Carolyn Tillie

I'm trying to think of things that I have cooked for picnics -- stuff that needed to be transported and was potentially at room temperature for many, many hours. Here's what comes to mind: - Left-over fried chicken - Pasta Salad - Muffaletta Sandwiches - Cold-cuts in general (almost any cooked meat; roast beef, pork roast, etc) - Grain and Bean Salads (not mayonnaise-based) - Fruit salad - Terrines - Mediterranean items like hummous, baba ghanoush - Roasted vegetables

For me, the warming of the glass (and the wine?) is not the issue -- it is ease of swirling and subsequent fingerprints. I like stemware for the very simple reason that it is easy to swirl -- sometimes violently to open up said wine. And when said swirling is completed, I want a clear image of the wine to note clarity and edge color, all of which would be detrimental if the glass were smudged with fingerprints.

I also heartily recommend Casanova. I eat a VERY light breakfast and make Casanova my lunch experience, which usually takes two+ hours. They have an amazing wine list with more half-bottles than I've seen here in the Napa valley. I should go back for dinner sometime.

Larousse, I would guess that about 65% to 70% of the wineries have "rooms" and guest cottages for the industry. The trick is getting a distributor to get the room for you as they are generally reserved for individuals affiliated with stores or restaurants that are supporters of the product. I have a good friend who is the wine buyer for a hotel in Los Angeles. Nine times out of ten, he can book the cottage at Stag's Leap, Franciscan, or Silver Oak THROUGH the Distributor that supplies said wine to the hotel. It is that Tenth time that he stays with me... My take on Highway 1 is to not bother. It IS pretty, but it seriously can take 12 to 14 hours to get from San Diego to San Francisco. It really is going to depend on how much time you have -- if you've only got four or five days, do you want to spend a whole day behind the wheel of a car? It is a great trip if you've got more than a week and can stop and experience the coastline more than once or twice on the drive. If your time is limited, than I would haul butt to get up here... Also, keep in mind that September can be REALLY hot, which could make spending a lot of time in a car (even with air conditioning) unpleasant.

You know what? I am wrong on that -- what I remember is that I liked it as a kid when it was made with saccharine. Then it was re-forumalated with aspartame which I despised. The Coca-Cola website confirms the reformatting occurred in 1985. Makes sense that my older sisters were drinking diet drinks when I was a kid and I was always stealing their cans.

When I was a teen-ager, I loved Fresca (and Cactus Cooler). It is/was(?) a grapefruit-based softdrink that 20-some years ago, was actually sweetened with real sugar. Now, I believe, it diet-only. Pity, though. The old stuff was great.

Trust me, it has been written about -- almost ad nauseum but it is only wine geeks who are reading...

He might have a table for 8+ -- those tables CAN be booked more than two months in advance. (I think it is a private room).

Larousse, with our continual rainy spring, it is unlikely you will be experiencing any crush in September except at maybe some of the sparkling producers (Schramsburg, Mumm, Domaine Carneros, or Domaine Chandon). These are the businesses that start their picking first but we are already speculating that harvest for most red wines will not be starting until October going into November. We are here in the second week of May and are sitting through a tremendous storm which has already dropped an inch-and-a-half of water. I'm not convinced that Opus One is the best tour/tasting in the valley. If looking for high-end cab tastings, consider Nikel and Nikel, Quintessa, or Caymus. Foodwise, Bouchon is much more accessible if you consider going in right when the wineries are shutting down (around 5:00-ish) but sit at the bar. The mussels in saffron are exceptional. I am also a big fan of Terra, Zuzu, and Pilar. Don't hesitate to PM me with any specific questions!

Oh Max... go ahead make me feel bad! Actually, it was really the advent of the digital camera that changed it for me. I WAS documenting my meals, but with old, standard cameras where it was not as cost-affective to scan the images for website postings. I did do it occasionally, but not inexpensively. By-and-large, it had to involve more tech savvy information than I certainly had. There was also not quite the audience for it. The meals I was preparing were for folks who didn't even own computers...

What type of wine do you like? Current favorites for Cabernet include Long Meadow Ranch and Regusci (besides our own Ladera). Favorite Zins? Lamborn and Outpost. Chardonnay? Smith-Madrone (no others). Sparkling? Mumm's Cuvee Red (with a splash of Syrah). To eat in Napa? I'm a fan of Pilar, Zuzu, and Terra.

Here in Napa, there are a number of licensed shippers that will do it for you (Buffalo, St. Helena Mail Center, Aero, just to name a few). Maybe there is something similar in SLO because you are near the wine industry of PR and SB. The "certification" is not new, but is now being enforced (according to my FedEx rep). It all has to due with the argument currently under consideration by the Supreme Court. This is why the big shipping companies have had to buckle down on the regulations that were already in place but basically being ignored. I was told that (in a nut shell) *someone* shipped a wine to an address. Without the proper certification, a minor was able to sign for the package and this was part of the argument why inter-state shipping should not be allowed. There are a couple of HUGE threads on this issue from uber wine geeks and folks like me who are in the business here and here

A bit further north, been there for 30+ years: Anita's 309 South Coast Highway Oceanside, CA 760-722-6323 I grew up on this place, until I moved into San Diego proper. My Dad still eats there and was the place that my family went to after my Mom's funeral last October as it was her favorite.

Best argument I've heard!

JohnnyD.... we were waiting to hear back how your terrine worked out!!!!

I first bought a Le Creuset tagine and later bought a 'real' clay one. I have never gone back to the Le Creuset and have seriously considered selling it on eBay (in fact, PM me if you are interested in buying it off me!). It is almost a pointless (no pun intended) piece of equipment in my kitchen now. I have made some of the same recipes in both the metal one and the clay one and can attest that the clay tagine works much better. The metal one does not offer the finesse or depth of flavor.

Interesting -- thanks, Derrick. I was speaking with Tom at Fermentations last night about tracking unique visitors and he recommended StatCounter. Are you familiar with that? I haven't had a chance to look into it. BTW, I your anniversary piece was just lovely and I meant to comment on it the day it was posted. I love the angled shot of you and Melissa...

I think the addition of stock really depends on how gelatanous it is -- the trick to using stock is making it horribly jelly-like to act like gelatine; literally a glue. If your stock was thin, the whole thing might end up watery. Also, I might have added a layer of goat cheese, but that just me... Let us know!

When I lived in San Diego, I found it easier to just dash down to TJ or Ensenada. Granted, San Diego Mexican food is TONS better the closer you get to the border. It is odd that there is this sort of distance effect in that the further away one drives, the less authentic it seems. I could get decent enough Mexican food in Los Angeles, but always found it wanting since I got my bearings in San Diego. Now that I am in Northern California, I really can't abide Mexican food as it just "doesn't seem the same." Oddly, hearkening back to the infamous Taco Truck thread, some of the best Mexican even in San Diego was to be had at the Taco Trucks that hung out on the less-frequented beaches. I used to swim near Torrey Pines and if you took the Northern route to Black's Beach, this awesome truck used to be parked there. I also used to enjoy chips and salsa in Old Town but it was the hole-in-the-walls in the not-so-nice districts that really had the killer carnitas! Funny... I just realized I started writing in California-eeeze: "awesome," "killer" eGads - it is 1980 all over again....

Therein lies the crux argument! I truly wish blogging had been around ten years ago when I was cooking all my historic feasts. Who knows where my career would have taken me if all those meals had been documented. But Tana has put her finger on it -- and the importance of a blog is What Will You Say that will make everyone want to read it more than coming here or going to another blog or chat list? Niche is critical. Another thing (which I am still figuring out) is PR -- some bloggers are getting insane press and I readily admit to jealousy on that account. Not too long ago, there were a number of articles written across the country about food bloggers. These articles appeared in the SF Chron, the Wall Street Journal, the Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, and a few others I can't exactly recall. The gist of it is that food blogging is this new, up-and-coming, but all these articles did was reference the same eight or ten food bloggers; some because they've been doing it a long time, others because they are especially good ones to read, and some others which have figured out the PR scheme. There are literally HUNDREDS of food bloggers out there and why these same eight or ten get the press shows the limited resources of investigative reporters (or, the same person re-wrote the article to appear in all these different publications... I dunno). Bottom line? Establish YOUR voice and your niche. What will you do that is different? Mine is wine. Yeah, there's a couple of dozen wine bloggers out there. Most taste wine and give there opinion in some fashion. Many regurgitate and comment upon the breaking wine news in the industry. Like political bloggers, you can visit any one of the sites and read basically the same thing in a different voice on any given day. The niche I have established for myself is simply to attempt to visit every winery in California. I figure at 1,800+ wineries, it will take me four or five years. But I'm patient. I am also, to my knowledge, one of the few WOMEN wine bloggers. That right there has added to my cache. I don't have nearly the readership that Derrick has, but every few days, I DO get e-mails from folks asking for opinions about where to drink/stay/eat in wine country and they are all names I have never heard from before.

I completely agree with Derrick -- it isn't that my blog has gotten me writing assignments, but has certainly made me more accessible (publicly) to editors and organizations to whom I pitch. The fact that I have a public voice is a benefit to those who then peruse clips of my published work and see that I established a voice -- I'm still working on getting that legion of devoted readers though!

I've been blogging (only!) since February and I have picked up a number of new and lucrative writing gigs since. I started for the basic reason that I was told several years ago that if you want to write, the best thing you can do is WRITE EVERY SINGLE DAY. Well, I am pretty bad at doing ANYTHING every single day (I often think about exercising every day or so, but I usually sit down until the thought passes!). Now, by blogging, I am forced to write every day which only hones the skills. It is also a great tool for that latest of PR-isms in becoming a writer; "establishing one's platform." I've been told that years ago it was not necessary for a writer to have a platform but now it is essential. Bottom line - it can't hurt!

Coming to pleasant hill..... Fat Burger!!!!! (Out does Taylor's in quality AND price, as long as it is ordered "on the char"). Can't wait!

The Robert Parker paid site is probably the best resource for that, although it is hardly inclusive. Stephen Tanzer's site is another good place to go for reviews on wine (and usually there is a comment like "best from 2005 to 2020"). While a tad more time consuming, all those sites I provided links for have search functions just like the one here on eG -- you could find out what others consumers of those wines think and their aging potential.

I'm becoming a huge Petite Sirah fan as well -- how coincidental that this very afternoon, I am driving up to Outpost to pick up their latest two offerings; a 2002 Petite Sirah ("Very dark, saturated purple color. A classic style of PS possessing aromas of creosote, lavender, grilled meats, and menthol. The tannins are very pleasant but ripe yielding to notes of graphite, wet stones, black cherry and champhor. Needs cellar time.") and the 2002 "The Other" Petite Sirah ("Massive expression of PS possesses an impenetrable dark red hue bordering on black all the way to the rim. The nose has ripe varietal elements of liquid minerals and blackberry liqueur with the addition of acacia flowers, white pepper and graphite. Black raspberry, pomegranate, and blackberry dominate the palate saturating the finish with a candied fruit character. Sweet chocolate and cocoa come through the wine as the wine evolves in the glass.") BTW, those quoted notes are from their release letter -- I tasted the wines at Rhone Rangers but didn't take adequate notes. I'm just thrilled to be on their mailing list and getting some of the meagre allocation; Two Bottles Each! Both made in disgustingly small quantities of less than a hundred cases each...