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March 2008 Contra Costa Wine Group
Newsletter
Our last meeting was held at the
beautiful home of Tom and Donna Powers in Martinez on “Leap Day.”
This was our annual meeting for the handing out of awards and the
pouring of the First Place winning wines. Donna and Tom laid out a
wonderful table of hors d’oeuvres for all in attendance. My
estimate of those at the meeting was right around 60 people. That
made it the second largest meeting of the year. Special thanks are
given to Tom and Donna for hosting this meeting as it has now been
held at their home for the last several years. Thanks also to those
in attendance as you all really “behaved yourselves” so that we
could keep the meeting organized and keep it moving along well. We
had 24 First Place wines to pour that evening!
Special thanks are also given to
Peter and Martha Dragovich for taking on the task of arranging for
all of the awards that were handed out that night. The ribbons were
more “special” this year as it was our 30th Annual
Professional Wine Judging and Potluck Dinner.
During the meeting, there was general
consensus that the Contra Costa Wine Group should have a presence at
the first annual WineMaker Magazine Conference being held in Rohnert
Park. We have been in correspondence with Brad Ring, the
Publisher. Mark Beecher, Tony Blackburn, Thierry Thys, myself and
Lee Wines will be the CCWG representatives, pouring group member
wines on Friday afternoon/evening, May 16, 2008. We’ll have our own
table with our banner proudly displayed on the front of our table.
Now you all have your first opportunity to donate one or two bottles
of your wine to pour at this event. Lee Wines will be at the next
meeting, Friday, March 28, 2008. Please dig through your stash of
great hand crafted wines and bring a bottle or two to this meeting
and get it to Lee. If you can’t make this meeting, you’ll have
another chance on Friday night, April 25, 2008. Thanks everyone.
Right at “press time” Maria
Pilkington sent me the following email:
Hi Al, Just wanted to provide you with an update regarding
scheduling a speaker/presenter for this month's meeting. We are
still waiting on confirmation from two possible speakers, which we
hope to finalize tomorrow. I'll let you know tomorrow (March 20).
Maria (I couldn’t wait, al t.)
Worst case, this meeting can be
strictly a social evening with lots of great conversation, mostly
about winemaking, I’m sure, and great wine. Dennis Miner was ill at
the last meeting and will be pouring his 2006 Contra Costa Merlot
First Place wine at this meeting.
The meeting is going to be held
Friday night, March 28th at the home of new members,
Steve and Joyce Mirabito in Lafayette. The meeting will start right
around 7:30 p.m. Steve let me know that parking can be a bit
difficult so he suggested that members hooked up with others going
to the meeting and carpool together.
Bring a jacket, a folding chair, a
wine glass and a bottle of your finest wine. If you haven’t made
any wine yet, please bring a bottle of a commercial wine that you
think the group may find interesting.
My family and I leave for the Grand
Canyon, Tucson and Phoenix for some baseball Spring Training games
on Saturday morning, the 22nd. It’s only the second
“Turner Family Road Trip” and my two boys are now 23 and 25! We
won’t be returning until after the meeting, unfortunately. If
you’re planning on going to this meeting, and especially if you live
“near” San Ramon, please give me a call so that I can deliver the
CCWG name tags to your home today or Friday. Thanks.
Enjoy the meeting. Al Turner,
Secretary, Contra Costa Wine Group (925) 837-9384
P.S.
Anyone having Website experience with some time on their hands,
HELP! Our website, ccwinegroup.com,
is woefully out of date! The links to contact someone are OK, but
quite a few newsletters, grape sources, etc. really need to be
posted. I’m “Front Page” challenged! |
