Tag / wine

La Brea is the new Melrose. Remember the artists – of the fashion and fabric sort – remember how they dreamed of having a store front to display their designs. Back in the day that was Melrose. Where they could afford it. Where they all found their dreams coming true. And they did and they established a street famous now for the radiant, urban, west coast open air fabrics that decorate many a Hollywood body and every few years, the rest of the country as well.

They made it the center of local fashion and the rent went sky high and the new, young designers dreamed of Melrose openings, while only the established could showcase.

I live in the La Brea / Wilshire hood. The Beauty District. SoHo: South Hollywood. I am drunk and walking home. I live here. There are three noteworthy wine bars in my hood and I walk home from a Masi, northern Italy, Amarone style tasting with my television development partner and see the parking attendant, with his mohawk, reading a book while he waits for the next wine bar patron, like me, probably drunk already upon arrival.

Bless the northern Italian wines.

Graffiti hedgerows, cacti and succulent lawns, a stumble, a stagger – even the industry executives look deeply in the eye and they are real people and I am just a misty inhale, unafraid of … anything. Longing for the intimate adventure and learning everything I know from the community consciousness. All I do is listen. Really well. I don’t watch tv. I don’t read any newspapers. I don’t listen to the radio stations or even watch the Youtube. I listen hard to the people who talk to me and take it in like it was the voice of the Universe giving me vital information.

What is so vital about living? C’mon now. It’s not actually that hard to keep living. Anymore.

I’ve been to paradise where the people don’t need money. The land gives so much food, none would fathom paying a price for a banana. They gift and give and socialize and sit. And there isn’t a lot of work to be done. There is no property to own. I’ve eaten the raw cacao in paradise and I’ve walked the glittering sidewalks of Hollwyood. And the people – the people in both locales are the great variable. They are surprising beyond belief, but all the while predictable. Perhaps we should listen to each other deeper. Looking in the eyes of the executive and wasting time on a chit chat with the native.

My native people – the designers, the artists, the producers, the neighbors laughing every nite – so stoned – watching sports. I love them. I cradle a bottle of Masi Massianco in my arms. A gift from the tasting at 320 South Wine Lounge on La Brea in Hollywood tonite. A birthday gift. Because every day of October is a day to celebrate being alive to me. Happy birthday. No drunk driving. Just a stagger home and a chaser of oj, spirulina and MSM.

How did I grow up a farm town girl in Michigan and turn into the most integrated, authentic wild woman in the majorest of cities? I don’t feel any conflict. I feel every day with my wide open, screenless windows, I am outside. I am in nature. I am with community. I am healthy. I have opportunities. I am stimulated. I am curious. I am in the right place. Give me love, give me music, give me wine. I will do what I must to continue this blessing. Without revision, I offer myself complete. I give and give and receive. I receive, too.

Crawling to another wine bar.  Seems like such a contradiction in terms.  Wine is not usually a gung-ho go-get-em score-that-touch-down wake-up-hung-over kind of experience.  Wine usually sits you down and says “Take your shoes off, relax … stay until the morning – or the next.  Just watch the stars shift and tell me stories in whispers at the crux of my ear.”  Wine wants to hear what you have to whisper.  And my third stop that evening was the resting point for my enjoyment.

A.O.C. provides a fuzzy blanket to spread out on.  John, the pourer, enjoys wine like I do and I when it comes to reds, I’d take his suggestion before even cracking the menu.  When it comes to whites and bubblies, well … I still like to feel in charge.  Flights of bubblies and a glass of white to follow – this is a private pleasure of mine right now.  And it’s so easy to alternate the light wines with water leaving no residual regret from a three-stop crawl the nite before. The pairing menu at A.O.C. is seasonal with vegan options available without special request and the raw vegan succotash is kind of something I dream about on a regular basis now.  I’ve never made reservations before showing up, so I’ve never actually gotten to sit down.  Instead, I belly up to the bar and get to know my pourer a little better.  Make coo faces with my Lover and pretend I don’t notice that I’m the only one dressed in primary colors.  It’s okay.  Wine is color blind.  And if the wine is good enough, so are those imbibing.

So, with great wine-taster finesse, we drink twice as much water as wine throughout our tasting and enjoy a walk when we are done before taking off for Los Angeles where the wine bar crawl continues!  There is a neighborhood in Hollywood I just adore – even now that some of the grit is gone.  I call it East of Highland and it’s a short 2.5 mile bike ride from my apartment. If I am not in my South Hollywood, I am East of Highland either taking classes at Second City, performing with The Lalas at Bardot, eating some raw vegan divinity at Life Food Organics, popping my head in at Pan Pipes or picking out the perfect avocado at the Hollywood and Vine farmer’s market.  Yes, I always considered East-of-Highland my perfect neighborhood – if only I could find a place to nab a killer glass of wine.  When I discovered Bodegas, I hoped it would become that place. The design is very modern and perfect for the 30-something industry-professional hipster crowd overflowing within.  Bodegas was happy to accommodate requests for vegan tapas, which I always am grateful for.  Unfortunately, the wine menu was chosen by someone with a sweet-tooth.  And I, like the next Californian, love a fruit-forward wine, but not at the expense of something to think about.  The waitress didn’t have much to say about her taste in wines when I asked for her opinion on a glass.  The crowd seemed to be focused on up tempo conversations about this show or that production and not so much into savoring anything too complex.  Sweet wines work well at Bodegas for that reason probably: no one wants to think too hard about it – they just wanna drink some unoffensive, quick and easy wine. I ordered four glasses at Bodegas just to get a feel for the list.  I did not finish any of the four.  Fruit-forward is one thing, but jammy sweet is another and it’s just not my thing.  Here’s a quote from their landing page on the web: welcome to bodega.

We like to drink wine. Not so much sniff it, stare at it, swirl it or try to describe it with funny words… but mostly just drink it. And most of our wines are the same price so it’s easy to try different things.

Obviously with my opening disclaimer to this wine bar crawl review, with my insistence that wine is a call to develop one’s own sensuality by expanding the senses, massaging a partner’s leg underneath the table, getting so high on sniffing that one can literally smell every pheromonic nuance in the room, I guess I should have known Bodegas might not provide the menu or the experience for me.  Still, I’m delighted that East of Highland has a mod wine bar – something for everyone.

 

 

Wine bars are a distant second to the actual experience of visiting a vineyard. I feel like a broken record replaying myself et nauseum when I say it, so I will say it quickly and get on with the show: if wine is a call to develop one’s sensuality, then wine tasting anywhere but the vineyard is like giving a massage with only 8 fingers.  Sure, it can be done.  Sure, a great massage can come from the eight-fingered hand, but without vines, animals, soil, air, architecture, energy design and the human beings, I am getting only 8 fingers of information through this touch.  My senses are only partially fulfilled, my sensuality cheated.  No matter how receptive I dedicate myself to being in this exchange, 10 fingers would be a better massage. Lift the needle and set it in another groove now:  wine bars are a wonderful way to get a good glass of wine, amongst other sensually-enthusiastic folk, when you don’t have the oomph to get out of the city. If you can find a sensual equal to wine bar crawl with you, then it becomes easier and easier to forget those organic grape fields.  My sensuality partner and I crawled through 3 wine bars the other weekend and I’m not ashamed to say it.  We started way up in Ventura at The Wine Rack (formerly known as Weaver Wines), owned by a conscious woman whom favors organic and sustainable farming methods.  Local wines decorate the tasting menu and some of my favorites were poured in flight.  The other tasters at The Wine Rack must have gotten the sensuality memo because they felt entirely comfortable cooing and reclining on the couches in this consciously country/romantic atmosphere.  International couples representing every age bracket flirted and jested and threw back their heads in casual laughter.  I like this place.  The city feel is notably missing.  Of all the wine bars I crawled this night, The Wine Rack felt most like a vineyard’s tasting room.  Plus, it’s literally one block away from Ventura’s only raw vegan restaurant, Mary’s Secret Garden.  BIG plus.

Cork Tree Cellars Wine Bar and Bistro in Carpiteria, CA was the hidden delight of my 2010 California Avocado Festival experience. As if the Avocado Festival itself was not enough for this California raw vegan renegade, it was topped when my Lover and I snuck into a doorway open to the festival crowd. Right in front of the Guac-N-Roll main stage, I nestled into a low-slung love seat, placed a request for a flight of pinot gris and drifted away to the festival’s out of control ska band, The Upbeat, keeping everyone on their feet.

What a delicious contrast I relished as the knowledgeable server returned with a finely displayed wine flight with a penny next to each stemless glass. She said “a penny for your thoughts” as she laid the spread before me and I noticed each tasting pour of wine centered on a circle burnt into the serving tray with three sections to choose from: Liked It, Not My Thing and Get Me A Bottle Now (or something to that extent).

One of my favorite things about wine is the tasting experience. If any one knows my particular brand of wine enthusiasm, then they know that I never buy a bottle from a store or warehouse. 60% of the wine experience is the road trip to the vineyard, the light catching the rows of healthy vines, the animals nesting or not within the property, the architectural fungi shui of the tasting room itself, the energy sources chosen to run the winery, the personality and education of the pourer, the glasses chosen, the laughter of the other guests, the food pairings offered, the glass quality, the sound of the cork and ah – finally we get to the wine! I feel if I miss any of the above, then I’ve missed over half of the wine experience. So it’s a big deal for me to go to a tasting room or a wine bar that focuses more on the social aspects of the enjoyment of wine: we all like wine, we can all go together, we still get a heavily sensual experience and we don’t even have to leave the city. Or the festival in this case.

So my Lover and got all sensual and sniffed and spoke our memories, we swirled and traded covert leg massages, we tasted and lost ourselves in silence while the imagery flooded our heads and the character spread through our bodies. We laughed and kissed and … in this way, I can certainly appreciate the social aspects of a wine bar. It’s lovely the way a good tasting room or wine bar can bring a part of the vineyard experience right to you.

Cork Tree Cellars had a wall of wine with an extensive local, boutique labels by the glass. I was in pure ecstasy to find one of my favorite pinot and chardonnay producers, Alma Rosa, the first pinot gris represented on my penny tray. Alma Rosa has been producing sustainably farmed grapes for over 40 years and have been growing certified organic wine grapes since 1983. I’ve always felt that I can taste sunshine in the wine maker, Christian Roguenant’s, finesse. And even at the Cork Tree Wine Bar, I think of Alma Rosa’s outdoor tasting room with Princess the cat laying where a floor mat should be, refusing to move, requiring every visitor step over her on their way to the Alma Rosa bar. Even at Cork Tree I taste these things in the wine.

And then my attention is grabbed by another upbeat dance melody and I am reminded, there is a festival honoring the fruit of fruits, the California avocado, right outside the open door. Califoria wine and California avocados – the world drinks and eats our goodness. And here I am right here, living it.

 

Last guest standing. Kind of.

He’s passed out on my sink. It was a thorough nite for him. It must suck to be passed out at the sink.

I’m gonna pass out here myself in a moment. We opened a lot of wine tonite at the OffWorld film wrap party. That I hosted. I fucking love California.

Amongst the wine opened, we did get the joy of finishing off two bottles of Beckman, of Santa Ynez Valley, CA. Certified biodynamically and organically farmed, we got to compare a rare 2006 Purusima Mountain Vineyard Grancach and the 2008 Block Eight Granache. Also certified biodynamic and organically farmed, we got to enjoy a 2008 Ampelos Syrache, a Syrah and Granache varietal blend. Amongst the Frey and the Chateau Du Pape, I am forever in love with California and that is why I live here. I must drive and taste these hills.

But enough of that fond reminiscing of how great wine can be. My friend stirs and is sick and I wish I could do anything, but I can’t. I can’t make the nausea go away and I can’t make the nausea awesome. Things are awesome. But I know nausea sucks and I can’t fix it. So I will remember the wine while filling my own belly with food and water to wake up having had a good time as the host tomorrow morning for my Sunday church; the farmer’s market. Blessed be.

One, two men with a bar stool in between.  Looks like a seat reserved just for me.

It’s been a thoroughly enjoyable evening in Honolulu for a wine geek like myself.  Amuse and Formaggio Wine Bars both provided tasting experiences to remember, but now back at my hotel, I fear if I continue tasting at this pace, I may have to request the gentlemen on either side of me to do the remembering.  Things are getting … social.  And silly.  Thank goodness for wine bars inside hotels.  I was assured to not be driving anywhere after, which is always a consideration, and in this case a non-issue.  So I bellied up to the Sensei Sushi Bar in the Waikiki Beach Marriott, flirted my best alhoa smile to the beer drinking men surrounding me, and asked for the third time that evening, “Do you have any Volcano or Maui label?”  And again, the response was, “What’s that?”  Apparently, not even Hawaii residents are aware that wine grapes are being grown and wine being produced on their own paradisal islands.  I did my geek research before setting out on the great Honolulu wine hunt 5 hours ago and I discovered there are indeed two vineyards in the Hawaiian islands;  Volcano Winery on Big Island, blending tropical fruits like yellow guava and the exotic jabitocaba with traditional wine grapes, or Maui Wine on Maui including pure cane sugar, pineapple and grapes in their feed stock and even producing a secondary-fermentation sparkling wine.  Right here in tropical Hawaii!  You can see why I was excited to sample the authentic wine terrior of this unique climate.  Alas, 3 wine bars have I conquered tonite and 3 confounded responses to my request for local wine.  It exists, but it looks like that adventure will be reserved for the vineyards tasting rooms only. I asked how my bar mates’ beers were as I sloppily fumbled through another impressive wine list, and discovered both men were locals to O’ahu and one was a pretty mean karaoke main-stager.  The other moved to O’ahu without a job, which I thought was totally cool, and was looking now for something in his real estate profession.  He knew a TON about the entertainment industry and both men entertained me attentively, but neither offered to split the 2004 Witchcraft Pinot Noir by-the-bottle with me, so putting a cap on my own sloppiness, I opted for a single glass of 2005 Tscharke Tempranillio instead. The Tempranillio wasn’t as rubbery as I prefer my Tempranillio to be (am I allowed to say that?), and I never could figure out why bars with extensive lists of wines, offered mostly by-the-bottle, would serve their wines in generic thick-lipped wine glasses, but at least they were glass and the clientele was local and about O’ahu; my mind had already changed from reluctance to delight. I had fun in Honolulu, O’ahu.  It’s no Hollywood, but it is indeed officially a city and has city things to do.  The world-traveling Karaoke star hugged me before departing and the brave jobless man walked me out, lighting a cigarette just to stand by a little longer.  All I can remember at this point, was how thoroughly delicious the ocean breeze was brushing my body from my balcony’s vantage point.  I am left with gratitude for these precious moments, between sips of sensuality and the unpredictable surrender to indulgence.

Voted Hawaii’s Best Wine Bar five years in a row, I expected my next stop, Formaggio’s Wine Bar, to make me want to stay a while.  Tucked in the back of a busy island parking lot, it would have been easy to miss Formaggios, with it’s entirely blacked out windows and only one little neon “open” sign suggesting life inside.  Dramatically dark and a sexily so interior, I was impressed by the renegade choice to sacrifice windows in order to assure eternal night inside the establishment.  Black out those windows, accent with brick, woods, reds and flames and offer a phenominal and unique wine list impossible to read in this dim room, and you’ve got yourself Formaggio’s Wine Bar – another Honolulu city stop saturated with wine drinkers; Japanese, Australian, Hawaiian – slowing life down and paying attention to the nuances – paying attention to one another. Most every wine on Formaggio’s list is available by the bottle AND the glass – AND the tasting pour.  Except the Champagne I started with of course.  I have a real taste for Champagne and sparkling wines and hesitated not, sparing none, when ordering this glass of Domaine Leflaive, Macon-Verzy ~ Burgundy, France 2007.  With every light bubble bite I ascended just to be with the taste.  To say a Champagne is woodsy and winter sweet at the same time seems like make believe, but indulge me for just this moment – exceptional Champagne goes with special occasions as well as private bubble baths.  Noteworthy Champagne goes with morning meetings as well as evening reading.  Or between Saturday nite Honolulu wine tastings as a clean up, complimented by another two glasses of water, and guiding me safely back to my hotel room on the ocean.  But not done.  I’m not done yet.

I sit down next to the two men at the bar because I want to get to know them.  If even breifly, since I intend on not seeing these men again – ever – in my life.  But that means a focused intensity is required disproportional to the introduction duration.  I am open minded to what I might hear or learn or recognize in even short encounters with strangers because … I truly love people.  So, too, is true love for wine. I’ve spent the last few weeks in the Hawaiian islands.  First; Kaua’i, the most lovely of all with an impressive grand canyon and half an isle of wild, isolated coast.  And every time I mentioned to a local Kaua’ian surf hippie that I was headed to O’ahu next, unanimously, the people responded, “You are gonna love O’ahu.  It’s the big city.  It has great food.” Two alerts immediately echo through my true traveler mind:  1; living on a small island like Kaua’i must give one a bit of social island fever, no matter how many waterfalls, and O’ahu must seem like the bridge to a huge, outside world from time to time.  And 2; I’ve lived in NYC’s Hells Kitchen, Chicago’s Bridgeport, San Francisco’s Sunset District and LA’s Hollywood.  I’ve traveled Rio, Tokyo, London, Bangkok and Toronto.  So, O’ahu’s “big city” Honolulu better be a crazy amazing city, like, way more good food or way more diversity or something way more outstanding for me, coming from where I’m coming from, to be drawn to O’ahu for it’s city-ness (when I more likely just wish it were a tropical jungle uninviting to the resort-bound tourist).   Like a true people lover, whom sits down for a drink with stranger just to get to know them for a second, though, I decide that the true traveler, too, sits down for a stay just to get to know a city for this moment. Thank goodness I was open to O’ahu, because when I got here I had a total turn around.  Honolulu IS a city.  The RESIDENTS far outnumber the tourists.  And it’s way BIGGER THAN I THOUGHT. …  With good food.  And noteworthy wine bars.  Yes, Honolulu is a city. The elegant simplicity of Amuse Wine Bar‘s mingling and tasting room was in direct contrast to the street of adult video stores, Korean strip clubs and erotic performer’s costume shops (love those shops).  Amuse rose over a safe and interesting neighborhood with fast city motorcycles and Saturday nite traffic silently wizzing by from the other side of a 2nd story full glass wall.  Amuse Wine Bar boasts noteworthy design – in more than architecture, my friends – in wine serving. I must say it: straight off, I missed the humanity of the pourer and that did not change throughout the tasting.  There were gorgeous Hawaiian and Japanese human beings managing the Amuse tasting room, but my tasting pours were self-dispensed by the push of a button.  Oh, this concept is brilliant!  I purchase a sleek, black magnetic strip card and place a dollar value on it.  I stroll around pleasurably-designed circular wine stations with over 80 bottles being “poured”.  I place my card in a slot and the dollar value reads while I notice varietals, valleys, countries, vintages and just north of every tapped wine bottle, a decimal point numeral indicating the price of an automated one-ounce “pour” glowed in moody red.  Many glowed 1.30 – 2.90 numerals.  Many were in the 5.25 range.  But there were 15.33 one ounce pours, too, and to that I have to shout out a thank you to Amuse – how often would I throw down $300 on a bottle of wine without tasting it?  I mean … on my fantasy good day, sure, but on every other day of my traveling life, I am enthusiastic for the one ounce poor – from a bottle of wine that was aged in a reading room, with every sip, a new novel unfolding a full story. AND I like to sample lots of wines.  An entire glass is honestly not the most fun for a little ol’ light-weight clean-eating fit-chick cheap-date like me.  I want to taste the 2005 Robert Sinskey Cabernet Saviaugn (organically, biodynamically and sustainably farmed grapes with all three certifications at that!), AND the Paso Robles Pinot Noir (the best Pinot I have EVER had – whom was the label – it started with T), AND the Argentinian Malbec (what a value).  I want to try them all and because of Amuse’s phenomenal one ounce self-pour system, I did.  Everything was exceptional and I apologize for not remembering some of the many of the labels I tasted because honestly, I had no idea when I arrived, how delightful this experience was going to be.  My little black funding card seemed to go on forever.  And every bottle was a well-opened sample of good taste from around the world with a majority of California features, to my celebration.

Having grown up in southern Michigan, I have a soft spot for the state. Is it really a coincidence that when I am asked by Los Angeles folk where I grew up, upon answering I receive an uncanny, “The coolest people always come from Michigan” response. I’m not kidding. LA folk like people who come from Michigan. And so do I.

Having spent a good 17 years of my upbringing in the Great Lake State, you’d think I’d know Michigan like the back of my hand. Or more appropriately, like the front of my hand:

I pride myself after all, in knowing the primo hot spots like the still-functioning drive-in movie theatre just outside Coldwater. Or the swimming pool on the 9th floor of Detroit’s Masonic Temple which was constructed, but never filled, since it would have made the building collapse. Or Ann Arbor’s U of M diag where one of the nation’s most organized marijuana legalization rallies, Hash Bash, has been held annually for 38 years.

Yea, I think I know it all about Michigan, but it wasn’t until I had moved away and turned 21 that my little bro introduced me to Michigan’s great wineries. I seriously had no idea that my home state even grew wine grapes. To my delight, yes, indeed they do: over 2,000 acres of wine grape vineyards reside in Michigan’s two peninsulas, feeding 71 commercial wineries. That’s a lot of wine I never knew about!

I’m lucky to have developed my palate and education in wine when performing in STOMP in San Francisco, road tripping every theatrical “dark day” (ie: Monday) to Napa and Sonoma. Sometimes, I am convinced, it takes a relationship with the fermented libation before it’s valleys and vineyards will reveal themselves to you. I had to earn my ability to appreciate Michigan wine before it presented itself to me. And let me tell you, now I am delighted to taste every time I visit. Just delighted.

Michigan accommodates it’s short growing season by growing grapes suited for the climate, like Pinot Noir, the impossible-to-find Gewurztraminer and my personal favorite; the German riesling. This past weekend,  a new friend and I tasted Traverse City’s Chateau Grand Traverse winery and not only was the entire tasting FREE (unheard of in California!), but there were no less than 25 wines to taste (for FREE!), of which no less than 6 were rieslings, ranging from dry to late harvest to blush blends. Riesling is so widely grown in the state and as a varietal world-wide, is coveted with the widest array of character, that Michigan has created a “Sweetness Scale” on their labels giving the enthusiast, like me, a visual introduction to the style of this multi-facited grape before the tasting. Some of Chataeu Grand Traverse brave blending included riesling with cranberry wine, too. Which brings me to another strong way Michigan accommodates it’s short growing season and it’s aggressive temperature and humidity swings during that short time: fruit wines.

All across the state, you will find odd fruits being fermented into wines, like cranberries, rhubarb, and of course the famous Traverse City cherries. I even found a cherry port! I personally love tasting the odd fruit wines, like Chateau Grand Traverse’s cherry / ginseng or mulled cherry wine, but alas, no odd fruit wine has ever won my heart over the tried and true grape.

Another way Michigan accommodates a short growing season is adding sugar, or sometimes the juice of the grape being fermented, depending on the winery. The short growing season does not allow some varietals to develop the full sugar content needed to produce an alcoholic ferment before frost. And although I am not used to, nor a fan of this sugar-adding, which is actually illegal in California, I understand how Michigan wine makers are determined to participate in the production of recognizable varietal wines, of which they are the 8th largest wine producing state in the nation.

Finally, Michiganders use the climate alas, to their advantage, producing honest to goodness ice wines, frozen on the vine. California sends their grapes to the freezers to artificially compete, but there is nothing like the authentic, rare gem of a true Michigan ice wine for all-evening sipping – or evaporating, as I prefer to attempt. Nature bestows gifts amongst the challenges for the perseverant and passionate to embrace.

Chataeu Grand Traverse’s downhill tasting room was simple (and had no restroom – what?). Very quaint and country in presentation, with a foot bridge crossing a small creek just outside along the lush green, spring grasses. I hear tell that Chateau Grand Traverse also has a tasting room at their vineyards which stits atop a hill, and looks out over the valley and Lake Michigan from it’s walls of glass and windows.

John poured with attentiveness to the designated driver and was a wealth of humble information when implored. The wines were moderately priced, as “young” whites can often be, with many bottles averaging $15 per, encouraging the non-driving and well-poured taster to take a few back to mom and little bro as gifts.

I did not find evidence of organic, biodynamic or sustainable growing practices being promoted amongst the wine grape growing community in Michigan, but having grown up here, I figure it’s on it’s way. Michigan wants to be a progressive and open minded state – it just takes them a few years longer than the coasts. Once the popularity, reason and excitement of land management as it relates to wine grape flavor and life-force nuances is embraced by Michiganders, I have faith in my folk: they will make waves by pioneering sustainability with a community fervor unique to the hearty, Midwestern spirit.