A Most Respectable Silver
Val du Vino PART 1
The 2025 White Dragon Blending Party
My dearest gentle drinkers. If you are like me, you love a good wine event! Over the course of this coming summer I shall let you “ride along with me” over the backroads of our local counties to explore, moving our wine enjoyment out of our abodes and into the countryside–the carriage is optional, my dears!
A lady always starts with good preparation
This past weekend I found myself joining a number of fellow wine lovers at a “Blending Party” for the Val du Vino 2025 White Dragon blend in lovely Murphys. A blending party is exactly what it sounds like: We were given bottles of the blend components–Picpoul Blanc, Roussanne, a white Grenache, Viognier and a surprise Muscat (new for this year). This will be the second vintage of the winery’s White Dragon blend (one of three “Dragon” blends they produce).
Of course, there were instructions from owner/winemaker Mark Hoover as to what he was looking for in this new blend, some restrictions such as no more than 3% muscat, and to keep the Picpoul Blanc as majority shareholder in this conglomeration. Then, as they say, you “have at it”. My dear gentleman companions (because one is not enough, dear drinkers) and I joined three charming ladies to take many tiny sips of wine for 3 hours. If I could give three pieces of insider knowledge should you choose to attend one of these events: 1. Plan ahead with a group of six friends or hope that your tablemates have similar tastes to yours; 2. Some basic math and conversion skills are helpful (not my forte!); and 3. It is very helpful to have someone in the party with a modicum of artistic talent (or this!) for your labels. We were extremely lucky in our tablemates, they met all three of these criteria.
This author’s gentlemen companions hard at work
In the end we made six runs at our blend, each refining and honing our favorite characteristics into our final wine. It is such a tremendous lark, gentle drinkers!
While each “sample blend” is judged by Val du Vino’s Mark Hoover and Assistant Winemakers Michael Stange (Metate Hills) and Ryan Teeter (LaFolia Wines), we were encouraged to bottle and label our own blend to take home. A lovely late lunch was provided by the winery so that some of us gentle drinkers were able to safely navigate away from our blending tables.
And here it is, mon cher amis, the Silver Medal Winner (apparently due to insufficient bribery)...
A lady never says she deserved first. She simply allows the record to show that second place was, in this case, simply a prelude 🍇
Val du Vino’s next Blending Party is for their signature 2024 GSM (the quintessential southern Rhone blend, gentle drinkers!) on Sunday April 12th–call the winery at (209)-728-9911 or online at valduvinowinery.com to book your tickets. Tickets are $60/person and sell out very quickly. It includes wine, food and a bottle of your own creation. You never know who you might find across from you–I already have my tickets…
A votre santé, my dears!
