I’m having trouble trying to upgrade the theme of my site. sorry for all this blue text. i’m working on it!
That’s what the local print shop guy, Dave, asked me, when I went in to drop off our James Beard Foundation event brochlets (not really a brochure, not really a pamphlet) we’re hauling with for our Thursday James Beard Foundation “Columbia Terroir” event with local chefs Aaron Solley and Suzanne Bozarth from the James John Cafe. I had to think. How was it? “Busy,” was all I could come up with. Here’s what I had been doing:
1. tweaking links and whatnot to connect our website to new e-comm site, hosted by Nexternal. all the nitty gritty. thank goodness for the Nexternal support. my gal Shauna is a dream. and thank goodness i love learning another language. it’s fun, but not when there’s a little 2.5 year-old tugging at you, or sitting on your lap with “wandering, happy keyboard fingers,” if you know what i mean.
2. tweaking design and layout of Columbia Valley Terroir brochure that I essentially wrote and designed. not being trained as a designer doesn’t help me catch the tiny things that are noticeable when printed (margins and stuff), thank goodness i have the software to fix it. but, oh, my shoulders from hunching over my laptop! but the big one was the cover image — we finally settled on something very pretty. you want a sneak peek, you say? well, ok – here you are:
This is the view from our vineyard, with a little photoshopy-shop going on for the grainy texture. 
3. saving hummingbirds. ok, not saving them, but making sure my friend’s frozen feeder got replaced with non-frozen syrup, so her little hummers could eat while she was away.
4. getting fitted for an outfit my crazily talented designer friend Yvonne is making for me, specifically for the James Beard event. she and i had a project together some years ago that didn’t take off, and I asked her if she would be interested in starting it again by getting her designs in front of a NY crowd. not that i’m a runway model, and not that squeezing between tables at the snug James Beard foundation constitutes a runway, and not that, oh — well, anyway — there’s been some back and forth and i can’t wait to wear it.
5. going to our POD storage unit we rented to declutter our little farm house with when trying to sell it (that’s been way over a year now) that we have not yet moved to our new house (a good 1/2 year already), to dig through and find an outfit just in case #4 (see above) fell through. i found some, but they don’t fit anymore. note to self: do something about that mama belly. enough is enough. it’s time.
6. prayed that #4 didn’t fall through since i didn’t have Plan B to fall back on (see #5 above), and had very little time, money or energy to go find an outfit, because clogs and jeans and wool sweaters, my standard portland togs, wouldn’t fare well at an NYC evening event in the West Village.
7. being a solo mama — scott was away on saturday, a drive to seattle to meet with a Masters of Wine residing there– and wasn’t I on pins and needles about THAT. would he like our wine? he LOVED our wine! and then scott was off again on Sunday to the farm, to meet up with a friendly farmer who has an absolute PERFECT smile (you do, Dave!), who was going to do some work for us. it gets too hard to coordinate farming with weather and scott’s full-time work — thankfully Dave has time and is willing to help. so while i’ve got all that going on in the back of my head, sam and i were out at the park, going to Yvonne’s fitting, helping hummingbirds, and taking a nap. ahh.
8. the standard laundry work. does it ever end?
yes, it was a busy weekend and somehow, very invigorating.
How was yours?
Tags: hummingbirds, James Beard Foundation, Masters of Wine, Nexternal, POD storage, Seattle
Went to a James John Cafe fundraiser dinner last week for our upcoming joint The Grande Dalles – James John Cafe James Beard Foundation dinner, and weren’t we overwhelmed by the outpouring of support — not just for James John, but from the people I spoke to attending the event, their enthusiasm and well wishes for ALL of us just about brought tears to my eyes. Ever since we planted the vineyard, the reception we’ve received has been chilly, putting it nicely: felt like the local wine community was rolling their eyes at us newcomers who had our own ideas about how to do things; the local farming community was not happy to have a vineyard in their midst; even felt like many in our family couldn’t grasp the enormity of our undertaking; and we couldn’t find a soul interested in investing a plug nickel — well, OK, except one, and that didn’t pan out. Bottom line, it felt like the only people intent on, or, should I say, who cared about our success was us, and wasn’t it the loneliest feeling in the world, especially out on that hilltop. Until that evening at the James John. And wasn’t it refreshing.
A friend of ours in NY, Dave S., reminded us when we were lamenting some “influentials” who declined our invite to our wine opening some weeks ago, that we ought to focus on those who would attend instead. Bullseye. I got it. Quit griping and embrace the people who DO care. I don’t know how that will change the tone of my blog, I know I have been at many times a big old whiney arse, and I at times cannot help myself when I point out the hilarity that abounds. But with these community blessings out there — one couple even told us they would open a bottle of our wine the time of the NYC event, and think of us, and send good thoughts in real time — it really lifts the heart and soul.
Soon we’re off to NYC, with the blessings of many in the St. Johns Community. And THAT’s a great feeling. Thank you.
Tags: James Beard Foundation, James John Cafe, The Grande Dalles
I know, reminds many of a Bob Dillon song, but I wasn’t thinking of that when we were out at our vineyard this past weekend. Instead, my title is based on the more literal facts: the tangle of our vineyard against that blue sky. It was a stunning blue, as you can see, and there was a sweet growing smell of Spring in the air, along with numerous Meadowlark calls, the one sitting in the slight bowl of our vineyard off to the east was so shrill and distinct, answering a number of other calls blowing in from afar.
So, what’s the tangle about? A few things. One, we haven’t pruned yet, so you have the tangle of all the old canes. The other is from all the dried weed called Mare’s Tail Scott’s now fighting.
Dried Mare's Tail, an obnoxious weed
Funny this weed didn’t show up early on back in the day, almost six years ago now, when we first planted our vineyard on that wheat ground. No, THOSE monstrous weeds were Russian Thistle, Prickly Lettuce, and, shoot, the last one escapes me — it’s a total ground cover, creeper-like thing, supposedly people eat it when it’s young. I’ll remember. Anyway. I’ve mentioned before, but in case you don’t realize, we purchased one MESS of a vineyard site as far as weeds are concerned. We had no idea that all these monsters lay in store, and how they’d materialize after the ground was no longer soaked in the big weed sprays of the commercial wheat farmer. Or maybe in our case, thankfully, the ground wasn’t all that sterilized, as all these weeds lay in wait. Pig Weed. That’s the name I forgot. Anyhoo…We’ve been fighting the slow fight, and thankfully, the native clump grass we’ve planted is now starting to choke out many of the weeds.
Native Clump Grass
Fingers crossed.
Tags: Bob Dillon, Mare's Tail, meadowlark, pigweed, prickly lettuce, russian thistle
At least that’s what we’d like to think it was, The Grande Dalles’ Inaugural Release Party at the James John Cafe. People came, people stayed, no-one tasted our wines and then nervously hustled out, and no-one was spitting, except Scott, who had been “tasting” all afternoon/eve.
First on our tasting list was Leroy’s Finest, our riesling; which many people first declined, imagining it to be sweet, until we told them it was bone-dry. And weren’t they pleasantly surprised by it! Many imagined how Leroy’s Finest would do with oysters and seafood (excellent, of course -just ask David Rosengarten!). Moving along to our reds, there were camps that preferred one over the other, but we expected that. Both have their own qualities and flavours, Home Place maybe more robust, Gampo not so much, but critic/journalist feedback reinforced the wines’ integrity: structured, well-made, fine wines. And with the food that evening: roasted pig and some good home fixins to go with it, everyone seemed to be rather happy.
A big THANK YOU goes out to Joe and Lana: Joe was our pourer, and Lana, his wife, got rounded up for the “Welcome” table. And of course a big THANK YOU to everyone else, for making the event a lively time, and for all the kind words and sales (!). Your support is absolutely priceless.
Tags: bone dry riesling, David Rosengarten, Gampo, Home Place, James John Cafe, Leroy's Finest, The Grande Dalles
At the James John Cafe, 8527 North Lombard Street Portland, OR 97203 – (503) 285-4930. If you’d like to swing by, please do — tell us at the door who you are and la voila. Or if you can’t make it, at least sign up for The Grande Dalles news and updates, so you’ll have more than a few hours’ heads up; we sent out this invite to that crowd weeks ago. Either way, tonight or another time, we’d love to see you.
Tags: James John Cafe, The Grande Dalles
Ok, granted we’re not there yet, we have yet to get on the airplane and have our Columbia Valley Terroir event, but we are officially on their March 2011 lineup, and that’s pretty darn good. How did we do it, you ask? With only our inaugural wines, and even more so as an unknown from a state that only really touts its pinot noir? BECAUSE WE’RE ON TO SOMETHING. And the James Beard Foundation recognized that when we visited them last Spring and invited us to pour at a dinner.
So, we went out and found suitable partners who share the same ideals–it’s not about the show, but what gets shown in the wines, or in their case, the food–and will create the dishes to highlight our wines, and our wines their dishes. It was rather serendipitous, I only asking if our neighborhood’s James John Cafe rented out their space, so captivated was I by its high, tin ceilings and quirky decor, out here where we live in what feels like the outpost of St. Johns in North Portland, Oregon. But after talking to them during our wine tasting, I stepped out and asked if they might be interested in joining us at The James Beard House. And there you go. Of course their training and expertise helped with selling them in to the James Beard House, these two gems of chefs, Suzanne Bozarth and Aaron Solley; each has worked directly with James Beard Foundation Award Winning Chefs.
I know it’s a slow process, getting The Grande Dalles’ wine out and about. And its difficulty becomes compounded by all the surprising number of people who don’t value the new and different, so god bless New York. If you, dear reader, happen to know of any individuals who don’t follow the herd, send them our way, please. Or at least to The James Beard House in New York on March 3.
Tags: Columbia Valley Terroir, James Beard Foundation, James Beard House, James John Cafe, The Grande Dalles
Very early into this (ad)venture, we began to run into a bunch of, how shall we say, very colorful people. Turns out one character we refer to as the Big Fish who was interested in buying land adjacent to ours is more colorful than the rest, showing up on last week’s Dateline NBC, the story picked up for 48 Hours Mystery this coming Saturday. Scott and I still shake our heads that the “character” behind a snarky comment on my at-that-time brand new blog turns out to be the president of a neighboring Wine Growers Association, but the Big Fish implicated in a murder? And I sat right next to this guy at dinner! What the what?!
Tags: 48 Hours Mystery, Dateline NBC
We’ve been trying to round up a photo for use for our March James Beard debut, so they can market the event (I’ll fill you in on the JBF event in a future post). Here’s the dilemma: we don’t have any “glamour” shots where we’re toting a glass, or sniffing one (perhaps empty, like Gianfranco, or full like everyone else); or throwing our heads back in mirth having a Hollywood moment; or standing in a silk wrap, I think it was, in front of a vineyard like we saw Helen Turley doing on one Wine Spectator cover; or like countless others holding a glass in front of a barrel, these images so expected like photos with Santa at Christmas where the set all looks the same. No superbly dirty hand shot; no child feigning sleep on our shoulders; no borrowed hilltop that we try to pass off as our own; no picture of Tuscany that we want you to think is just like our place. None of that. Odd, don’t you think? I mean, we ARE in the wine business. But we’re also in the business of keeping it real. And just like we don’t doctor the grapes from our vineyard, we don’t like to doctor our lives, even for marketing. Yes, we need some “pretty” shots of the “real” that make up what we do, and I’ve been meaning to have Kim Miller come out to the vineyard and snap our goings on out there (the wine bottles below are Kim’s work). But until then, what we have is what we have: mainly photos I’ve taken, so really there are none of me; and they’re not glamourous. They’re real.
Wine bottles by K Miller Photographs
Tags: Helen Turley, James Beard, K Miller Photographs, Tuscany, Wine Spectator
Put this together for you, from when we were last at the farm.
Live The Life
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