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It’s always fun to talk to winemakers, learn their background, winemaking goals and styles and taste some of their handywork. This week my guest is Skip Coomber from Coomber Family Ranch winery. Skip was in Wichita a couple of months ago hosting a very special dinner at Scotch & Sirloin. I had the pleasure of sitting next to skip and talking wine while enjoying many of his products and the great food at Scotch & Sirloin. Follow Coomber Family Winery on Facebook.
Skip Says:
“In 2009 we started out making small batches of wine for our own enjoyment at Terravant, a fantastic wine-making facility in Buellton, California (a city made famous by the wine movie SIDEWAYS). We have an extremely small production of our Private Reserve wines, which we make in the style that we personally like. We hope that you also like the style of our wines.
“Our Vintner’s Collection wines are created from grapes sourced from multiple vineyards and blended (still all one variety of grape) to create a particular style of wine that has solid body and fruit so that it drinks well with food, but is also not too heavy, so that it drinks well alone. Many restaurants pour our Vintner’s Collection wines as their “by-the-glass” offerings.”
“Coomber Family Ranch wine is about the love we have for wine as well as the love we have for our animals. We have decided to use our wine sales to support animal welfare organizations. So, we donate at least 5% of all revenues generated (not just of profits) to animal welfare organizations.” Learn more about Skip and family here!
In the second half Andrie Krahl, Executive Director of the Kansas DUI Impact Center will join us and we will be telling you about the 2016 “HOPE IN SPRING GALA” This event supports victims of DUI crime and raises impaired driving awareness in Kansas.
The Gala will take place at ABODE Venue on Sunday, June 12th, 2016 from 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM. The price for admission is $100 per ticket or $900 per table seating ten ($77 & $670 Tax deductible respectively). The price includes a three course meal catered by Larkspur followed by a live auction and musical entertainment from Kansas’ own live band, The Source. Learn more and get tickets today!
Good Life Guy’s Wine of the Week:
A couple of fine wines from Skip Coomber and the Coomber Family Ranch winery
Cooking with the Muse offers 150 nutritious international recipes with a plenitude of imaginative poetry about food and ingredients, along with enlightening literary essays, playful culinary and historical notes, and 200 beautiful full-color photographs. Here’s a feast of words and images, with easy-to-follow steps for preparing individual dishes and whole meals.
Doors open at 1 p.m. for the Grand Tasting and Silent Auction. Tickets for the Grand Tasting are $45 (inclusive of convenience fee) and can be purchased at Century II’sWichitaTix box office, by calling (316) 303-8100 or online at ww.wichitatix.com. Tickets entitle participants to a tasting mug, program guide and a key to the world of beers. Also look for non-beer drinks, an array of beer-friendly food, a brew-lover’s Silent Auction with the opportunity to win lots of great prizes, and music. The Silent Auction is a benefit for Prairie Travelers/Andover Augusta Rail Trail Initiative (AARTI.)
From America’s “master griller” (Esquire), a step-by-step guide to cold-smoking, hot-smoking, and smoke-roasting, and a collection of 100 innovative recipes for smoking every kind of food, from starters to desserts.
The Kansas beef industry is vital to the Kansas economy, generating over $9 billion annually. Kansas is home to 6.25 million cattle as of Jan. 1, which is more than twice the human population of 2.9 million. Kansas also ranks third nationally in the value of beef and veal exported, at $787.7 million in 2014. The industry also supports more than 48,400 jobs in Kansas.
March was Women’s History Month and a great opportunity to celebrate all of the women that have helped define American history like Virginia Dare, the first English child born in the New World to colonists in 1587. Legend has it that Virginia Dare lived among the Native Americans and grew into a beautiful young woman trapped in the middle of a fatal love triangle. On the very spot where she died, a grapevine sprouted with its fruit stained red. According to the legend, this is how the white wine of America became red wine. The grapevine is widely believed to be the 400-year old Mother Vine, reportedly the oldest cultivated grapevine in North America which still exists today — a clipping of which will soon be planted in Virginia Dare Winery’s Sonoma County estate vineyard.
In 2006, Walheim was hired as an associate winemaker for Francis Ford Coppola Winery. Under her direction, she and her team are responsible for all Sonoma County wines that the winey produces. As she puts it, “a lot of winemaking is problem solving of some sort, which can be really fun, like working a puzzle.” She thrives on the challenges that each vintage, varietal and appellation present — and looks forward to the tremendously gratifying aspect of bringing each wine to its finest quality potential.
