during the event. We will also discount everything in the tasting room 20%, all wine, all food, all glassware, everything – and wine club members will get 25% off – during this special three hour event.

We are thrilled to partner with the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve, even though I was Army and Guinness was Navy, in putting on our 3rd annual McFadden TOYS FOR TOTS Toy Drive and Wine Tasting event, and equally thrilled to bring all of the collected toys to the Hopland Volunteer Fire Department so the men can help Santa bring some very much needed Christmas cheer to some local boys and girls who need your help and charity.

I want to thank KOZT for the many mentions this year, and the Ukiah Daily Journal for allowing me to turn my wine column into a plea for your help once each year, but most of all I want to thank you in advance for the donations of unwrapped toys (or cash which I use to buy shopping carts full of toys with) that you will bring to McFadden tomorrow during our toy drive & wine tasting event, or after if you can’t make it tomorrow.

Everyone from every religion can get behind smiling Children so, wine drinker or not (yes, I’m looking at you, my Adventist neighbors), I hope to see you tomorrow, Friday December 12 between 4 and 7 pm, with a new unwrapped toy or cash (minimum $10 recommended) donation. Our raffle assortment basket has no wine in it, so there is no barrier to charity for anyone.

Again, thanks in advance for your help bringing Christmas cheer into a needful child’s life, and I hope you can handle the feeling when your heart grows three sizes this holiday season.

 

Six Days until Christmas

Note: This column originally ran in the Ukiah Daily Journal on Thursday, December 19, 2013 –

Wow, the last column before Christmas. This is where I am supposed to write the cliché “Holiday Gifts for your Wine Lover” piece. I’ll probably mention a couple of things that I like, but first, I have a couple of notes of thanks:

Thank you to everyone who, after reading my column last week, came to the McFadden Farm Stand & Tasting Room with a new unwrapped toy donation for our Toys For Tots toy drive & wine tasting event. We just about doubled the number of toys brought in last year, and we will be able to bring these toys to the Hopland Volunteer Fire Department for the wonderful firemen to deliver, helping Santa, on Christmas Eve. The thanks for this success, and the joy and smiles of the children helped, is all because of you, and I am incredibly grateful.

Thanks also go to my boss Guinness McFadden and to our winemakers Bob Swain and Mark Beaman. Last week, I was invited to sit in on tastes of wines we’ll release in the future, and helped shape a future Coro blend. I am a taster guy; I taste wine, describe it, and sell it. I know the rudimentary process of winemaking, but this knowledge is much more theory than practice, and sitting with two accomplished winemakers in their realm, not mine, was a terrific experience. I learned a ton, and I gained a new and valuable perspective.

Finally, many folks to thank for last week’s Chef’s Wine Dinner at Crush Ukiah, featuring the 2010 vintage Coro Mendocino wines.

First, thanks to my boss for picking up the tab for my dinner. Next, thanks to the entire staff at Crush, from chefs Jesse and Nate and their entire kitchen crew to the front of house team, for another spectacularly executed wine dinner experience. Speaking of front of house team, thanks to Julie Golden from Coro Mendocino for working alongside the team to pour a plentitude of delicious wine. Huge thanks go to local superstar photographer Tom Liden; as soon as I saw Tom with his camera, I knew I could leave my picture taking device in it’s bag. Finally, thanks to everyone who attended the dinner; without you and the energy you bring, there would be no special wine dinners.

Photography by Tom Liden, Tom Liden Photography

The Coro Dinner at Crush saw the largest event gathering, 70 guests, in the history of all three Crush restaurants, and the event sold out earlier than any previous dinner, with many people on a waiting list, hoping for a cancellation.

I love the Zinfandel based blends of the Coro Mendocino program, they were all delicious. Food highlights for me were the wedge salad with Nueske bacon, blue cheese, and red onions; the crab balls – they were billed as cakes, but trust me they were balls; oysters Rockefeller; and Prime Rib with all the trimmings. For me, the best, and most memorable, food and wine pairing of the night was at dessert, when the Butterscotch Budino, a bowl with chocolate pudding on the bottom, then caramel pearls, then butterscotch pudding, topped with Chantilly cream and mint – you dug down to get all layers with each spoonful – was paired with the Double Gold and Best of Class awarded 2011 McFadden Late Harvest Riesling. I expected delicious, but this pairing left delicious far behind; this was a perfect pairing. A spoon and a tiny sip, another spoon and another sip, until, too soon, it was gone.

This dinner series is a treat, and I’ll let you know about future dinners when I hear about them.

The next scheduled Coro dinner will be the 2011 vintage release party at the Little River Inn on Saturday, June 28, 2014. For more info, or to make a reservation, call the Little River Inn at (707) 937-5942.

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Okay, here are some wine gift recommendations for Christmas:

Wine. Visit any winery tasting room, enjoy a wine tasting if you have the time, and pick up some delicious wines for the holidays. Wine makes a great hostess gift when you visit for a Christmas party or dinner. Wine makes food taste better, so you should serve it at your table too. A couple of bottles wrapped and placed under the tree make for great emergency gifts when someone gives you a gift and you hadn’t purchased a gift for them yet. Wine was Christ’s first miracle, and he offered a cup to the dinner guests at His last supper, so wine infuses a little miracle into this season of Christmas.

Wine gadgets. A good wine opener, an aerator, reusable bottle stoppers, a Champagne stopper, and a can of argon or argon mixed with nitrogen to preserve wine between glasses are all great gifts that a wine lover will appreciate.

Wine books: I have two to recommend. The first features the words of Heidi Cusick Dickerson, who wrote a weekly wine column in the Journal before I did, and the photography of Tom Liden, and is focused on the wines, wineries, and vineyards of Mendocino County. The book is Mendocino Roots & Ridges and retails for $29.95. It is gorgeously rich in content, and hand signed copies by Heidi and Tom are available widely, including the McFadden tasting room in Hopland.

The second book has a larger focus, The New California Wine by San Francisco Chronicle wine editor Jon Bonne retails at $35, and is available at better book stores everywhere. Among my favorite dozen inland Mendocino vineyards that Bonne notes are Eaglepoint Ranch, Gibson Ranch, Heart Arrow Ranch, Lolonis, McFadden Farm, Sun Hawk, and Testa; as well almost twenty Anderson Valley properties. The book is a look at California’s wine industry today, growers, winemakers, and the wines, and is an absolute must have book for anyone serious enough about wine to have a library of wine books.
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That’s it, some thanks, a couple of wine gift ideas, and this wish: Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, or whatever year end wish for happiness works for you, from me.