Last week, I attended the 9th annual Dark & Delicious Petite Sirah™ wine and food event held at Rock Wall Wine Company in Alameda. The event is put on each year by P.S. I Love You, an association of Petite Sirah growers, producers and winemakers.
There were about 50 wineries pouring. My guess would be there were over 100 wines available for tasting.
As always, at a large event such as this, I focus on tasting a combination of tasting the latest releases from some of my favorite producers and seeking out new to me producers.
I tasted 55 wines, including about half of the new to the event for 2015 wineries.
My top 15 favorite wines (in alphabetical order) were:
- 2012 Carol Shelton Wines Petite Sirah Florence Vineyard
- 2012 Dashe Cellars Petite Sirah Louvau Vineyard
- 2012 David Fulton Petite Sirah
- 2011 Denier-Handal Petite Sirah
- 2010 Gustafson Family Vineyards Petite Sirah
- 2012 Harney Lane Petite Sirah
- 2012 Klinker Brick Petite Sirah
- 2009 Mineral Wines Petite Sirah
- 2009 Neal Family Vineyards Petite Sirah Rutherford Dust
- 2010 Overland Wine Company Petite Sirah Kick Ranch
- 2012 Overland Wine Company Petite Sirah Kick Ranch
- 2012 Ridge Petite Sirah Lytton Estate
- 2009 Ridge Petite Sirah Dynamite Hill York Creek Vineyards
- 2012 Robert Biale Petite Sirah Thomann Station
- 1999 Teldeschi Petite Sirah
I also keep an eye out for wines that over deliver in terms of quality for the price. For value (under $20) check out:
- 2012 Parducci Petite Sirah Small Lot – $14
- 2012 Michael-David Vineyards Petite Petit – $18
Conclusion:
This was our fifth consecutive year attending Dark & Delicious. It’s one of our favorites events because it offers a great combination of Petite Sirah, a wine we love, and food.
In terms of the wine, this was the best year ever in my book. There were a couple of new to me wineries that were among my favorites, including Mineral and Overland. Add to the newbies perennial favorites like Carol Shelton and Dashe Cellars (which where new to Dark and Delicious for 2015) along with perennial favorites David Fulton, Robert Biale and Ridge Vineyards, and you got a winning combination!
Food-wise, the highlight of the event for me was Chef Tyler Stone’s Petite Sirah Ice Cream made from one of the Concannon Petite Sirah. I must confess I was disappointed with the number of food partners. There weren’t as many as there have been in prior years.
Nevertheless, we had a wonderful time tasting some of the best dark and delicious Petite Sirah California has to offer!
Related posts you might enjoy!
- Recap of Dark & Delicious 2013 The Petite Sirah Event of the Year
- Recap of 6th Annual Dark and Delicious – The Petite Sirah Event of the Year
- Petite Sirah Smackdown; Round 1 – 12 Petite Sirahs Blind-tasted
- Petite Sirah Smackdown; Round 2 – 8 Petite Sirahs Blind-tasted
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Martin Redmond is a Financial Executive by day, and a certified wine geek with latent foodie tendencies the rest of the time. In addition to the wine lifestyle and food he enjoys family, fitness and traveling. He likes to get thoughts of wine off his mind by sharing experiences on his ENOFYLZ Wine blog, which features wine reviews, wine country travel, and wine and food pairings.
Follow me on Twitter @martindredmond for all things wine, and since I’m a wino, with latent foodie tendencies, you’ll also find food and wine pairings, and food related stuff! Become a fan and join ENOFYLZ Wine Blog on Facebook. Cheers! This article is original to ENOFYLZ Wine Blog.com. Copyright 2015 ENOFYLZ Wine Blog. All rights reserved.
Thanks for another great review, Martin. I’m delighted you were with us, and you’re my guest any time, anywhere. Please remember that.
Regarding what you wrote above, so you’ll understand, “I must confess I was disappointed with the number of food partners. There weren’t as many as there have been in prior years.” …
In past years, the Alameda County Environmental Health Department wanted to be notified of our event. This year, it became a major issue, beginning on Tuesday of D&D week. As I was given their county “hoops” to jump through, which involved our food partners, these great people just didn’t have the time it would take to give the county all that it needed to be in compliance. I was also told that it was going to cost $3,000, adding up this, that, and the next thing.. “A hit of $3,000 is going to put us out of business,” I told them, but we had to march forward, regardless.
By Friday… day of event… we had lost six food partners, based on everything the county needed. It was devastating to the event (and to me personally), because having food with wine is D&D’s hallmark. I’m still reeling from it. I wrote about it on Sunday, to get it out of me… It was like being possessed. Still, it’s a sting that will go down in history as one of my biggest disappointments. It’s hard to recover from such failure. Yes, the show did go on, but I was heartsick through the entire event, after the week I had been through… One where I should have been finalizing details; instead I was complying with the government. We did in four days… right up to 5:59 p.m., what would take me 30 days, if I had been in the loop. My own blog about this one is titled “The food safety license was issued at 5:59 p.m.”
Here’s the link, for anyone curious for more details: http://www.wine-blog.org/index.php/2015/02/22/food-safety-license/
I’m not sure if D&D can continue, with an unexpected $3,000 bill, to continue as planned into each year’s budget. We barely scrape by with all that it takes to produce such an event. Yeah, all that and less food? Hum…
One of their rules: It’s $150/hour to host an event… Caveat? It’s a “10 hour minimum,” which equals $1,500… just to begin. PS I Love You is a non-profit, existing on a budget of $70,000/year. Imagine what that extra $3,000 this year has done.
It’s a very tough lesson, but I also understand that the Alameda government has to function. I’m not sure we can afford their city is the real dilemma.