The Wine Knows

Continued from COME TREAD ON ME - Day 1

Day Two

We purposely took in the majority of wineries during the first day, because we knew we had to leave for home before 4 p.m. on day two. Visiting 10 wineries in a 7 hour period is a bit much….but it was still a lot of fun!

This economy has taken its toll on another favorite restaurant. This time, it's Pearl's on Pearl in downtown Ellensburg, Wash.

Ron and Cinda Kohler will close the restaurant Feb. 28 after eight years of combining fantastic cuisine, regional wines, live music and comfortable surroundings into a successful venture.

Day 1 of 2

There is something about blazing the wine trail of Yakima Valley that stirs the interest of most of us wine lovers. Whether we fancy ourselves as a wine expert or a wine novice, there is always something to see and learn about when touring wine country. Did you know that only one bottle in six consumed in Washington was produced here? Many would think that the only wine country that needs exploring is the California Wine County. This just isn’t so! There are so many different wineries in the Northwest, that sometimes it can seem rather daunting when a person wants to explore it all. My husband and I decided that we would select a certain Northwest AVA each month and explore that AVA to its fullest. We will then feature the selected wineries on our website NORTHWESTWINEQUEST.COM (currently under construction). In doing so, we hope to share what we have learned about these small wineries with others.

I've been working on a new feature that compiles feeds from a variety of blogs whose posts focus on Northwest wine.

I put this together with Yahoo! Pipes, a tool I'm still fooling around with, trying to learn. So I have some refining to do still, but I wanted to share this with you.

This past weekend, we covered several wineries on both sides of the Columbia River Gorge. Some we had been to before, some were new experiences. I have always supported the idea of charging a 5$ fee for people who don't purchase a bottle, especially the smaller wineries. It is rare that I don't purchase at least one bottle frome each place we visit, mostly because I usually find at least one I liked, and partly because I want to help out the small operations.

Hey People!

Well, Bottle Shock is finally out on DVD. We rented it last night and watched it with great anticipation.

I was a little mixed on it. It is a very superficial treatment of a pretty major event in the wine world. Wine lovers will find that it falls short in history, as it really only deals with Chateau Montelena, who won the chardonnay contest. There is so much more that could have been done in the story line. Even at the big tasting at the end, they only covered the whites. Interesting... the mention of Stags Leap Wine Cellars winning the red contest was a footnote at the end of the film.

We were recently blessed by being invited to a private tasting of McCrea Cellars. McCrea is located in Ranier Washington. They claim to be Washington States premier Rhone varietal winery. Their wines are pricy but well worth the money for that special bottle. The wine makers claim to fame is that he wrote the cantina song for the orginal Star War's movie.

It was with great sadness that I learned this morning of the passing of Gary Andrus, who owned Archery Summit Winery until 2001 and later Gypsy Dancer.

We are relatively new to Washington State and am curious about places to go on the Washington coastline. Where can we go without giving up good food and wine?

Yesterday I visited Pizzeria Venti in Prosser. This is the new Pizza/Italian Restaurant. We had a lunch consisting of tossed salad, Bocce bols (a meatball in dough), and a slice of white pizza.
They have 4 beers on tap and an extensive wine list of local small wineries and some Italian wines.