TAR - bringing theater arts back without busting the bank!

Times are tight and dollars scarce, but that’s no reason to assume the entertainment circuit is faltering as much as the economy. Coinciding with the kick-off of summer, Theater Arts Revival (TAR) is stepping onstage to jumpstart the performing arts scene. How you ask, sarcastically, since the theater scene is dead in these parts, right? Think again my wine swilling peeps. Try TAR's mission on for size: bringing theater and arts programs back to the community without busting the bank and or being bored to tears with tentative shows and the people that attend them. Stand back, catch your foot before you stick it in your mouth. The company’s inaugural show “Pastiche,” is a musical comedy of the absurd. What am I talking about, exactly? If carnivals make you cringe and cackle, these performances will offer a bounty of both, right along with a glimpse into all things good and evil in the wacky world of carnies, and you know how much we here at WineSense love the "wack" factor in all that we choose to promote. But don't take our word for it, the Bohemian voted this stage romp their critic's pick of the week. Here is a taste of what the show will serve up, along with wine, cookies, and a silent auction with many goods up for grabs including sought after garb from Carlos Santana himself. Carnival Pastiche is a second-rate, small time freak show that’s seen better days. A fake Hungarian countess, who may’ve spawned the “cougar” craze sits at the helm of this posse of misfits that includes sideshow attractions, singers, dancers, gypsies, dreamers, and even an Elvis impersonator, none of whom can sing or dance! No, not really, just wanted to make sure you're paying attention. These carnies can croon as good as Sinatra and howl as good as Michael Jackson. When Pastiche’s glossier, alter-ego-of-a-show competitor, Pablo Fanque’s Faire accidentally burns down (foul play anyone?), the fabulous Fanque players (the ones that did NOT get kicked off Dancing With The Stars and America Idol) threaten to replace Pastiche for good. The show is loosely based on characters from the John Lennon song, ‘Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite,' which was written about a real carnival and its performers. So turn off the boob tube, temporarily cork up your wine bottles, and grab your footloose-and-fancy-free alter ego, and prepare to be Razzle Dazzled, as you sing your way through this and other loosely recognizable Broadway show tunes that are sure to make you sizzle and stick to your seat. Performances are set to take off at Calistoga’s Tucker Farm Center at 8PM on Friday and Sat (May 28-29) as well as a 3PM Sunday matinee on May 30th. So go on, shut down your BBQ for a couple hours and get your "wack" on for one night or more. Score some seats now before all the good ones get slurped up!

They came, they went, they CHEER!ed

Frankly, I'm still recovering from all the spellbinding wine, food, and frolic that this month's CHEERS! St. Helena served up. And no, not from too much wine, I'm a professional. I was traveling. Read on for a full wrap-up of the good, bad, ugly, and evil (hint the latter 3 aren't really applicable).Lots of happening things to report. First, CHEERS! was full of frolic just as it was last year, but bigger! Or, as I will now reference the events from this day forward, CHEERS! Full Throttle! Am I dangerously close to sounding over-the-top? Great, I’m doing my job. Random bits of goodness that was uncorked. Gaggles of informal street music performing up and down Main St., in addition to the 3 headlining bands. Thank you CHEERS! for helping the town to rise to this acoustic occasion. We quite literally rocked from blues, to classical, and classics. Well done! Miner (who I lavished on about at the end of last year) poured what I like to call their "pink lady" wine, otherwise known as the Mendocino Rosado. The perfect "lady's lunching/bridal shower wine." Light, fruity, frilly. You feel fancy drinking it. I can't thank you enough Schramsberg, you can "blanc de blancs" me anytime you please. Don't just sit there! Play your seat, won't you? - Chris Vorland, took me up on the offer as he banged bongos and his wood crated seat (is this really a drum disguised as a milk crate?) while strumming a guitar, as he sat tucked in a corner of the always posh Martin Gallery. Between the music, swank decor, and the Orin Swift Prisoners wine that was flowing freely I was hard pressed to find a reason to escape that spot. But more adventures awaited. Varozza Vineyard's Petite Syrah, I hesitate to even get myself started on this wine, as I may never stop yammering on about it. Brevity is the new pink, so here I go: sturdy, zippy, cherry-berry delightful. This wine sings like a Sinatra song. Quintessa's 06 Faust Cab. Rich, robust, rockin. Speaking of rocking (an unexpected new theme for my posting) as I wind down my rantings for the moment. The Odd Fellows' after party bash showed us that St. Helena is not a sleepy wine town after all. When we put our minds to it we can host a shindig when we want to. I'm not sure how they got CRV (CA Rasta Vibes) to play all night long, but thank god they did, they rocked like only a big city band could. Rumor has it that the Odd Fellows might make this post-party thing a stable of the First Friday scene. So CHEERS! to all that showed up, slurped, poured, and opened up shop for one of the highlights of the season. Missed this months rendition? Get yourself together, you have one month to prepare for the next First Friday CHEERS! social. Until then keep your wacky ways about you.

Hop Aboard the Good Times Express – CHEERS!

Time is short and money tight, what better reason to celebrate! Leave the economic woes behind and enjoy where you are – smack dab in the middle of another season of sun, fun, and frolic. The bears have left their winter caves with the promise of a bright and bountiful spring and summer season – exactly what CHEERS! aims to deliver, if you’ll let them. I’ll be concise since there is lots to do before the good time express gets rolling at 6PM tonight, in and around the main drag of the town of St. Helena! Join the Wacky WineSense community as we hit the streets to enjoy wine from gaggles of your favorite local and generous vintners, stroll and shop until you drop, boggie and bop to local bands, learn to juggle and decide to believe in magic for just one night (magicians will be on hand to help you ‘get’ the trick). New in town? Make some friends. Townie local? Outstretch your social wings and introduce yourself to someone new. So sip, mingle, jingle, and jazz. Most of all, toast the town and the onset of another season and reason to CHEER! If your still swinging when CHEERS! rolls up their reindeer games at 9PM, hit the Odd Fellows POST-PARTYto extend your very good time.

Some ODD FELLOWs Keep the Good CHEERS! Flowing with a Post-Party!

For the short attention spanners of the community – CHEERS! after-party this Friday. Read on to learn more! If you live in the Up Valley or threaten to keep up on it’s antics you should be aware that this Friday (May 7) marks the onset of another CHEERS! season of slip, slurp’in, and slid’in good times. If none of this sounds familiar it’s time to step out from under the rock you’ve been sleeping under in your fruitless attempt to ward off the wet season. More on the actual CHEERS! shindig later this week. For now, let’s cut to the “after” party high-jinx. If you’re like me, CHEERS! is so much of a good thing it leaves you yearning for more. Why should a good time have to end at 9PM when most tweens are allowed to stay up well past nine, shouldn’t we, as residents and visitors to St. Helena be allowed to stay up too? Hell Yes!

For those of you that are with me on these sentiments, the good fella’s of the St. Helena chapter of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows are answering our call by keeping the good times rolling this Friday. The after-party kicks up its boots at 9PM, exactly when CHEERS! is rolling up its wine soaked carpet. Here is what ten of your hard or easy earned beans will buy ya:

1. Entrance to the hippest (my words not theirs, they're far too humble to boast) post-party in town (located in the exclusive and often times elusive Odd Fellows Lodge @ 1352 Main Street - entrance between I.Wolk and Martin galleries)
2. Live Music provided by CRV = boogieing and bopping until you drop
3. Fresh Mex plates from Villa Coronoa, beer, and more wine (all available for purchase)
4. Be a part of random acts of kindness - a portion of the proceeds from the event will go back to local communities in need
5. You’ll finally receive answers to your burning questions about what “gentleman’s” clubs like the Odd Fellows are really up to during their secretive meetings.

It’s a tell-all kind of night! So yell and tell everyone you know.

Vercelli – St. Helena’s Savory Sidekick

Hailing from Manhattan where casual, affordable (yes, you heard me!) Italian food haunts are as plentiful as subway rats, you can imagine how shocked I was to find no such establishments (Italian, not rat-filled) in the Up Valley. When I would ask friends, foes and anybody that would listen, where such places were hidden I typically got back blank-faced stares in return. Or, I would be given a rundown of places that serve good homemade pasta (Cook!), and while I certainly love such places, I wanted a truly all-Italian experience – red checkered table cloths, Chiantis, and all! When left to my own devices I finally stumbled into Vercelli Ristorante Cafe on St. Helena’s main strip. I had lowered my expectations considerably since I hadn’t heard much about this joint, though I had walked by it countless times, rubbernecking on the outside looking in, and sometimes lingering around the outdoor cafe. The few tiny tables squished on the sidewalk had Manhattan written all over it. It was then that I decided to give it a taste-test drive. Outdoor, streetside dining is arguably the best way to eat and imbibe in the warm weather months. The ambience at Vercelli was everything I’d come to expect from my east coast dining counterparts. Inside, very cozy, Sinatra and his Rat Pack buzzing in the background, an Italian maitre d buzzing about, and the sweet scent of garlic overtaking the airwaves in the best possible way. The outside section of the restaurant is the closest I’ve come to experiencing true alfresco dining in these parts. If you don’t know what that means, now is your chance to live and learn. Because everything from the service (very friendly, attentive, lacking of all pretense) to the ambience was winning rave reviews, my cynical side expected the food to fall short. Note to self: the times they are changing baby! After a ravishingly good meal I decided to kick my cynicism to the curb, for good maybe. I fell in love, mad, fleeting, food love with the pillow pasta (gnocchi) in gorgonzola cream sauce. As a fellow Italian with a granny that made pitch perfect gnocchi, she also schooled me in all the ways that this type of pasta is done horribly wrong. I did my part over the years by tasting one too many of these “soggy” carb blobs posing as pasta, the type that give pillow pasta a bad name. I can honestly say that my dearly departed granny would give her stamp of approval on Vercelli’s version. They’ve perfected the perfect pillow in consistency, taste, and well, what else is there? The Cesar salad was also a winner. I was weeping by this point so it’s hard to pinpoint what made it so special other than the obvious, superb dressing, gaggles of fresh grated cheese and homemade gigantic croutons. Unfortunately I've started salivating and am at risk for destroying my already aging keyboard, so enough said. If you’ve been craving the perfect pasta in a low-key, casual, and arms wide open setting, do yourself a favor and drop in for some alfresco dining. If you’re lucky Juana will be your server, and serve she will, with a broad smile, all night long until she rolls you out the door in a food coma. Wacky WineSense Rating: 4.7 Grapes!

A “Swift” Kick You’ll Be Glad to Get

It’s possible that you may tire of my cutesy plays on words, but I'm betting you’ll never tire of the wine behind my latest dalliance. Orwin Swift wines, one of them aptly named “Prisoner” are worthy of a jail break to score this juice. Lucky for you such drastic measures aren’t necessary unless that’s the only way you get your kicks. With one sip you’re led down a path packed with a bounty of cherries and berries that guarantees nothing short of a big fruit finish that lingers long after you’ve slurped your goblet bone dry. There’s something in this red wine beaut for just about everyone with an unbalanced blend of Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Petite Sirah, Charbono, and a scant trace of Grenache. What does this mean to you the able-bodied wino? You’ve got nothing to whine about because this stuff will tickle your palate senseless. The Papillon Red, another delight, is a mingling of Cab, Cab Franc, Petite Verdot and Malbec. I can’t be certain what you’ll experience when you suck down this wine, but for me, each sip made me feel like I was lying in bed smashed pleasantly between a mixed berry pie mattress and a comforter that smelled like the after affects of a night spent around a smoky, toasty campfire. I could lie nestled in this wine wonderland for days. Wacky WineSense Rating: 4.75 Grapes!

Wine and Art Do the Dance at Eric Kent Cellars

Some days (usually those dastardly rainy ones that I thought I escaped when I moved from the Big Apple) I feel like wine has lost its luster. One wine after another, one vine blurring into the next. And sure, it is the wine country, so what did I expect in moving here? Quite frankly-to be WOWED! Continuously. Luckily, rain or shine, there are still spellbinders out there begging to keep my WOW ways alive. Gray weather blues were cured, with just one sip of Eric Kent wine. He was an ad man back in the day, much like myself and that delish Don Drapper on Mad Men, but he, like me had the good sense to leave advertising behind for a far sexier and satisfying sport – winemaking! (I just drink it, he makes it). Not wanting to leave creativity trailing in the dust, him and his other half Coleen have gone on to make it their mission to display works of art on each and every bottle of the wine. So not only was I knocked out of my wine swilling socks because of the grape stuff, but also because of the arty labels swathed across each bottle (each vintage featuring a different artist). Every tasting I go to there are stand outs and fall short-ers. In the case of Kent’s wine, no such bad luck. Every drop I downed was just as dandy as the next. I even, shock to my own horror, liked their Russian River 2008 pinot. If you follow my ramblings regularly you understand the magnitude of me asking for seconds of this wine. It was light, zippy, spicy and flavorful. The 08 Chardonnay was equally alluring with its delectable and decadent pineapple tendencies. Just when I thought I could be wowed no more, I was. Kalen's Big Boy Blend Syrah was just that, a big, beefy mouthful of a wine. Or so I thought until I tasted my favorite of the night, the 2008 Dry Stack Syrah. Everything I dream about in a wine became my reality with this one. Juicy, deep on flavor and finish, sturdy and reliably delicious, sip after sip. Ok one more S, it was downright succulent. Made me want to dance all night long and I don’t even like to boogie unless I am forced to at a bachelorette party. I have sung one too many songs by now on these wines and the art that adorns them, so hip hop your way to the web, and taste for yourself. You too will be busting some moves soon enough. Wacky WineSense Rating: 4.8 Grapes