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Star Sommelier of Sonoma County
| Thursday, 23-04-09Star Chefs.com recently announced the 2009 winners for their Napa Sonoma Rising Stars Award. And Geoff Kruth, of The Farmhouse Inn and Restaurant in Forestville, was honored as the Star Sommelier in Sonoma County.
One of Kruth’s tips that the judges liked: When in doubt, serve champagne with soup. It provides a nice contrast in textures.
Kruth is a Master Sommelier, one of less than 150 throughout the world, and he founded the non-profit Guild of Sommeliers.
Other Sonoma County Stars include:
CHEFS: Eric Korsh and Ginevra Iverson, Restaurant Eloise
HOTEL CHEF: Jesse Mallgren, Madrona Manor
RESTAURATEUR AWARD: John Toulze, the girl and the fig, fig café, and Estate
SUSTAINABILITY: John Stewart and Duskie Estes, Zazu and Bovolo
MIXOLOGIST: Scott Beattie, bar manager at Cyrus Restaurant and author of Artisanal Cocktails
Check out this video of Eric Korsh just before he and wife Ginevra Iverson opened Restaurant Eloise in Sebastopol. (Guess which of his dishes a lot of people would choose as their “death row final meal.”)
And here’s a video of John Toulze right before he and Sondra Bernstein opened Estate restaurant in Sonoma.
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So Much Wine, So Little Time, So What?
| Thursday, 20-11-08
Earlier this week I took a few bottles of wine to a friend--actually, she is my teacher but explaining the exact relationship would be a distraction from my point--who had expressed a fondness for both syrah and sangiovese. When I gave her the package of wine she plopped down in the middle of the studio and began examining each label, a look of delight on her face. She reminded me of a child on Christmas morning, excited, eager, grateful.
I felt a little sheepish.
It is so easy, here in Sonoma County, to take wine for granted, especially if you work close to it, as I do. Samples arrive on my doorstep almost daily and sometimes I think, sheeesh, more wine.
It is easy to feel overhwhelmed, especially when storage space is limited, as mine is. And then there’s the recycling that the packaging requires, no small thing. And I have twice broken a toe rushing from one room to another and failing to see the cache of wine bottles behind the couch. Ouch!
And so the look on my teacher’s face slowed me down a bit.
Have I grown jaded, cynical?
Maybe just a little but only temporarily, I promise.
How lucky we are to live in this wonderful place, where the land gives us such an extraordinary bounty. I will never be able to drink all of the wines that find their way to me but I will never again take them for granted, not even briefly.
And speaking of sangiovese, I have in general been disappointed with the varietal’s performance in California. But a couple of weeks ago I tasted DaVero’s It is delicious, smooth, full and easy to drink, the best example of sangiovese I’ve seen in California.
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