Wining in Solvang with the Garagistes...

The Goddess of Wine was happy to attend the second annual Garagiste Festival's Southern Exposure event in Solvang at the end of March. Was that only 2 weeks ago? An easy drive on a beautiful Saturday morning got me to that charming Danish town early enough to grab some breakfast at a local eatery that shall remain nameless because the food was truly bad. How you can mess up breakfast, I don't know, but...anyway, on to the Garagistes!

As defined by the Garagistes themselves: GARAGISTES – (gar-uh-zhē-stuh) n, Fr. – A term originally used in the Bordeaux region of France to denigrate renegade small-lot wine makers, sometimes working in their garage, who refused to follow the “rules.” Now a full-fledged movement responsible for making some of the best wine in the world. Who’s laughing now, Francois? Syn: Rule-breakers, pioneers, renegades, mavericks, driven by passion.

Wining by Proxy...JD's account of the Barrel Seminar at Garagiste Southern Exposure...

As the Goddess of Wine was pouring Shai Cellars wines at the Garagiste Southern Exposure event in February, First Acolyte JD attended what was to be a seminar on the science of barrels in winemaking. It turned out to be a bit different from planned...

We started off with an easy and fortunately uneventful drive to Solvang on a beautiful, dry, bright Saturday morning. Let’s spend it inside learning about barrels, their effect on wine and taste some wine!

Ryan Render of the cooperage company Tonnelerie Saint Martin was sick, so unable to make it.

The original wine samples from McPrice-Myers were put into a reverse-layout side-by-side refrigerator/freezer the previous night. This situation was not discovered until the morning of the seminar. Alas, the wine was frozen. A quick scramble was done at Larner Vineyards and Michael Larner brought in a nice cross section of his in-process wine for the seminar.