Dan Fredman PR

Tom Colicchio's South Australia Dinner 1 Nov, w/Torbreck, d'Arenberg & St Hallett

Chef Tom Colicchio visited South Australia earlier this year and returned to the USA quite inspired by the food and wine of the region. He'll be behind the stove on Monday, 1 November at Craft Los Angeles when he prepares a 6+ course dinner featuring the wines of Torbreck and d'Arenberg. One would have to believe that having spent some time with Dave Powell and Chester Osborne made quite the impression on Mr. Colicchio...

The South Oz evening will begin with a reception featuring the wines of St Hallett from the Barossa Valley. Once seated, diners will begin with a dry white from d'Arenberg (of McLaren Vale) and move on into a formidable lineup from Torbreck, beginning with their Woodcutter's Semillon, Viognier/Marsanne/Roussanne, and then on to the Steading (GSM) and The Struie, a Shiraz blended from fruit grown in the Barossa Valley and the Eden Valley. Dessert will be accompanied by one of the d'Arenberg "Noble" stickies.

The dinner also celebrates the launch of the Unlimited Flights To Australia sweepstakes, sponsored by SA and Qantas; the winner will receive just that: unlimited flights to Australia for a year. There will also be some extraordinary travel packages (including tours of the Penfolds Magill Estate in Adelaide) available at the dinner, so come prepared to work out an itinerary for your visit!

For reservations, email Anna Morini at AMorini@CraftLosAngeles.com or call 424.279.4180.

Click on the image below for more Information about this fantastic event!

 

American Wine & Food Festival 2010

The team from Dan Fredman PR had the pleasure of participating in the annual American Wine & Food Festival (AKA: Meals on Wheels) again last Saturday. The sweltering folks representing Hirsch, Markus Huber, and Torbreck doing what they can to conserve energy and rehydrate prior to the start of the evening's festivities.

The weather was scorchingly hot, thus creating a larger-than-normal desire for cool white wines on the part of the arriving attendees (but a special shout-out to Chef Octavio Beccera of Palate Food + Wine who had the foresight to bring along a pile of ice-cold Modelo). Our tables were right at the entrance to the event, so almost immediately upon walking through the site's gates the thirsties were quenchable by a choice of Torbreck Viognier/Marsanne/Roussanne, Hirsch Chardonnay, or a bevy of Grüner Veltliners and a Riesling from Weingut Markus Huber.

Event co-founder Barbara Lazaroff interviews Chef Paul Prudhomme

Our tables were right next to those of Chef Paul Prudhomme, probably the first "celebrity chef" I'd come in contact with some 20+ years ago. His food remains excellent and he's a total trouper at these things, as always happy to chat with his fans and pose for pictures. One of my favorite things about this event is that all of the participating chefs tend to be extraordinarily gracious. This is more than just being friendly with potential patrons- in this day and age where it seems as if every recent graduate from culinary institutions considers themselves celebrity chefs, this group was (for the most part) a bunch of people who'd worked their way up through the ranks and are now running restaurants (if not empires) that are successful, inspiring, and are standard bearers for the idea of success being achieved through hard work fueled by a vision. I spent a little time chatting with Charles Phan of the Slanted Door and Jose Andrés of the Think Food Group. Both were charming and passionate about what they do.
Chef from Estiatoro Milos of the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas filets a whole fish cooked in Greek sea salt. It was a very memorable dish and worked well with the 2007 Antica Terra Pinot Noir that Nate Ready was pouring a few tables away.

The other AWFF co-founder, Chef Wolfgang Puck leads some young revelers on a tour of the evening's sights

A good time was had by all, and attendees had the opportunity to enjoy a lot of different flavors of food and wine, all on the Universal Studios backlot, surrounded by food and wine and music a bunch of new Audis (I liked the R8 Spyder 5.2 FSI Quattro quite a lot) Our tables were pretty much mobbed all night. At the Hirsch Winery table, Tess Bryant and her friend Holly poured the 2007 Hirsch San Andreas Pinot and 2008 M Pinot Noir and added a lot of fans to the mailing list.

Torbreck was (as usual) a crowd pleaser; in addition to the Viognier/Marsanne/Roussane white Rhône blend, we poured the 2009 Cuvée Juveniles GSM and the 2006 Struie. As the evening cooled down (although not that much) we had more takers for the red wines. 

The wines from Markus Huber seemed to catch people off guard, but after the first sip they liked them just fine. The three levels of Grüner Veltliner showed the difference made by sourcing fruit from a single vineyard (the 2009 Obere Steigen was magnificent) but it was also interesting to compare and contrast that wine with the single vineyard 2009 Huber Engelreich Riesling. Both were excellent, with the nod going to the GV in terms of playing nicely with the grilled lobster being served across the way from us. Huber was not the only Austrian winery represented at the event. Damon Ornowski was there from Vin Divino and he was pouring wine from Domäne Wachau and Zantho and he did a great job of keeping the band happy (particularly the bassist, given that she's from Vienna).

This is usually my favorite food and wine event of the year. It brings out a great crowd on both sides of the table and the weather is invariably pretty good. Check back at the their website for details on the 2011 American Wine & Food Festival.

Tobreck's 2008 Cuvée Juveniles w/Budi Kazali's Red Pork Belly @ HdR

Sommelier Journal Editor Randy Caparoso, MS held forth at a wine & food pairing demonstration during Hospice du Rhône last weekend. He matched the 2008 Torbreck Cuvée Juveniles with a Red Pork Belly prepared by the Ballard Inn's Chef Budi Kazali.

The pork was locally grown at Windrose Farm in Paso Robles, one of my favorite sources for all sorts of organic produce (they sell at the Santa Monica Farmers Market). The accompanying flavors of the intense pork essence worked beautifully with the unoaked Grenache/Shiraz/Mataro blend made by Dave Powell at Torbreck's winery in Australia's Barossa Valley. The extremely old vines producing the Grenache and Mataro (Mourvédre) grapes add a serious amount of gravitas to what might otherwise be a fairly quaffable wine. The lack of oak combined with the hint of earth from the Mataro makes Cuvée Juveniles an ideal wine to pair with pork, be it a slow-roasted loin on a spit over charcoal or sautéed pork belly and greens as was the case at HdR.

Master Sommelier Randy Caparoso has built his career around pairing food and wine. As the longtime wine director for the Roy's Restaurant group, he's developed a special facility for tying together flavors that others find difficult to match. He's always championed Rhône varieties and the way that Juveniles matched with this dish easily shows how the balance of fruit and earth enhances the food, while at the same time the wine becomes more vibrant because of the flavor elements of the dish.

Derby Wine Estate amid Bugattis, Aston-Martins, Bentleys, et al...

When I began representing Derby Wine Estates, I was delighted to discover that owners Ray and Pam Derby, in addition to loving wine and wine business, are also car people. They own a couple of really beautifully maintained, carefully selected collector cars and drive them on a regular basis. It's all well and good to have a couple of pristine vehicles in the garage, but it's so much more fun to hit the road in an old XKE or Corvette (the same situation holds true for people who collect wine but never get around to actually drinking their prized bottles).

So it felt appropriate that we availed ourselves of the opportunity to show the 2005 Derby Wine Estates Cabernet Sauvignon at a meet 'n' greet at the O'Gara Coach Company in Beverly Hills. The largest Bentley, Rolls-Royce, and Aston-Martin dealer in the US, they also represent Bugatti, Lamborghini, and other marques so obscure that few people have ever heard of them unless they're regular readers of Automobile magazines.

The wine was very well received by the attendees, mainly automobile brokers and financial advisers who do business with O'Gara on a regular basis. They were surrounded by a lot of phenomenal automobiles, great O'Gara staff members, and excellent hors d'oeuvres. 

While I'm very partial to the design and engineering that goes into the Bugatti (above), the financial aspects of such a car are immense. By some rough calculations, for the cost of one Bugatti Veyron, you could buy approximately 45000 cases of Derby Cabernet. Personally, I'd probably take a pass on the Bugatti and buy an Aston Martin DBS, a Rolls-Royce Phantom, and a Lamborghini Murciélago LP670-4 SV, and still have enough money left over for a couple of hundred cases of Derby Cabernet. Depending on currency fluctuation, there might even be plenty remaining for some Derby Pinot Gris. 

I love working events such as this one. The O'Gara folks were great to talk to, and best of all, the crowd was friendly, they enjoyed the wine, and took the Derby brochures with them.