OCWS
The Orange County Wine Society has always been an organization with countless volunteer opportunities throughout the year. Despite the cancellation of many of our events due to the pandemic, we are moving forward with the planning for 2021 activities. We invite all OCWS members to consider volunteering for one or more of the organization’s committees. […]
By the time you read this first article in a series of “Best of” offerings, Thanksgiving will be just a fleeting memory, but I’m pretty sure many of you would have had a delicious homemade meal accompanied by an amazing Pinot Noir which, in my house, is the wine of choice to accompany turkey.
With the help of George Cravens who, in better non-COVID times, coordinated the Mini-Tasting gatherings, and with the flavors of the start of the holiday season still lingering in my mind, I am pleased to share with you in the coming months, while awaiting in-person gatherings again, some of the award-winning recipes and wine pairings from the recent past.
Pinot was the wine of choice for the last pre-COVID Mini-Tasting held on February 22 of this year, with the following wines taking the top three spots:
1st Place—Paul Hobbs, Russian River Valley
2nd Place—Bellante Reserve, Dierberg Vineyard,
Santa Maria Valley
3rd Place—2017 La Brisa Vineyard, Sonoma County
Interestingly to me, none of the winning dishes of the night even came close to resembling turkey. There was Roast Pork at the Cravens’ home ala Linda Downey, Grilled Salmon at Robin McCormick’s ala David Rutledge, Chicken Provencal at the home of the Newall’s ala Linda McLean, Glazed Ham from Kevin Donnelly at the Neutz’ home, Pork Tenderloin from Eric and Carmen Kaines at the Solis’ home, Lasagna ala Kim and Sam Clark at the Topham’s home and, Chocolate Cake by Cheryl Bell at the home of Marcia and James Vaughan.
I know that just the change in seasons and the reminder of what was sampled that night makes me want to open a terrific bottle of wine and dabble in the kitchen, but the winning recipe that caught my eye and has me salivating was the submission by Barbara White (which, by no coincidence had Pinot in it) of a veal dish that she and her husband, David, presented while hosting the evening at their own home. Thank you Barb for sharing this dish with all of us.
Wishing everyone a Merry and Happy Everything during this month of holiday magic.
May you all be well and happy and drinking fabulous wines while puttering in the kitchen!
– Fran Gitsham, Contributing Writer
Oven Braised Veal Stew with Black Pepper and Cherries
Ingredients
2 lb. boneless veal stew meat cut into 2-inch pieces
¼ tsp. black pepper
2 tsp. kosher salt, divided
1 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
2 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. olive or canola oil
¾ cup boiling water
2 Tbsp. veal demi-glace (try Williams Sonoma)
2 cups fresh or undrained thawed frozen pitted cherries
2½ Tbsp. honey
1 cinnamon stick
1 cardamom pod
1 dried bay leaf
1 cup dry red wine (Syrah, B arbara, Pinot Noir) optional
1 Tbsp. finely chopped fresh parsley
½ package of flat butter noodles
Steps. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Place veal pieces in bowl; sprinkle all over with pepper and 1 tsp salt. Sprinkle with flour and toss to coat. Melt butter with oil in 5 to 6 qt Dutch oven over high heat. Working in 2 batches (if necessary), add veal; cook, stirring occasionally, until browned on all sides, 6 to 7 minutes per batch. Transfer veal to a bowl using a slotted spoon; set aside. Pour off drippings from the Dutch oven.
Stir together ¾ cup boiling water and demi-glace mixture, cherries, honey, cinnamon, cardamom bay leaf and optional red wine to Dutch oven; bring to a boil over high heat, scraping bottom and sides of oven to loosen browned bits. Reduce heat to medium low; cover and simmer 10 minutes. Uncover; nestle veal in the cherry mixture.
Cover and roast in preheated oven until veal is very tender, about 90 minutes. Remove and discard cinnamon, cardamom, and bay leaf. Stir in remaining 1 teaspoon salt. Sprinkle with parsley and serve immediately over noodles.
Optional Thickening. Deglaze the stew. Pour the veal, cherry stew into a bowl through a sieve. Place veal, cherry mixture in a bowl and set aside. Return the sauce to the Dutch oven and add ½ cup heavy cream. Heat over medium heat until the sauce has thickened; 10-15 minutes. Return veal, cherry mixture to the sauce to Dutch oven and reheat over medium heat 10 minutes.
Make Ahead. Stew can be made up to 3 days ahead; let cool then cover and refrigerate. Reheat gently.
Wine itself is obvious. It represents so many things—contents of the bottle reach out to a time, to a place, to people, to food and to hospitality. To be engaged with this special life force, to connect through our senses and know others connect with it in the same way, is a reason why we all like wine! What are your thoughts on the matter?
Greek poet, Homer, said it best, “it is the wine that leads me on, the wild wine that sets the wisest man to sing at the top of his lungs, laugh like a fool—it drives the man to dancing…it even tempts him to blurt out stories better never told.” Contrary to Homer, The Wine Press wants you to share your story, your experience, that moment in time when your travels have taken you across the California wine regions to a new discovery.
There is a very good chance that most of us have heard of or visited the most well-known wine regions of California, or the world for that matter—Napa and Sonoma. Have you reached beyond the hub of California wine tourism and escaped into and experienced other wine regions? Talk about it, put pen to paper and share it.
The Wine Press would like to publish your story, even if it’s just a one time contribution. The decision is yours. Topics should be California-inclusive. A few suggestions you might like to think about:
· Hidden gems of California’s lesser known wine regions
· An area that captured your attention with its natural beauty, or a town stuck in time
· Incredible California wineries that have been producing some of the best wine for decades
· A unique wine event
· A varietal that literally took your breath away
· A relationship that began as a wine match
There are endless possibilities of what you can write about.
Contact me at Linda@ocws.org to get the conversation started!
– Linda Mihalik, Editor
A little Wine Trivia:
Keep an Eye on Those Bubbles. Bubbles in wine have been observed since ancient Greece and were superstitiously attributed to evil spirits or the phases of the moon!
Using Zoom software as a communication tool has become a common way to safely hold meetings and webinars during this COVID-19 pandemic. To participate in a Winery Program Zoom webinar, each attendee will receive an email containing a link to connect to the webinar. Each attendee must sign-up on the OCWS website. Note that purchasing […]
As a continuation of our November Winery Webinar, Big Nose Winery has offered our members a special sale. They are offering our members a 25% discount on all their wines.To order Big Nose wines, go to the OCWS website to connect directly and order the wines. You can also connect to Big Nose at: bignosefamilywinery.com/shop. […]
Thank you to all of our Orange County Wine Society members who sent in their electronic votes for the Board of Directors this past month. The new electronic election was flawless, and I want to congratulate both Carolyn Christian and Fred Heinecke as they join me in our 2020-2021 Board term. I am honored to say that I have been elected as the President of the Board of Directors for the upcoming year.
We have all been disappointed these past months, as our entire lives have been disrupted by the ongoing lockdown, brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. The OCWS has been impacted, along with all other organizations, and our in-person activities have been severely impacted. We have not had a social event since March, and our two wine competitions, along with the entire OC Fair and our Wine Courtyard, were cancelled this year.
Many thanks to our creative staff, who have formatted several “virtual” wine events using Zoom in lieu of in-person events. Appreciation and recognition also goes out to our creative staff and presenters for pulling off both educational and entertaining seminars.
Every organization is a collection of assets, minus liabilities, which gives us our net worth. With the Orange County Wine Society, we don’t look at our net worth in just financial terms.
From our Board of Directors, our greatest asset is you, our members! Without you, we would devolve to a small core of people conducting boring activities, and we would quickly fall apart. The Board is working on minimizing our outflow of funds, but our biggest objective is to keep you all involved, and to keep you all signed up as active members. We hope you will all continue to work with us as we navigate our way through these challenging times.
In the near future, you can look forward to more entertaining virtual events, and I hope you all will sign-up and participate with a glass of wine in your hand and a smile on your face!
Needless to say, we all look forward to a time when we can resume our lives, and we can all meet again in person at our events.
– Kevin Donnelly, President
I had the honor and distinct pleasure to interview the brave and dynamic team of Roger and Janice Mattar and Doris and John Severs, winemakers and owners of Big Nose Family Winery who, this month, will be presenting their wines to the OCWS membership via our Virtual Winery Program.
I call them brave, as they took the leap from being OCWS Winemakers’ Group amateur winemakers to commercial winemakers, and I call them dynamic in that their commercial debut entries in 2019 to the OC Fair Commercial Wine Competition garnered the highest awards, that of Double Gold, for both wines entered, not a small feat by any standards.
Upon the start of the interview, it was clear to me that the heartfelt emotion emanating from Big Nose’s four principals in tandem and their personal relationships with each other are why they were a major hit right out of the gate. “You should do whatever you’re passionate about and wherever your heart takes you, as long as you do it with love” and “You need good grapes to make good quality wine,” they said. Clearly a winning combination for them and for those who have had the pleasure of tasting their wines.
When asked how they got involved in making wine, they relayed a story about a trip to Napa in 2011, meeting a home winemaker and, as they said “after quite a bit of drinking great wines,” thought, “why not try it?” Roger, Big Nose’s primary winemaker, upon return home to Orange County and some research, discovered the Orange County Wine Society and a passion was born. They had never made wine before joining the OCWS and being mentored by long-time home winemakers.
Now only two years in commercial business, and as with many other winemakers, this quartet is still working paying jobs (often more than one at a time), to sustain Big Nose, with hopes Big Nose will sustain them in the future, while fulfilling their dreams. Sadly, they, like so many others, have been impacted by COVID-19. They said that, with hopes of moving “toward a tasting room and the whole nine yards, COVID-19 back peddled us. We had to stop knocking on doors, doing small events, and gathering our wine club members together for fun times, which we love. We’ve had to adapt and work in the atmosphere and society we’re in right now.”
With a number of wine varietals currently in their repertoire, they are moving forward with love, laughter and the strong conviction to continue making quality wines and the necessity for their wines to be “free from defects, well balanced, and enjoyable to drink and share with others.”
To learn more about Big Nose Family Winery and their amazing ownership team, check out their video interview with Sara Yeoman, OCWS Vice President, on the OCWS Facebook and Twitter pages. Don’t forget to reserve a space for the OCWS Virtual Winery Program on November 20 featuring Big Nose Family Winery.
– Fran Gitsham, Contributing Writer
Our members have been pleased to learn about the scholarship colleges and universities the OCWS has supported since 1981, beginning with two colleges. Benefits of OCWS membership include the enjoyment of knowing about our contributions to the students in the educational world of campus agriculture, business and research, and their appreciation of our generosity.This season […]
Thanks to all of our members who joined the virtual Annual Business Meeting on Friday, September 11. Highlights of the year’s past events and the financial health of the organization were reviewed. A recording of this meeting will be available on the OCWS website to those of you who missed the live meeting. Special thanks to all of our presenters for helping to pull off this event. The highlight of the evening was the recognition of our volunteers who this past year contributed over 1,034 hours of volunteer time in support of the OCWS up through March when COVID-19 restrictions were implemented. Please see George Craven’s article in this edition for the details of those recognized.
This year, it was my honor and privilege to present the President’s Award to Kevin Coy for his many years of outstanding dedication and service to the OCWS as a Director, President, Cellar Master, and Director of Judges for the Commercial Wine Competition. Pictured is Kevin holding his award. Congratulations, Kevin!
At the September BOD meeting, Jim Beard, was recognized with the President Emeritus Award. This award is presented by the President with Board recommendation, as a special designation to acknowledge the dedication, time, and effort given to the OCWS by those who served as OCWS President, and who have continued to volunteer after their term of office has concluded. Congratulations, Jim!
This year’s BOD election has brought forth a great turnout of candidates. In addition to our first “virtual” Annual Business Meeting, we are conducting the election electronically this year. Thanks to Greg Hagadorn and the Election Committee for pulling this off. Please stay tuned to ocws.org for information on the election results. Unfortunately, the Annual Installation Dinner is cancelled. I would like to thank outgoing Directors Brian McDonald for his dedicated service over the past six years, and Ken Scott for his expertise over the past three years. This will also conclude my six years of service on the Board.
As the outgoing President, I wish to thank all of my past fellow Board members for their service. A special thanks goes to my wife, Carolyn, whose encouragement and delightful sense of humor has supported me over the years and who introduced us to the OCWS over 19 years ago—it has been quite a journey! Cheers,
– Bill Redding, President
In looking to find some fun alternatives to The Courtyard at the OC Fair that, sadly, were not able to be held this year, Summer Sunday Seminars were created. Ten weeks of entertaining seminars were developed by a talented team of people who combined their passion for the OC Fair seminars and their love of our organization and its members.
Carolyn Christian, Dawn Iglesias, Ed Reyes, Ken Knapp, Kevin Donnelly, and Sara Yeoman combined their collective talents to bring enjoyable and unique topics to life. Ten seminars were presented via Zoom, with an average of 75 attendees each week. All seminars were recorded and are available to members for playback when logged into the OCWS website; the main menu item Webinars will appear.
The seminar group was also very honored to be invited to participate in the OC Fair & Event Center’s Virtual OC Fair and recorded fun wine-related clips that were featured on the OC Fair’s website and social media.
After receiving overwhelmingly positive responses to the Summer Seminar Series, this group is excited to announce that they will be retuning with a Winter Series beginning Sunday, December 6 and running through Sunday, February 28, 2021. Watch your inbox in November for more details and the full seminar schedule.
If you have any questions, feedback, or suggestions, you can reach out to us at Seminars@ocws.org. We look forward to having more fun with you this winter in today’s virtual world.
– Sara Yeoman, Director