Pouring Vineyard {511} Cab at Flavor Napa Valley and at SF Vintners' Market

Ed and I spent an entire weekend pouring our 2010 Vineyard {511} Diamond Mountain District Cabernet Sauvignon, at two wine events--Friday night at Flavor! Napa Valley, at the Culinary Institute of America at Greystone, formerly the historic Christian Brothers Winery, in St. Helena; and Saturday and Sunday afternoons, at the San Francisco Vintners' Market, at Fort Mason, on the shore of San Francisco Bay, with incredible views of Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Flavor! Napa Valley's Grand Tasting event, also known as the Appellation Trail, drew over 100 Napa wineries and rock star chefs, such as Michael Chiarello and Thomas Keller. Wineries were grouped by appellation; we were paired with other Diamond Mountain District wineries- Wallis Family Estate (Edward Wallis pouring) and with Schramsburg-- and paired with delectible bites from Chefs Joe Panarello of City Winery, Stephen Barber of Farmstead and with Don Giavanni restaurant. Yum!

Early Saturday morning, we were off on a longer drive to San Francisco, to set up for the Vintners' Market, a wine tasting and buying event that drew over 200 wineries from Napa Valley, Sonoma County, Paso Robles, Santa Barbara and Russian River Valley. We chose to pour in the event's Cult Lounge, where only premiere wineries were pouring their wines, such as Chappellet, Lail, Plumbjack, Spring Mountain Vineyards, Twenty-Four by Charles Woodson Wines, and Miner Family. Luckily, daughter Kelly and son-in-law Jeff helped us pour at this two-day, very busy event.