The Ahwahnee hosts a number of special events during the off-season. Vintners’ Holidays is the first, and brings top wine-makers from around the country to showcase and give seminars about their wines. The event is capped with a gala dinner in the vast and sweeping Ahwahnee Dining Room, that, as one Vintner remarked is strongly reminiscent of the dining hall in Hogwarts (for you Harry Potter Fans) minus the owls.
And on Nov. 6, Tom and I got to go.
Couldn’t possibly market something that you don’t know, right? That was the previous excuse, but this time, I was selected to sit in front of a video camera because…? Because I sit in the same cubby room as the guy who makes the decision about who sits in front of the video camera. Too sweet!
Of course, dress up events aren’t exactly things that Tom and I participate in frequently, so there was a some stress leading up to the day of the dinner. I borrowed a super cute outfit from my chic neighbor, Josie, right down to the shoes and matching purse. Tom located the bag with the one suit that he owns, but was chagrined to find, the night of the dinner, that there were no shirts and only one dress shoe in the bag. The left one, I think. We found a solid colored work shirt that was made passable with a few sweeps of an iron, and made a sheepish phone call to a similar-sized friend for shoes.
Vintners was amazing. Not being a real foodie, just playing one on TV, literally, I don’t have the rich foodie vocabulary to describe what I was tasting in terms of the food or the wine. But, I’ll tell you this much, a few Vintners’ Holidays, and a Chefs’ Holiday under my sleeve and I’ve gotten hard to impress. The presentation, and flavor is hard to beat.
There’s so much to know, about just the wines, or just the food, but there’s also something to be said for just pure enjoyment. In fact, another friend had the pleasure of sitting next to a real connoisseur, and he even recommended against analyzing the wines you really enjoy. Just enjoy them. And so we did. It’s a tough job, but someone’s got to do it.