Sokol Blosser Wine Blog

Our Grand Poobah and President, Susan (also my mother), has a birthday just once a year. This year, we all decided to surprise Grand Poobah with an Indian luncheon feast from one of her all-time favorite restaurants, India House in Portland. It took quite a bit of coordination to order the perfect selection of food (lucky for us, the Chef at India House happens to know which dishes she loves the most!), get the hot food all the way out to the winery (thanks Lee!), set up the table (thanks Scott, Patty and Jason!), get the organic chocolate cake baked and delivered (thanks Alex & Jennifer), and then finally get our Grand Poobah to the right place at the right time for us to yell surprise! Perhaps the most miraculous part of the whole surprise luncheon was the weather. These photos were taken on November 16th in Oregon - it was sunny and warm enough to sit outside and eat!

By the end of the wonderful meal, we all agreed that Evolution was the perfect match for spicy Indian food. We're not the only ones who think so too! Check out the December issue of Food & Wine to see their recommendation for Evolution as a "Staff Favorite" and "Great Bargain" with a suggested recipe of a classic Indian Punjabi dish: Shrimp with Tangy Tomato Sauce. http://www.sokolblosser.com/aboutus/press_coverage.html

Posted by Alison Sokol Blosser at 02:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Normally during harvest, we have an uncontrollable amount of fruit flies pestering people by flying around; choosing not to land anywhere, but instead, persistently teasing a person until they feel the need to swat at the fly. Sometimes, the fruit fly is so pesky that it instantly disappears underneath a quick hand that squashes it down on the counter. Other times when they are more fortunate, they are able to escape this fatal destiny.

This year, the fruit flies were not too bad until recently. They seem to like it more now in the tasting room for the warmth and the unsuspecting crowd. As days go by, the tasting room staff tries and tries to think of new ways to rid of these annoying creatures. None of us could have imagined a better solution than what happened a couple days ago. When Melissa, our new Assistant Tasting Room Manager, arrived for work, she noticed that a little drop of wine in the bottom of a wine holder was just enough to attract numerous fruit flies. She instantly got some papers to cover up the holder and trapped them inside. “But,� she asked “now I don’t know what to do with them.�

After a full day of watching these flies sip up every last drink of the wine from the holder and possibly even produce more fruit flies, nobody was able to come up with a way to get rid of them. We closed up the tasting room and completely forgot to do something with the flies.

The next morning, a new crew came to work and asked, “Are we breeding fruit flies now?� I looked over and saw them flying around inside with the papers trapping them in. “Oh!� I said. “We forgot to get rid of them yesterday.� Keith, one of our Tasting Room Associates looked at them for a little bit, scratched his head and said, “I’m going to put them in the water.� So, he took them into the sink, rinsed them out with hot water and sent them into what we like to call “A Fruit Fly’s Destiny�.

If this ever happens to you, we also recommend this concoction of ingredients to capture these flying pests.

A little bit of vinegar
A little bit of sweet white wine
A little bit of water
Put it in a glass, add a drop of liquid soap, swirl around until you get some bubbles on top. Leave on the counter where your fruit flies are and they will be stuck to the soap in the glass in the morning!

Posted by Patty Meuchel, Tasting Room Manager at 10:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)