WineLife365.com is teaming up with GourmetGiftBaskets.com to give away 1 delicious award-winning gourmet gift basket that’s packed with all sorts of tasty goodies!  Designed to satisfy any snacker’s sweet tooth, this gift basket includes raspberry honey mustard pretzel dip, gourmet dipping pretzels, key lime white chocolate chip cookies, almond pecan crunch, peanuts, trail mix, buttered pecan crunch, peanut roll, organic coconut bar and cheese biscuits!

Sound yummy to you?  Wanna play for this basket of goodies? 

Here’s how:
All you have to do to win the Snack Gift Basket – Classic from the nice peeps at GourmetGiftBaskets.com  is make a guess on the total number of wine closures that I’ve got stashed in my WineLife365 “Estimation Station” shown below.  That’s it!

Approximate dimensions of the container: 15 x 11 in. at the opening and 9 in. tall

 
The closest person to guess without going over wins this naughty little snack basket!
 
To Enter:

• The contest starts now and is only open to WineLife365 Facebook Fans and GourmetGiftBaskets.com Facebook Fans.  So, if you want to play, you’ve got to “Like” the pages!
• Place your guess in the Comment area of this post on the WineLife365 Fan Page.  Please limit to 2 guesses.
• This contest will close at 5:59pm ET on Friday, July 9th.  The winner will be announced shortly thereafter.

Good luck and happy guessing!

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They’re fun, edible, and people absolutely love giving and receiving them on all sorts of special occasions.  No, not a Chia Herb Garden, but rather a beautiful gourmet gift basket filled with a mountain of goodies that’ll keep a smile on your face and make you do a happy dance until the last tasty morsel is gone.

I was fortunate enough to have been a recipient of a Ravenswood Red Wine Gift Basket from the nice peeps at GourmetGiftBaskets.com.

Rather than keeping the goodies for myself, I thought it would be more fun to give my little basket of joy to a friend in exchange for her answering a few questions for me.  Besides agreeing to provide her thoughts, she paid it forward and shared the love with some of her friends as well.   Here’s a little Q &A about the Ravenswood Red Wine Gift Basket with Val and company:

After placing an order with GourmetGiftBaskets.com, how soon would you expect to receive the gift basket?  In other words, how long is an acceptable amount of time from the time you place your order to the time it’s sitting on your or the intended recipient’s doorstep? 

2-3 days max. 

Bingo!  The shipment only took 2 days to receive. 

What was your initial opinion of the packaging?   

Pleasant to the eye.  The coloring and decor of the box was very nice.

How well did GourmetGiftBaskets.com pack/protect the contents of the gift basket? 

The additional packing fit nicely with the basket in the box, ensuring that it didn’t move around in transit. 

When you took the gift basket out of the shipping package, was anything noticeably broken or damaged? 

No, everything looked as expected. 

What was your initial reaction of how the gift basket looked?  Were you impressed by its appearance? 

My initial reaction was that I was very impressed that everything fit so nicely in the basket. 

When you took the bow and plastic wrapping off was there anything broken? 

Everything was intact, however it was a little difficult to separate the products from the glue and the decorations.

What kinds of items did the gift basket contain? 

A bottle of wine, smoked cheese, sausage, crackers, wine biscuits and bruschetta. 

Did you like the items that were inside the gift basket? 

I very much enjoyed the items.  I brought it to a girl’s night at a friend’s house and it was perfect for snacking.   

What was your favorite item? 

Unexpectedly, it was the bruschetta, it was “rock star” to say the least!    

Would you send this gift basket to someone that you know? 

Yes. 

What would you expect to pay for this wine gift basket?

$60-65

(Actual price: $69.99) 

On a scale of 1 to 10, how impressed were you by the gift basket?

8 

Thanks so much Val for sharing your thoughts on the Ravenswood Red Wine Gift Basket.  I’m glad everyone enjoyed it!

Stay tuned for details on a chance to win your very own gourmet gift basket from the folks at GourmetGiftBaskets.com.  You can also checkout all of the other delicious gift baskets that GourmetGiftBaskets.com has to offer by visiting their site.

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One of the most helpful wine gadgets that I’ve had the pleasure of using over and over again this past year have been these terrific portion controlled pourers from Drinker.com. 

These little babies are fantastic for conducting any size wine tasting.  Can I tell you how many tastings that I’ve been to where I’ve been poured practically an entire glass of wine?!  Not a bad thing when I like the wine, but otherwise wasteful.  The greatest beneficiaries, though, of this gadget are definitely any commercial businesses that serve wine and spirits that are interested in controlling over-pours in their establishment.

It’s simple:  You just push the pourer into the neck of the bottle, tip the bottle so that the bottom is turned to a 1-2 o’clock position, and pour.  The liquid flows out and stops when it’s reached the right amount based on the pourer size you’ve selected.  Another excellent feature about these super accurate pourers is that they’re also great for drip and spill control.  FYI, I’ve been using the 1 oz. pourers, but there are several different measurement sizes (and colors!) available.

Well, enough of my rambling and on with the show!  Checkout the “Hi-Profit-Pour” in action for yourself:

If you’d like to learn more, please visit Drinker.com.  If you’re interested in purchasing these dandy little pourers, don’t forget to use coupon code D005 to get a 5% discount on orders up to $150 and coupon code D010 to get a 10% discount on all orders over $150.

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The criteria for this particular evening:

1. Bring a bottle of Pinot Noir from anywhere on the planet priced less than $30.
2. After getting “bagged”, our judges were to utilize two scoring methods to give each Pinot Noir a fair shot at finding love in the dark:  The WL365 method and a 25 Point Wine Scorecard to evaluate each wine based on appearance, aroma, body, taste, and finish.
3. We combined the scores of each one to find out who got some love and who got the cold shoulder from the panel.

 Our panel sure looks raring to go!

Our lovely hostess Candice showed off her dazzling cooking skills with several scrumptious Pinot Noir friendly recipes.  A few were from the book titled, “Oregon Bounty Recipes”, and one was an old family recipe of lollipop lamb chops with fresh rosemary, parsley and garlic  that was simply out of this world GOOD!

Lamb Chops:

Oregon Dungeness Crab Cakes:

Baked Foreleg Pears with Proscuitto and Blue Cheese:

And no wine tasting party would complete without a little cheese – we had several fancy–shmancy selections to choose from:  Tomme Aydius (France), Kunik (Nettle Meadow) (US), Fontina Val d’Aosta D.O.C, and Pleasant Ridge Reserve from Dodgeville, Wisconsin.

And to top things off, we had a magnificent mascarpone cheesecake to ensure that our daily dairy requirements would be fully met by the end of the night.  Unfortunately my photographer called it quits by this point in the evening, so I don’t have a picture of the cheesecake.

Now back to the wine!  It’s just you, an empty glass, and 9 brown-bagged Pinot Noirs!  Here were some of the comments:

Brown Bag #1 – Our tasters said: “I liked it. One of my favorites!” “Low.” “Peppery, tannic.” “It’s ok…kind of tarry and smoky tasting.”

Brown Bag #2 – Our tasters said: “More balance of fruit and pepper than Brown Bag #1.” “Stinky Feet.” “Smoky, a bit veg. Crazy stuff, interesting.”

Brown Bag #3 – Our tasters said: “Fresh berry nose. Tart berry taste.  Absolutely no finish.  It’s like drinking stale Kool-Aid.” “Licorice, sweet aroma.” “Did not like at all.  Weak.  No flavors to mention.” “Everyday drinking type of Pinot Noir.”

Brown Bag #4 – Our tasters said: “Black pepper, spices and berries. It’s ok in every way.” “Sugary, sweet aroma.” “Almost watery appearance. No real legs running down the glass.” “Peppery on the finish.  Great wine!”

Brown Bag #5 – Our tasters said: “Burnt tar, very tannic, nice berry flavors, a bit hot on the alcohol.” “Dry.” “Pinkish color, upfront strawberry flavors, low pepper and spice.”

Brown Bag #6 – Our tasters said: “Slight tannin, no fruit flavors”. “Light from start to finish. Flowery strawberry and licorice notes”. “Bright aroma, medium length, dry”.

Brown Bag #7 – Our tasters said: “Good everyday Pinot Noir.  Good Thanksgiving wine.” “My favorite.” “Pretty, nice balance of fruit and spices.” “My 2nd favorite of the bunch.” “I like this wine a lot, good combo of fruit and oak, super long finish.”

Brown Bag #8 – Our tasters said: “Very enjoyable Pinot Noir.”  “Big on the nose, I like it.” “Peppery notes on the nose.” “Peppery, smooth, great with food.” 

Brown Bag #9 – Our tasters said: “Astringent, leggy, brown, tannic, pepper, little fruit.” “Long finish.” “Peppery notes on the nose.” “A bit veg on the nose, brownish tint, very disappointing, bad.” 

Let’s reveal their identities and find out who found love in the dark and who didn’t:

9th Place – Brown Bag #9 – 2005 Cambria Santa Maria Valley Pinot Noir Julia’s Vineyard ($25)

8th Place – Brown Bag #6 – 2008 Willamette Valley Vineyards “Whole Cluster Fermented” Pinot Noir (Received as a sample. $19 SRP)

7th Place – Brown Bag #3 – 2008 Domaine Cornu-Camus Pernand-Vergelesses ($25)  

6th Place – Brown Bag #4 – 2008 Wild Rock Pinot Noir ($17)

5th Place – Brown Bag #2 – 2007 Valdivieso Reserva Pinot Noir ($15.50)

4th Place – Brown Bag #5 – 2007 Willamette Valley Pinot Noir (Received as a sample. $25 SRP)   

3rd Place – Brown Bag #1 – 2007 Orogeny Pinot Noir Green Valley ($25)

2nd Place – Brown Bag #8 – 2008 Fess Parker “Santa Barbara County” Pinot Noir ($23)    

1st Place and the Winner of this tasting was Brown Bag #7 – 2007 Acacia “Carneros” Pinot Noir ($20)

A very special thanks to Candice and Rob Holden for hosting and to all that participated in this blind tasting.  Looking forward to the next one…Cheers!

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“Toys are hereby declared illegal, immoral, unlawful AND anyone found with a toy in his possession will be placed under arrest and thrown in the dungeon.”

Old Burgermeister might not have been such a party pooper had someone given him a cool little wine gadget like the Vinturi Deluxe 7-Piece Wine Aerator Set.

The wine aeration arena is certainly starting to get pretty crowded with all sorts of devices claiming to yield a better tasting glass of wine.  The peeps at Vinturi have some of the most popular wine aerators on the market and a boatload of favorable reviews and testimonials about their products all over the internet.  A little while ago, they were kind enough to send me the Deluxe 7-Piece Wine Aerator Set to try out and review.

Here’s what Vinturi has to say about their aerator:

“Wine needs to breathe to allow it to open up, release its intended aromas, and of course, make it taste better. Vinturi’s patent-pending design speeds up this process by instantly aerating with ease and convenience in the time it takes to pour a glass of wine. Hold the aerator over a glass and pour wine through for instant aeration. It mixes the proper amount of air in the right amount of time.”

The result is supposed to be a “noticeable” and more enjoyable wine experience.

So, is there a noticeable difference in the way a wine tastes when it’s poured through this little contraption, versus being poured straight from the bottle into a glass?  The answer is…yes.  However, I’m not going to sit up here and say that your wine will taste better:  I think this really depends on the wine and the person drinking it.

After multiple “tests” with the Vinturi Aerator, I’ve found that it has a way of smoothing out much of the upfront assertiveness that a given wine might possess.  With these wines, it spreads things out a bit to give you a little more taste in the middle palate and at the backend on the finish.  Most of the people that I’ve shared this device with noticed a difference, and did in fact prefer their wine poured through the Vinturi aerator versus straight from the bottle.  However, I’ll admit that I’ve also had a few people tell me that they preferred the taste of some wines before they used the aerator.  Their reason was that they felt that the aerator smoothed out or softened up the wine too much for their liking, and that they missed the upfront kick that the wine initially displayed.  Overall though, most people, including myself, chose the aerator over the direct pour.

One more thing that I would be remiss to point out about the Vinturi Aerator is that there are a lot of reviews or comments about some dripping from the air holes on each side of the aerator while using it.  If you check out some other reviews at sites like Amazon, the dripping “issue” is mentioned quite a bit.  This is true.  There is a very small amount of wine that will drip out and run down the sides if you don’t follow the manufacturers’ instructions to “Start pouring on the side of the bowl, instead of directly down the center”.  My helpful hint:  I find it’s easier to get the “right pour” (i.e., no drips) by holding the aerator rather than using the stand.  With that said, I will continue to work on my “stand method” because, well…it’s just fun!

All in all, the Vinturi Deluxe 7-Piece Wine Aerator Set is a nifty little wine toy.  Any wine lover in your life will get a big kick out of it and they will undoubtedly conduct countless tests to taste the before and after Vinturi difference.

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