Wine and restaurant reviews
Recently we attended another wine class organized by the Neighborhood Restaurant Group, this time focused on Shenandoah Valley wines. I neglected to take a picture at the restaurant, so the image above is an AI interpretation of a Shenandoah vineyard. The growth of vineyards in this region has been incredible. In 1980 there were six […]
Recently we’ve attended local wine events featuring Champagne and Rose wines. The Champagne event was put on by the Neighborhood Restaurant Group, the same folks who hosted the Central Coast tasting in April. Their head wine person Erin told us an interesting story about the Champagne region, how growers have begun to take control back […]
Earlier this month Gabriele and I attended a California Central Coast wine tasting put on by the Neighborhood Restaurant Group. We’ve been fans of NRG for a long time. It was a fun thing to do on a Saturday afternoon and we got introduced to two new favorites. The host of the tasting was NRG’s […]
Happy early spring! We’ve enjoyed some new wines this winter and here are a few standouts. The 2019 J. Christopher Volcanique Pinot Noir is an excellent wine. From the Dundee Hills region in Oregon, the wine is a beautiful balance of raspberry fruit and acidity, light on the palate but with a lot going on. […]
The holiday season seems to increase the number of restaurants doing wine dinners. These are enjoyable ways to learn about different wines, and usually a pretty good bargain as well. Recently we attended one featuring French and Italian wines at Cedar Knoll, a conveniently local place right on the George Washington Parkway. The first three […]
Earlier this month Gabriele and I spent a fun week in Atlantic Beach, North Carolina. This area of North Carolina is a stretch of barrier islands and coastal towns also known as the Southern Outer Banks. While there we of course sampled some of the nicer restaurants in the area. Our first dinner out was […]
Last weekend Gabriele and I got away to the Blue Ridge Mountain wine area of Virginia. We stayed in a nice VRBO, had a couple of great meals and hit four wineries on Saturday. Our first stop after driving down Friday was the Ivy Inn in Charlottesville. It was a bit of a drive from […]
Usually on Work, Wine and Wheels I’m writing about red wine. But as summer arrives sometimes a white wine is the right choice. Recently Gabriele and I have enjoyed three quality summer Chardonnays that will enhance any event or meal. The first one is the Hartford Court 2021 Russian River Chardonnay. This wine is flat-out […]
Gabriele and I got back recently from a week in western North Carolina. We rented a cabin about halfway between Boone and Blowing Rock. It was a refreshing break that included a little snow, sightseeing and a lot of good food and wine. An old favorite of ours, Joy Bistro, had closed but we found […]
Last weekend Gabriele and I attended a fun wine-tasting event in the Del Ray neighborhood of Alexandria. Planet Wine set up some tables across the street from their location and poured 30 different wines for a crowd of about 50 on a gorgeous fall day. From the email invite: As always, we’re breaking this thing […]
Recently I had an occasion to celebrate and it made me think of a suitable wine. The kind of wine you spend more on because of the celebration and the experience you expect. My wife and I both like pinot noir so we did a comparison taste test of some well-known makers. Merry Edwards is […]
Earlier this month we took a long weekend in Pittsburgh. Gabriele’s new company is headquartered there and her job is full-time remote. But her boss wanted to bring the department together before the holidays. This was just before the Omicron variant started to dominate the headlines. We had a fun visit to Pittsburgh two years […]