Pinot Noir 2010
We picked a good day to go on a wine-tasting trip to Soquel Vineyards. The winery had released their Estate Pinot Noir Partners’ Reserve 2010 ($40) that very day, and I immediately fell in love with it.
Wine Reviews
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Soquel Vineyards
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Poetic Cellars
Cabernet Franc 2008 – A Lyrical Wine You Will Love
Looking for a romantic wine—and with a romantic label to go with it? Poetic Cellars fits the bill. Poetic’s labels show a picture of two lovers embracing, and every back-of-the-bottle label carries a beautiful poem by Joseph Naegele—a partner and owner in the winery along with Katy Lovell. But the true poetry appears in the wine itself. Winemaker Lovell makes the kind of wine that reminds one of a sonnet—with an ode to a lover in each sip.
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Big Basin Vineyards
Rattlesnake Rock Syrah 2008
Big Basin Vineyards is turning out some incredible wines these days—not the least of which is the Rattlesnake Rock Syrah. Made entirely from grapes grown on Big Basin’s estate in the Santa Cruz Mountains, the 2008 is wondrous nectar to be sure.
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Thomas Fogarty Winery
Gewürztraminer 2009
When looking for a bottle of wine, Gewürztraminer is not the first to come to mind. Given the popularity of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Merlot and Pinot Noir – to name but a few – Gewürztraminer sits low on the totem pole. Somewhat sweeter than most wines, Gewürztraminer is often drunk with dessert – as is a Sauterne or a port wine. That doesn’t mean to say that it can’t ever be drunk with savory food.
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Burrell School Vineyards & Winery
Pinot Noir 2007 – Estate Reserve Principal’s Choice
A Russian, a Greek and a Brit go out for dinner and drink a bottle of Pinot Noir. It sounds like the beginning of a joke, but I, the Brit, do, in fact, have friends from Russia and Greece and we go out for dinner now and again.
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Pleasant Valley Vineyards
Austin Craig Zinfandel 2008 —Big Red Zinfandel
Looking for a Zinfandel that’s bold, voluptuous and deliciously good? Then let me introduce you to Pleasant Valley Vineyards’ 2008 Austin Craig Zin. Here’s a sinful Zinful if ever there was one. From the time that Craig and Cathy Handley purchased Pleasant Valley Vineyards in 1996, they have been producing some excellent wines—and the 2008 Grand Reserve Zin ($40) is one of them.
Dining -
Wine Reviews
Read more...
Vino Tabi Winery
2008 California Red Wine Blend
Once a month I get together with my British group of women friends, and it usually the one who is hosting makes dinner for the group. My friend Joanna has gone on an organic vegan diet so the food she prepared for us all was ultra healthy with spinach from her garden and palm sugar in the dessert instead of white sugar.
Page 6 of 27
Share this on your social networks
Share this
- Ice Plant Peace Invasion
- Nearly 150 Years of Memorial Day Remembrance in Santa Cruz
- Local Nonprofit Participates in National Contest
- Update on Police Shooting Investigation
- Trek on Track
- Film, Times & Events: Week of May 23
- From The Editor
- Free Angela
- Poetic Cellars
- The Pleasure of Süda
- What do you know about Monsanto?
- Santa Cruz Movie Times
Free Angela
Political activist and UC Santa Cruz Professor Emerita Angela Davis commands the spotlight in a riveting new documentary. PLUS: UCSC’s Bettina Aptheker opens up about the political upheavals of the ’60s and ’70s—and today. Angela Davis is not a human being who can be easily summed up in several sentences or paragraphs—books maybe, but, even then, capturing the political activist, scholar and author in the most comprehensive light is downright complex. That’s because Davis is an undeniably unique political creature, one who should be seen and heard to be fully absorbed and downloaded. Which is what makes Free Angela and All Political Prisoners, the new documentary about Davis and the turbulent political upheavals she faced during the late-1960s and ’70s, so inviting. In it, filmmaker Shola Lynch marks the 40th anniversary of Davis’ acquittal on charges of murder, kidnapping and conspiracy with a historical vérité style of filmmaking to illuminate a side of Davis few may have seen (or can recall), and captures the events that thrust the woman into one of the most fascinating orbits of notoriety and political intrigue of the 20th century.
No Big Surprises
The highly anticipated draft Environmental Impact Report for desal is finally out. Will it change anything? When scwd2, the group pursuing the proposed joint desalination plant for the Santa Cruz Water Department and Soquel Creek Water District, set up a booth at the Santa Cruz Earth Day festival in 2012, its reception was less than warm. Signature gathering for Measure P, the “right to vote” on desal ballot measure, was in full swing, as were tensions over the controversial project, which would produce up to 2.5 million gallons per day of desalinated water and cost an estimated $100 million. What were representatives of an energy-intensive desal plant doing among the recycling and conservation booths? That was the attitude Melanie Mow Schumacher, public outreach coordinator for scwd2 (pronounced “squid squared”), remembers sensing.
The Maya-Ixil Move Forward
Local nonprofit works to educate and create opportunity for indigenous communities in Guatemala In an isolated region of the Guatemala mountains called Ixil, the indigenous Maya population was devastated by a civil war between the government and leftist guerrilla factions that spanned 1960 to 1996. During that 36-year war, the Guatemalan military eradicated entire Mayan communities. In what amounted to genocide, soldiers burned Mayan farmlands and homes, raped and tortured the people, and scattered families. By the end of the war, 200,000 Mayans had been killed, 7,000 of whom were Maya-Ixil.
Public Thinking
Watsonville teens host TEDx event Santa Cruz County is no stranger to the TED brand. TED—which stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design—talks have come to the area through independently organized events 10 times since 2011. This month, the gathering returns to the county with a new twist, thanks to the Watsonville Youth City Council. TEDxYouth@Watsonville, which will take place Sunday, May 19 at the Henry J. Mello Center for the Performing Arts in Watsonville, will feature only speakers younger than 19 years old and will traverse topics from racial stereotypes and renewable energy to traditional Mexican dance.
Transoceana
Danny Moriarty’s musical influences have been known to impact his life beyond his local rock band, Transoceana. “I went through two periods,” confesses the singer, guitarist and songwriter. “I borrowed Bono’s mullet look from the ’80s for a while, and then I dressed like I was from the ’70s and had big hair like Jimmy Page.” Bono and Page are also symbolic of Transoceana’s evolution as a band during their three years together.
Cruzin’ for Inspiration
Former resident pays homage to Santa Cruz with locally shot thesis film When he left Santa Cruz for the University of Southern California’s graduate film program in 2010, Christopher Guerrero had completed the film major at UC Santa Cruz in 2008 and worked on campus in the film and digital media department. It wasn’t until he headed south, that Guerrero began to reminisce about the coastal town. “It was really really hard when I moved to L.A., to acclimate and find friends,” he says, adding that—counter to the philosophical, conversational culture of Santa Cruz—he found nowhere in his new town where he could simply sit and talk about life with someone. “I didn’t really realize why I love [Santa Cruz] so much until it was gone.”
Beck to the Future
In celebration of Beck’s solo acoustic show at The Rio, GT explores Song Reader, the alternative rock icon’s most ambitious interactive art piece yet. Here’s an odd little paradox of the digital revolution: The more sophisticated our technology gets, the more our musical milieu begins to resemble that of a bygone era, when song ideas were passed around from musician to musician, perpetually taking on new twists. Dozens of different YouTube users might try their hand at setting somebody’s rant about cats or double rainbows to music, or you might hear the Belgian musician Gotye turning the many and varied covers of his song “Somebody That I Used to Know” into a virtual orchestra (see below).
Growing Berries Without Bromide
Researchers test a new alternative to a controversial chemical The scarecrows perched in Santa Cruz strawberry fields do little to scare away the birds, much less the insects and fungi harbored in the soil. Everything likes to eat strawberries, which makes growing them a risky business. This predicament led UC Santa Cruz professor Carol Shennan to take an unconventional approach to pest management. Nine years ago, the fatal plant disease Verticillium wilt was wiping out strawberry plants at the university farm. Chemicals hardly phase the pathogen, and Shennan saw little improvement with crop rotation, which is typically used to treat infested fields. A visiting plant pathologist from the Netherlands recommended a little-known organic technique called anaerobic soil disinfestation, and, with so few other options, Shennan decided to give it a try.
Uniting All That Has Been Separated
