Good-bye to an old friend, Classes, Subscriptions, and Wine Walk

There’s so much to report this week, that I don’t know where to start!

What do you want to hear first? The bad news or the good news?

Let’s start with the bad news.

Jimmy’s Café is now closed. I am incredibly upset, not only because it means the end of the cutest little café in the city, but also because of the loss of the fabulous wine club, the Sunday brunch, and (my favorite) The Crossings tri-tip salad. Along with a glass of Pinot Noir, it was ethereal and perfect. Jimmy is very busy right now (I understand that a golf course made him an offer he couldn’t refuse), and just couldn’t do everything at once. All he needed was 48-hour days. Sometimes the toughest decisions are, well, *tough* to make. The wonderful restaurant stands empty and we are all the poorer because of it.

Best of luck to Jimmy with his future endeavors and here’s hoping that he’ll find the time (ha!) to open another restaurant in the future. We love you! Now what the heck am I going to do for those days when I want a Sunday brunch?!?

Next, a request to my readers.

SUBSCRIBE!!! Somewhere on the right-hand side of this Blog is a place where you can go to subscribe. Please do it and help me reduce my spam-level mailing every week! It will also help justify the money I’m paying each month to have a service manage my mailings and subscriptions! Thanks.

And now for the good news!

The Combatting Swirl Envy – Lite! classes are really rockin’! I can’t believe how much fun we’re having and great everything is going. There’s always something different in each class!

I’m always being asked if each class is truly different from the other. Yes, they are. For instance, last week’s class was on bottles, bottle shapes, opening, pouring, storing, etc., wine. Next week’s classes will be different. Considerably. Let’s just say that lots of sniffing with actual specimens is involved.

You may have noticed that I used the word “classes.” As in plural. Yeah, I did.

Thanks to Khoury’s Fine Wine and Spirits, there will be a class on Tuesday, February 4, at the South Durango store. It is the basic, beginning Swirl Envy class. Wednesday’s class is still at our base camp, Valley Cheese and Wine (the Stinky Cheese store) where we began this fun endeavor. We are looking to expand to make the classes available to more wine Neophytes in the Valley. Stay tuned for more locations and classes!

Check out the link to Local Wine Events for more information!

Next week I will be talking about more stuff in Vegas which I had intended to do this week, but the closure of Jimmy’s Café really surprised and saddened me. We’ll get back to regular stuff next week.

By the way, I joined the local wine meetup (http://www.meetup.com) in order to learn more about local tastings, home and vendor events, and other wine-related stuff. When you go the site, just do a “wine” lookup based on your local zip code. I haven’t attended an event yet, but it looks like it’s a lot of fun! What a great way to meet other wine folks in the local area!

Oh yeah! I almost forgot. If you participated in the Wine Walks for the last couple of years or so, you will be happy to learn that they are no longer going to be at Lake Las Vegas. Beginning in April, the Wine Walk will be in The District in Henderson. Woo Hoo! That’s so much closer for me, especially since I live in the NW valley. As I get more information, I will report it, and I encourage you to participate since it’s for a good cause. “Good Cause” means that it helps kids. Pay money, drink wine, help kids who need it. What’s better than that?

Later!

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Relationships, Aussies in the House, Classes, and a Cute Story

Several people have noticed that although there are many, many restaurants, wine-based stores, shops, etc., in Las Vegas, there are only a few that are showcased here. “Why is that?” they wonder. Well, it’s pretty simple.

All of the local places here aren’t just businesses – they’re relationships. In each and every one there are real people who greet you, offer assistance, deal with you honestly, and are always appreciative for the business you bring, even if it’s just a little.

The restaurants we love offer great food and wine choices with fair prices. I have yet to have a negative experience at any of the restaurants that I’ve linked to, and I doubt if it will ever happen because of their love and passion for the business.

Our retailer friends are the same. Not only do they have great selections and fair prices, but also the owners/proprietors are very knowledgeable about what they have to offer. I have tried more wines on the recommendations I’ve received at the shops than I probably would have ever tried on my own. They often recommend wines that have been off the Wine Spectator/Wine Enthusiast radar. The bad thing about that is the effect on my budget. Oh well.

My love for Paso Robles is well known by the regulars on this Blog, of course. The wonderful winemakers with the laid-back, friendly attitudes who are so generous with their knowledge and their wine are now a relative rarity in the “real” “Wine Country.” The warmth and love there are almost addictive, and I can’t wait until I get up there again!

Here’s a shout out to Elliot Pemberton, who, along with his father-in-law, Jim Lambert of Stanley-Lambert Winery, did a whirlwind tasting of their expanded line at our favorite local places this weekend. I was only able to make it to the tasting at Marché Bacchus, and discovered an incredible cab, their new Silent Partner Cabernet Sauvignon. While it’s not in my budget yet, you can be sure that I will be grabbing a bottle as soon as I can! Great seeing you, guys, and thanks for the terrific wines!

The first Combatting Swirl Envy – Lite! class for 2008 had its launch last week at Valley Cheese and Wine, and what a great time we had! This season is starting out to be a fun one, and the plans are in place for even more. Last week concentrated primarily on swirl basics, touched briefly on wine racism, defined Swirl Envy, and described gender issues in spitting.

In the next class we’ll be talking about bottles, closures, corkscrews, pouring, and storing wine. Lots of hands-on show and tell! And swirling, of course! And I now have something special for those who sign up and pre-pay through PayPal via this Blog. If you do, you will receive a raffle ticket in class for a chance to win a wine-related item – either a book, some other wine accessory, or a piece of Vegas Wineaux Gear™!

There are more classes coming up in February, and those will be posted shortly. By the way, several of my co-workers, students, and friends have discovered VC&W and affectionately call it the “Stinky Cheese Place.” They love the cheeses there, and realize that Kristin is there to educate them on artisanal cheeses, which have character and complexity. She’s not really a “pusher.”

There’s a little story I’d like to share with you at the insistence of one of my friends. It’s definitely not wine-related, but I love it when things like this happen.

On Christmas night, my family and I (Mom, Aunt Joyce and cousin Byron) went out for our annual dinner, but decided to do something a little different by going to the buffet at the Wynn. I won’t go through the annoyance of standing in line for such a long period; it made Disneyland lines seem like a blink in comparison.

There was a dad and his kids in line in front of me. They were Asian, and as far as I could tell, couldn’t speak English – at least not very well. We nodded and smiled, and I played Tetris on my cell phone while passing the time. After a while I noticed a weight on my left leg. One of the man’s sons, a little boy of about, say, six or seven, was slowly losing the battle to stay awake. He had one arm wrapped around my leg, and he nodded and dozed while leaning against me. I reached down to hold him there and he snuggled against the soft fabric of my jeans and slipped into sleep. Talk about a hand around my heart! This little guy had had it and needed a nice soft place to nap. The dad turned around and the universal look of embarrassment raced across his face. I smiled at him and waved him away. We were going to be standing in the same spot for quite some time, and I just reveled in the feel of a little one depending upon me for comfort.

As was inevitable, the line started to move and the dad reached down to pick up his now soundly sleeping son. We smiled and he undid the latch on the stanchion and took his other sons out of the line. The spell was broken, but what a warm and wonderful memory.

And no, we didn’t get to eat that night. After a 90-minute wait in a line that snaked outside of the buffet in the hallway, there was an additional 90-minute wait once we got into the buffet itself. We threw in the towel and finally ended up eating pretzels at the Rio. But that’s another story.

More on wines next week!

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CSE-Lite! Class, Paso Robles Tasting, and Wine on Tap!

By the time you get to read this (at least for many of you) the Combatting Swirl Envy – Lite! class will be taking place Tuesday evening at Valley Cheese and Wine in Henderson. We’ll be tackling the subjects of Swirling, Sniffing, Sipping and Spitting, the proper way to handle a wine glass, basic wine/food pairing information, winespeak, and the Ten Commandments of wine tasting. I hope that your curiosity leads you to join us one future evening!

If you weren’t at the Paso Robles wine tasting at Vino 100 on Friday evening, then you missed something pretty special. I had planned to be there right at 5:30, the scheduled starting time. Silly me, I forgot that it’s rush hour and didn’t actually arrive there till about 5:35. At first, the tightly-packed parking lot confused me. Then I realized…Paso fans are out there!!

It was almost literally shoulder-to-shoulder as everyone jockeyed for position in order to taste the rich and delicious Paso wines. Palm Cellars was represented, as was Opolo, Linne Calodo, Adelaida, Garretson, L’Aventure, Tobin James, and Villa Creek. Let’s hear a giant YUM!! I met lots of people there, and we shared our Paso stories. I also learned a bit about a few obscure wineries with ethereal wines, and will be sure to visit them next time I’m up there. For a Paso junkie like me, it was pure heaven. The 45 minutes I had planned to stay turned into two hours before I knew what happened. As the last of the people reluctantly and slowly departed, I finally gave the last good-bye hugs and trundled out, tired, happy, with a full camera and a bottle of Mtn. Zin tucked under my arm. Phooey on the budget!

OF COURSE I took pictures! Lots of them! I knew there was no way that I could put all of the pictures on the Blog, so I made a slide show for everyone to see. Here is the “hidden” page for those who want to remember the fun experience, or for those who want to see what they missed. Feel free to share the link with anyone!

http://www.vegaswineaux.com/Vino100_Paso.html

After weeks of being too busy to even breathe, I finally got to stop at Marché Bacchus for their Chateauneuf-du-Pape tasting on Saturday. Wow, what changes! They now have a beautiful, marble-topped wine bar with 20 wines on vacuum tap. There are 1 oz, 3 oz, and 5 oz pours available from some very nice, high-end wines. It’s the perfect solution for someone who wants to try an expensive bottle, but who may want to try the wine first before parting with the big bucks. According to Rhonda, the wines will be changing on a regular basis, keeping the selection fresh.

By the way, the new pictures of the wine bar will be updated on the website shortly.

Next week, more about local tastings and events. Las Vegas is quite the wine town!

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Restaurant Rants & Raves. And more exploration into ethnic food variety.

I have to tell you that you must read this all the way through because there are gems throughout. This week’s entry is (in my not so humble opinion) something special.

Let’s start with the rants.

I had already decided to do a New Year rant regarding my usual beefs about restaurants when my wine club had an interesting experience at Envy, the Steakhouse. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect. Envy did something that was off of my usual radar, and they did it with panache and pure stupidity.

The great thing about Vegas is that there are many restaurants here that offer world-class food and service. The bad thing is that these restaurants do way too well because of the fact that over 30,000,000 people come through here annually, and they don’t have to worry about taking care of locals. This week’s wine dinner was a perfect example of company policy taking precedence over customer service.

Envy advertised their half-price on wine dinner, and my group took advantage of it on Wednesday evening. Perfect. Day after New Year’s. The food was great, the service exemplary, and wine list and wines were extraordinary. So what happened that made the entire group decide not to patronize Envy ever again?

It came down the check. Read more

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